California Attorney General Rob Bonta last night filed a request for a preliminary injunction in California’s existing case against Amazon for price fixing. Attorney General Bonta’s 2022 lawsuit alleged that the company stifled competition and caused increased prices across California through its anticompetitive policies in order to avoid competing on price with other retailers. New evidence paints a clearer and more shocking picture. The motion for a preliminary injunction comes after a robust discovery process where California uncovered evidence of countless interactions in which Amazon, vendors, and Amazon’s competitors agree to increase and fix the prices of products on other retail websites to bolster Amazon’s profits. Time and again, across years and product categories, Amazon has reached out to its vendors and instructed them to increase retail prices on competitors’ websites, threatening dire consequences if vendors do not comply. Vendors, bullied by Amazon’s overwhelming bargaining leverage and fearing punishment, comply — agreeing to raise prices on competitors’ websites (often with the awareness and cooperation of the competing retailer), or to remove products from competing websites altogether. Amazon’s goal is to insulate itself from price competition by preventing lower retail prices in the market at the expense of American consumers who are already struggling with a crisis of affordability.
BREAKING NEWS!!
Evil company known for being evil is caught doing evil things!
👏🏻 We 👏🏻 demand 👏🏻 public 👏🏻 executions 👏🏻
There was a time when Amazon was not full of scummy rip-off products, when it was not playing games with prices, when it was not a cloud-computing powerhouse, and you know what happened?
That’s right, they crushed their adversaries (retail shopping) and earned billions in profits. They won.
But somehow that’s not enough winning, there isn’t enough winning until all the value has been vacuumed up from the world.
Bezos explicitly undercut the competition for years to drive all of the competition out of business. Amazon took as much time from 1997-2016 to make as much profit as they did in 2017, which is also (not) coincidentally when they hit peak market saturation and were able to start raising their prices.
So what you’re talking about was real, but it wasn’t like, “back when Amazon was good”, they were just preparing for what they are now. Having a huge monopoly on just about everything has always been their win condition, and they’re no where near done winning.
Yeah. It’s the same thing Uber did with pushing cab services out of business.
Not only that, but AWS is the real money maker for them. Not that retail and gaming and prime and whatever don’t also make boat loads of cash, but it doesn’t even graze AWS. The scale of these data centers is unreal and most of the internet runs on AWS.
I’m an industrial electrician with background on what they’re ordering and installing in terms of control panels and if you saw the weekly shipments it’d make you sick. And we’re only one supplier, they have others.
I think it’s worse because Bezos (ex-wallstreet) had his buddies at Bain Capital short-and-distort competing companies into bankruptcy, which has the added bonus of clearing the tax burden from the gains on those shorts.
And that is why I no longer buy anything from them. I’m just embarrassed it took me as long as it did to realize what they were really doing.
The frustrating thing is we can’t boycott AWS since so many of the sites we use run on it. But yes, we absolutely shouldn’t buy things through Amazon or any of the other web stores Amazon owns.
we absolutely shouldn’t buy things through Amazon or any of the other web stores Amazon owns.
I try to use eBay as an alternative, though i find every 3-4 orders i place there, i get one in an Amazon box that by all rights appears to have been shipped by Amazon. I swear people are drop-shipping stuff from Amazon to their eBay buyers.
They are. If it has free returns and thousands of feedback it’s probably a drop shipper. Return it and use the eBay label it ends up costing them money.
Go figure the margins are that thin.
They are doing exactly that for a sometimes hefty markup. I got something like that with a gift receipt, so ultra lazy, looked up the item and it was $11 cheaper. Like that totally defeats the purpose of going elsewhere.
I reported the seller then returned it.
I have often wondered whether targeted internet boycott days would shake up AWS, but I don’t know enough about their billing structure to run the numbers to see how much that would dig into AWS profits + how much of their income is flat subscription fees vs. billing on number of calls and haven’t had a chance to dig into it yet.
