You know, they were actually rare for a long time, and a good deal of trading sites (gmailswap.com) and ebay auctions arose from that, so you can't completely fault the guy.
I received mine at the very beginning of beta from a friend who works for google, and for a long time, i only had 2 to give out.
Of course, that was over a year ago, so at the very least the OP has to check his calendar.