The difference between AVR and auction scanners is that AVR allowed people who don't know how to raid to raid; Auctioneer and such only allow people who know how to play the AH do it better. If you want a real comparative raiding tool, Auctioneer is like Boss Mods - telling you that you are standing in fire with an audible alert but not showing you where to move or what button to push to do so.

You mistake a record keeping tool for an active manipulation process, I assume because you do not really know how auction scanning works. If I am tracking item price over time, I am doing nothing more than reporting (to myself) the activity which is going on around me. If I then compare that activity to what is available for sale, and decide to buy low and sell high, that is exactly what happens in every financial market (or market of any other kind). Should your grocery store not sell apples at a price higher than what they paid for them? Do you think they do not go out and find the cheapest supplier for those apples to maximize their profit? How is this different than playing the Auction House market?

I would argue that Blizzard specifically created the Auction House to allow this sort of commercialism in the World of Warcraft, and abetted the creation of AH scanners to make it a more vital element to the game. Far from not being an intended element of the game, the whole thing is exactly what they intended. It gives many people (myself included) much more interesting things to do than run around farming herbs or whatever. And when you need something and go to the Auction House to buy it, you should realize that it is more than likely that the reason why it is available to purchase is because some people manage and maintain each faction's market, and the whole community benefits.

Just like raiding and PvP, if you don't like this part of the game, don't play it. But don't come on to the AH column and try and trash it. You just look silly and uninformed.

And my pro tip for this week: Auctioneer's recommendations are frequently not right, so that thing about how it does all the work for you . . . good luck with that.