You would basically have to convince a few hundred million people to not use the internet for months at a time with out a single percentage of them breaking the boycott to actually even start to hit aws.
Countless things have to start failing before aws even starts to feel it since it’s not a consumer product. You basically have the drive all the companies using it to near bankruptcy so they can’t afford to pay for aws anymore.
Frustrating, but I appreciate your answer; thank you.
Use vercel instead
/s
AKA the Walmart method.
Walmart didn’t even touch amazon on this. There were articles for years about how mind boggling (and the articles were praising, not even critical of) it was that amazon’s investors were content to let bezos run amazon on a net zero or even negative profit model. I don’t think I’ve ever heard of walmart not pulling a profit.
You can’t really compare online book retailer Amazon to global online marketplace Amazon. Your underlying point is still mostly correct, but I would exclude the years that they were primarily focused on books. From my lived memory they didn’t really become the online retail juggernaut until a few years after the launch of Prime. Free shipping turned them into what it is today. So maybe the best comparison would be from like 2006-2016? Or maybe I’m wrong and the distinction isn’t necessary. Idk. I’m just trying to foster conversation
Yeah, I remember Amazon the book store. I still had my mom take me to the local bookstores, cause I knew them and the people, so I was comfortable lol. I remember when Prime launched. I don’t think anyone was expecting that, at the time. Free 2-day shipping on so many products was insane. And all for $89?/yr? Especially, when everywhere else online charged anywhere from $5-10. It was truly the Walmart of the online world. They ate shipping costs, which killed them, and put hurt their competition until AWS became such a powerhouse and they had a monopoly on online marketplaces.
That’s what’s crazy to me, they survived the dot com crash and were so diversified that I have no idea how they stayed afloat. I would think that all of the combined expenses across all of their ventures without a true cash cow would sink them. Instead they survived and became the trash heap of consumer rights violations that they are.
The reason Amazon survived is because they WEREN’T running a dozen different ventures. They were an online bookstore and people kept buying books. Amazon benefited from the crash because that was when they started buying up servers to build AWS. Prime was just free 2 day shipping on books when it launched.
Ehhh not really. They operated at massive losses for a decade or more to eliminate the competition while growing their customer base. This is simply stage 1 of enshittification. You can only do this if you’re unbelievably filthy fucking rich. Then at some point they needed to cash out on all the good will and reputation they developed and that brings us to the shithole economy of today where people are simply too lazy to shop anywhere else.
The other commenters here are right about Amazon’s initial methods, but I’m also going to highly recommend Cory Doctorow’s Enshittification for a detailed explanation of how this happens (including a breakdown on Amazon specifically) and what to do about it.
To quote a favorite singer of mine,
You could fill a man with gold, and still have room for greed.
It’s easy to crush the competition when you purposely take a loss as an investment in future market share.
Nothing will change until there’s jail time for executives.
oh I just cant wait for the highest profile minor slap on the wrist of the century!
Yeah don’t worry. They’ll get a small fine and will appeal and drag it out for years
I could see them threatening something absurd like no longer shipping to California.
Dont worry guys well give one of the richest men in the world a 100k fine!
They’re BUSTED when someone goes to prison.
For now they’re just SLAMMED
Just wait until they get BLASTED in a strongly worded email.
Well, it’s California’s attorney general, so better than even chance for actual punishment.
“Europeans need to be harder on Amazon” Wags greased finger
New evidence shows Amazon, its vendors, and competing retailers are price fixing, hiking up prices for consumer products and making Amazon richer and richer
So, jail time it is for Jeff Bezos, right?
Bezos was a hedge fund manager. This should surprise nobody.
Bezos was a Senior VP by the age of 30, working for D.E. Shaw, and was a rumored heir for taking over the business after he retires. Bezos would have made billions and managed a major hedge fund. Set for life.
But that was not enough for him, he wanted to hoard hundreds of billions of wealth instead, so here we are. How perfectly healthy and in no way a mental illness.
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I think it was pretty obviously sarcasm
It was not. Poe’s Law.
They’re a complete stranger, and there are actual people who unironically say stuff like that, even on the Fediverse.
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It’s pretty obviously a troll account.
Poe’s law strikes again
When you’re not sure check their overview. That one was obviously sarcasm.
Yourself though, you’re angry and reactionary so it tracks.
Their post history reveals them to be kind of a jerk. If it was an attempt at sarcasm it was a poor one.
yall are exhausting. Hate it or don’t but move on. Nobody wants to check post history
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But but but capitalism, free market, competition, etc. etc. etc …
If America was a serious country they would break up Amazon for this AND arrest Bezos and send him to a random Supermax for corporate blackmail, mass fraud, and unfair competition. But I fear they never were.
America was bought by the corpos a long time ago.
One could argue it’s always been about the wealthy.
it has always been about cheap labor that’s for sure, the united stated was built by slaves, that’s why they love dubai so much
The Guantanamo Bay detention camp is a stain on America and a threat to all of us now.
I’m being hyperbolic, but I do think every CEO of every company in America worth hundreds of billions should be arrested, have their companies broken up, and said CEOs sent to Supermax prisons for mass fraud.
A nitpick, but America won’t have Gitmo in that scenario tho. Displacing american people to random countries now is deeply rooted in the premise it’s okay to have a torture camp franchized over to places out of everyone’s sight. It wasn’t okay before and it’s not now, and serious country with some sense and a accountability would not employ such tactic.
If you did want to nitpick Bezos hasn’t run Amazon since 2021, so we’d have to check when they were being accused of doing so.
5 years on and most of us think Bezos everytime we hear Amazon still
I mean, how can we be so sure Bezos doesn’t still have influence over Amazon? He sure owns a lot of stocks in it for obvious reasons. He’s bought the Washington Post to spread propaganda. He’s set up Blue Origin to get government contracts. I’ve no reason to believe that he’s not apart of the Amazon problem and their influence over American Markets.
Something about one big club.
He certainly has an influence - he’s still the chairman of the board. He gets to decide who gets fired and when. In some ways, he found a way to have more influence, while being less hands-on.
I cannot express enough how angry I am that people still use amazon. Major cringe when friends tell me all the shit they buy on there. I used it 10 years ago a couple times, never once since then. Its shit, slave labor, and enriches billionaires. No one forces you to use it.
Unfortunately, they are a master at driving local businesses out of money. Buying a certain pet food at my local retailer (a franchisee) would be about $30. On Amazon, it’s $25 (and sometimes even $15-20, if you do the subscription discount). At the local store, I’d have to pay more and drag the stuff home on my own feet.
It’s the Walmart model. A lot of the frustration is that it’s a systemic problem where individuals are incentivized against their best interests and the best interests of their communities.
Because shareholders. The Line, must go up.
Thankfully (/s) Amazon has enough money that it’s cheaper to bribe politicians than provide a better product. So systemic solutions are that much more difficult.
I avoid Amazon as much as possible, though on occasion I’ve more or less had no other reasonable choice. But that’s happened something like 4 times in the last 10 years or so.
The big problem with boycotting Amazon is that while it’s easy enough to avoid buying from their online store as much as possible, AWS (Amazon Web Services) is pretty much unavoidable if you’re using the modern internet.
True, but its a start! We win not by everything at once. Small steps.
It’s cringe because it’s affordable and convenient? Whenever I buy something from there I always price compare online and it’s the cheapest hands-down. Some people don’t have the luxury of constantly considering geopolitics and large-scale repercussions when they’re just simply trying to get by.
It super depends on what you’re buying. Personally, I just go without in order to avoid them. The only things I ever buy from Amazon are things I cannot find anywhere else that I need to have, such as water filters for the lead pipes in Montréal.
We don’t have the luxury to ignore how bad Amazon is. Amazon is aware of this and does everything it can to force you to buy from them by under cutting other businesses until competition dries up. Every time I can buy something for a little bit more and skip Amazon that’s a huge a win for everyone from the original supplier, the more local store selling it, and the working class in general.
Edit: Reading and writing more comments, I’m gunna find a way to get those filters from elsewhere even if they cost a bunch more.
No bro water filters from Amazon are unethical, please expose yourself to lead because some guy on lemmy is virtue signaling /s
I cannot tell what side of the argument you’re trying to be on here, gunna be real hokest with ya.
I mean what I said. I also buy water filters from Amazon because I suck water straight from the ground. Some times the water is yellow and needs to be filtered.
I think personal safety is more important than virtue signaling. You should have used your political power to regulate it before it became a critical service in communities. I hate Amazon, yet I am dependent on it. I come from the side of nuance. You want to handle Amazon you monopoly bust it. Boycotting won’t help.
Sure, but there’s many people who are wealthy enough to make the choice and still use amazon because they dont know any better. And this is what happens.
Understandable, perhaps one day I’ll be in that boat myself. Amazon has pissed me off in a few ways and I’m definitely looking for alternatives. Regardless of where I shop, I feel like my money is still going into the same greedy pockets unless it’s a local brick and mortar store.
Its true, but perfect is the enemy of good. If 10,000 people quit using amazon right now, that’s a huge difference. And millions of people use it.
“some people don’t have the luxury of considering whether their product is made from death camp body parts when they’re just simply trying to get by”
Jesus H Fucking Christ. How about electing a government that will regulate Amazon instead of comparing poor people who need consumer goods to nazis. This is some tankie ass behavior
You missed the point completely, so I’ll lay it out for you: Everyone has to draw a line SOMEWHERE. And when a country whose government sends fascist death squads into the streets is supported by a company, there’s a fuckton of lines to be drawn.
There’s ZERO excuse for doing business with amazon. No one is starving because they can’t shop there. So GTFO with your lazy ass morally corrupt exuses.
Great reason to business with Amazon. Armor plates and carrier. Gun mods. These are real expressions of political will. Enjoy your boycott. Glad you’re privileged enough to have money and options on places to purchase consumer goods. Super happy for you. Very righteous.
Now that we have a dictator I find it hilarious you’re trying to do the steps from before we have a dictator. It’s too late for boycotts and protests and voting. You missed your chance for that 10 years ago. Amazon’s got cheap body armor.
Sorry bub I’ve got plants to feed. Don’t worry my neighbor is going to genocide us no matter where we buy water filters from.
Yeah, these people saying they NEED amazon probably didn’t live in ye olden days without internet. We survived then, you can survive now.
There’s thousands if not millions of sellers all over the internet. People are lazy/dumb and just want to 1 click buy and are scared to go anywhere but amazon.
And then have the nerve to argue on behalf of “poor people” most of whom probably don’t have any spare money to buy convenience products on amazon.
I mean Walmart wiped out every other store so that’s usually where “poor” people have to go, especially in small towns. Amazon is doing it on a much larger scale.
Once all the competitors are gone, they will increase the prices to absurd, heartless levels
Its always the plan. Walmart. Discord. They all do the exact same thing. Which is why we must resist.
Feel free to provide goods to my rural community any time! You can’t believe that poor people have budget consideration and seek the cheapest product?
Use eBay or literally any other site. What is so specific to amazon that you need ? Amazon isn’t even cheaper in many cases if you actually search.
eBay’s just as fucking bad? They monopolized your post office pricing and fix prices on their market place, they manipulate visibility and charge more for promotions. It’s the same scam with a different name lmao
Well, if you wanna say that, all stores are bad, capitalism is evil, stop buying things and go live in a cave 😁
There is not one store out there that’s not evil, because capitalism relies on exploiting the poor and weak and less intelligent. That’s how it is. Unless you go live off grid in Alaska but guess what you’ll still have to import products made with slave labor.
Again, Lemmy being angry because we aren’t perfect. Using eBay or a small store instead of amazon is astronomically better than buying your funko pop collection on amazon.
Amazon is cheaper than eBay on every item I’ve looked at in the last 6 months. eBay has robbed me a few times in the last 6 months. What a wild ass suggestion.
Huh, bad luck. I’ve been using eBay for 20 years with maybe 2 issues and they’ve always been resolved.
Yeah, IIRC when a bunch of large corporations got away with doing this in the 1980s and 90s, a lot of us just assumed it would keep happening. Some people have tried raising the alarm about this, but have been shouted down pretty consistently.
As far as distractions from the Epstein Files go, this is an exciting one.
Can’t wait for them to be fined one penny for every $20B made.
Hey now, don’t get your hopes up.
…did bezos get mixed up the honeypot?..
Holy shit guys! S-so, if you have a monopoly, it’s like, you can do whatever the fuck you want? So it’s like in THE FUCKING GAME OF MONOPOLY? Jee, we are learning something new every day
In the game, you have to improve your properties to charge more rent. In reality, the monopoly can reduce quality and raise price at the same time.
You dont really improve it, just added more units. Its about volume, not quality.
Which is also a pretty good tactic in Monopoly: try to buy as many houses as possible, but do not upgrade to hotels - exhaust the housing market- that way the other players cannot upgrade either
Wait, is Jee how the kids spell it these days?
Considering the origin is “Jesus”, “Jee” is technically closer spelling than “Gee”. Not that I have a dog in this race.
Thanks bro, gee is what I was going for, kisses from Eastern Europe, or, as we call it, Gesus land
Well, your English is much better than my Eastern European. :) No clue you weren’t a native English speaker, so there’s that <3
The intermediate step is “Jeez.”
The post-step is “Geezie willikers!” :)
Was going to add “Gee Whiz” which comes before that one? Like it got shorter, then it got longer again?
It’s like nicknames. First it’s Joseph, then Joe, then Napoleon Jonaparte.
Oh, I thought that was the… just… regulat step. hehe.
I guess for some sort of vaguely-serious discussion[1], without doing any research, I think Jesus / Jesus Christ has stably evolved to Gee, with some variants like Gee Whiz being pretty common. I think Gee Willikers was more common around the TV Batman era and so now it’s less said straight and more said ironically. heh. I can’t think of any other common “Gee [something]”… maybe “Geezie Kreezie”, but I’ve only heard that from Suzy[2] Izzard, so not sure if that’s common or not. lol
It definitely got short; I wonder if we’d count a second word as it getting longer, or a second word replacing “Christ”. These are the types of inconsequential discussions I love. :)
In the game, even if you’ve built yourself up, an unlucky roll can still lose you the game. As opposed to real life, where the government decides you’re too big to fail.
That’s why you’ve got to get chummy with the banker and promise them a cut, and also that you’ll give them some of your cookies after the game.
I’ve been telling people to stop supporting amazon for years, but everyone seems to have their reason to keep supporting them. This hopefully will be a good enough reason for people to finally stop shopping on amazon.
I haven’t bought anything from amazon in over 12 years. I find everything on the manufacturer’s website or eBay. No need to ever use amazon for anything.
My biggest problem is that very specific niche products that also have no direct sale options from the supplier / manufacturer tend to only be available on Amazon.
Like there’s a specific caramel sauce I like to put in my coffee that is made from real caramel and not “caramel flavored corn-syrup” and the company that makes it is great and based out of the US, but they have no direct-sale option on their website nor any place that says “where to buy.”
The only place I’ve found it to be reliably sold from is Amazon, because I’m not a small coffee business. As far as I can tell, unless I order massive quantities via some sort of scheduled contract ordering agreement, I don’t think I can order direct from the manufacturer.
I hate Amazon and would rather not give them money, but they have effectively created a de-facto monopoly for certain products… whether they are the actual only major supplier that has both a web storefront and that will ship around the US… or they are the only web storefront that yielded search results for specific products when consumers are combing the web marketplace for them.
Until the US govt or other entities with regulatory teeth willing to prosecute them for monopolistic practices and maybe even break them up some day, I don’t think it’s realistic to expect even the most savvy consumers to fully remove themselves from purchasing at least some number of very specific goods form Amazon.
Your point is valid and definitely a concern.
But how are people so basic.
You hate Amazon, but just have to have your caramel syrup? Doesn’t really sound like hate.
Sounds more like you do not want to have to make sacrifices to the things you like.
Wonder why bad things continue to happen.
I use Amazon too. Not trying to be too judgy, but come on. Accept some personal responsibility for your actions.
Ah yes - the “personal responsibility” argument… 🙄
Whatever product it is isn’t really the point.
There are certain things that people either need or want and if Amazon is the only place to get them and your solution is, “well, just sacrifice” is fine if it’s a luxury good like stupid caramel sauce, but what if it’s something like vacuum cleaner bags for the vacuum you use are only sold now via Amazon?
What if it’s a specific chewable version of a vitamin your kid’s doctor suggested for your child who has a specific deficiency and can’t swallow pills and the only maker of the kids chewable of it sells on Amazon?
Should the parent just “take responsibility” and not give them that vitamin their pediatrician suggested they need?
…or maybe we should just be okay with criticizing the fucking trillion dollar company that gets to have a monopoly, and maybe think of other suggestions to give other than a “Ben-Shapiro tier” canned response. 😑
Oh gosh. Great 6 paragraph essay countering made up points I wasn’t making.
Choosing Amazon for a dr recommended medicine is definitely the same as choosing it for your coffee flavoring.
Nevermind the part where I said I also use Amazon.
My point is unless you are under duress, you are responsible for your actions.
Oh gosh. Great 6 paragraph essay countering made up points I wasn’t making.
Sorry to make you read so much?
Here…
Let me make a 4-paragraph response to that criticism specifically (since apparently when I do the internet thing of separating out some sentences to give certain thoughts some visual breathing room, that’s means it’s a big scary paragraph I guess.)
🤣 Perhaps I am mistaken, but I think (based on the other responses you got besides mine), your point seemed to be “don’t like it? Stop buying that thing b/c you don’t need it” rather than being something perhaps more prescriptive from a policy-proposal standpoint where you might accurately assign the blame to the giant monopolistic company who has a stranglehold on the space of digital marketplaces like “yeah we probably should break up Amazon” or maybe even just more helpful in a direct way like “here’s a link to a place you could buy that thing that I know about” instead.
Choosing Amazon for a dr recommended medicine is definitely the same as choosing it for your coffee flavoring.
The point I was making in response is that what the product IS matters NOT. The point was that a SINGLE COMPANY might be the only feasible place your average consumer could purchase said product - whether frivolous luxury sprinkles, or a niche but paramount healthcare need… is bad.
My point is unless you are under duress, you are responsible for your actions.
Disagreed due to poor framing. One of the reason we broke up monopolies in the past (but don’t anymore thanks to capital basically fully capturing any semblance of a working democratically elected government), was to eliminate the ability of singular entities - through the knowledge that they owned the ONLY way to get something - to exploit or price gouge on goods that consumers either want, but especially NEED.
Obviously my stupid caramel sauce is not a great example of a NEED, so you can disregard it, but my point wasn’t about stupid caramel sauce or other frivolous bullshit… it was about the fact that THERE ARE SOME THINGS NOW THAT YOU CAN ONLY REALISTICALLY FIND ON AMAZON and if THEY ARE THE ONLY ONES WHO HAVE IT, THEY CAN FUCK YOU OVER HOWEVER THEY WANT.
“Don’t buy stuff” is a stupid fucking argument (regardless if it’s your banana slicer or your fat ass’s XXXXL diapers that your mom can’t buy anywhere else) - in the same way someone says “just sell your house if global sea rise causes it to flood there…” like how Ben Shapiro likes to do.
Assigning “personal responsibility” as a response to a SYSTEMIC problem is a stupid one.
Why are Americans fat?
Me : “Because we have more shitty foods literally lab-designed to maximize addiction, filled with additives that were made illegal in other countries, because we allow companies like Coca Cola and Pepsi to advertise to children and set up soft-drink machines in school common areas and cafeterias now have fast-food outlets in them, there is almost no public transit or walkable cities anywhere in the US nor safe biking lanes or even consistent side-walks - meaning a car is the only choice for many places Americans live - which means less traversal by foot, zero free time to cook healthy meals nor the larger incomes needed to afford things like fresh groceries, nor even access in some cases to nearby healthy food suppliers such as grocery stores vs gas-stations filled with lukewarm hot dogs and 5-hour energy drinks? All of which statistically can be linked to people in the US on average having a much higher-than-other-countries-with-similar-GDP average weight, increased rate of diabetes, and other tangential health problems.”
You : “No, stupid… it’s b/c Americans are big fat lazy cunts who love choco-bars and are unique to the world and like being fat.”
Ooops sorry - that’s like 30 paragraphs. Just forget reading it since that’s probably too hard. Probably because you hate reading… not because of any other factor. You just need to take personal responsibility.
Lol. We just disagree. Your point seems to be all or nothing with the blame. I believe there is never 0 personal liability unless under duress.
I am well read, and I gather you are too. No point going further with you here.
Enjoy
But how are people so basic.
I would like a thing. All retail commerce has been monopolized by a handful of big box storefronts. One of those storefronts sucks marginally less than the others, such that I can actually find what I want to buy and expect it to be delivered in a timely fashion.
But I shouldn’t shop there because… ???
Wonder why bad things continue to happen.
Damn, so true. We should never have quit shopping at
TargetWalmartSearsWoolworths. Now we live in Capitalist Hell and its all our own fault.You shouldn’t shop there because of their blatantly anti-consumer monopolistic practices.
$1000 says you’re, at best, a college kid. Probably a teenager.
Why? People with actual life experience in this shitty system don’t make the personal responsibility argument because they’ve lived enough to know that’s bullshit.
Companies like Amazon can’t exist if people don’t buy from them. The fact that you think people have to buy from them is the problem.
No one has to spend their money with Amazon. There’s always going to be a personal responsibility aspect when people willingly do something they know is wrong.
You don’t have to use Facebook… but if you have a kid… - guess where almost every school seems to post EVERYTHING you would want to know about?
Like upcoming charity events, extra-curricular club sign-ups, campus event pictures (none of which I would want of my kid being posted, but they will do anyway), important announcements about the next school dance, or anything else you might give a shit about if you’re a parent who wants to do more than the bare minimum?
Do you have a choice then NOT to use Facebook? Yeah… but it’s kind of shit to suggest since it then would mean not realistically having access to a bunch of stuff a parent would want to have.
Even the ones that DON’T use Facebook use some other dog-shit app with ads and monthly “premium” features they put behind paywalls.
So the real answer instead of the Ben Shapiro-tier response of “just take responsibility” is "Hey maybe we should have publicly funded applications and privacy laws that help stop schools from putting shit up on Facebook w/o legal consequences… maybe we should have an app without ads and spyware that allows public schools to safely and securely put this kind of stuff up so that parents can participate without having to use Facebook or the hit mobile app - “DefinitlyNotKIDZAdvertisingSpamSpyware2026.”
Do you get what I mean? You don’t HAVE to use Amazon is the same sort of silly-seeming argument where the real solution can be crafted using legislation NOT drafted by barely-lucid octogenarian luddites. We could treat them like a hostile monopoly and break them up or something, and that would actually SYSTEMICALLY fix the issue.
We’re not talking about Facebook. We’re talking about buying things.
Jesus Christ… Can you not understand the relevance of using that in my point? 🤣
I’m using another massive monopolistic company (Amazon = Facebook) who has pretty much cornered a market (shopping online = social media) - thereby making the only options for most Americans wanting to have access to something said company has a monopoly on (caramel sauce, niche healthcare product, etc. = school communication) being “A - don’t use the thing” and “B - stop your bitching and use it?” and how terrible it is that we don’t instead go with “C - do a legislation to make it so we can still do the thing we want or need, but we don’t have to let the shitty monopolistic company continue to have carte blanche to do whatever they want in that space?”
Is that really lost on you?
How about… you do what you want with your own money and let other people do the same?
I do. It’s just the claim that people aren’t personally responsible for where they choose to spend their money is preposterous.
Yeah, free will sucks like that…
What a facile argument.
So you think people aren’t responsible for where they choose to spend their money? Is Amazon holding a gun to their head?
I bet they’re in their early-20s and either are done with college or didn’t attend so they’ll respond with “HA. Wrong!”
Lol, I’ll take my $1000.
Sorry that you lack logical thinking. Enjoy your coffee.
I’ve found the Shop App to be a good alternative along with eBay. Shop App is basically a search engine for retailers who use Shopify, which is a ton of them. From my research it seems to be generally better for retailers.
I was going on buy some jack stands for my car and saw the exact same models from harbor freight or auto zone on Amazon. Even if you’re not trying to support Amazon, you can’t escape the slop products.
Amazon, in many cases, is not the seller. They are simply an online market. The reason you see the same products across multiple websites is because it is the same product. Doesn’t really have anything to do with shitty products although that’s what a lot of people do. They take advantage of Amazon’s monopoly on the market and sell products for hundreds if not thousands of dollars % mark ups. The reason it’s still cheaper on Amazon is because of the aforementioned price fixing.
Hey pal, do not use shit stores for car work. You are endangering your life. Please get a proper jack from Napa or at least northern tool or something. Harbor freight is for pry bars and shit, not life saving equipment.
Get a carlyle Jack as well. Affordable and lasts a lifetime. Dont skimp.on anything holding a car or an engine. I don’t care how poor you are. You will get hurt.
I would like to remove the word “slop” from common speech for overuse. Sorry for your jack stand experience.
Same boat, I cancelled prime 5 years ago. My wife will activate for the holidays but I refuse to use it
Okay. Here’s my story. I have been looking for a 4K 32 to 43 inch monitor for my PC. TV or monitor, I just wanted 4k 120hz minimum. Didn’t really care about IPS or VA panels. Both have their pro’s and con’s.
So I ended up getting a Philips Google TV 43" 4K Gaming TV with native 144Hz refresh rate. The asking price from Amazon was 450 CAD. everywhere I looked online It was 50 bucks more OR they were the same price, but charged 50 bucks in shipping.
THAT’S why I use Amazon. IF I can find it cheaper elsewhere, I’ll buy it somewhere else. For me price is everything since I’m on a fixed income.
Okay, but have you considered that Amazon is the reason prices are high?
Obviously, none of these other retailers had a hand in it.
Exactly what they got “busted” for
You’re not alone in that. A lot of people’s care for ethics ends where a good deal begins.
What you should know is that these companies offer these good deals for a variety of reasons, but usually involving shady or borderline illegal business practices in one way or another.
I understand you’re on a fixed income - I sympathize with that and I don’t want to be rude to a stranger - but is the deal on a particular item you want worth the cost of endorsing what these companies do and stand for?
That 50 bucks means I only eat rice for a week. I’ve done it before, but I do not enjoy it.
$50 is the difference between having to eat only rice for a week, but you absolutely NEED a gaming monitor thats 32-43 inches with 4K resolution and 120hz refresh rate?
The only person your justifying your continued use of amazon to is yourself, and you’re doing a poor job.
Average Lemmy user 😅
And I’ll keep on doing it!
More power to you I guess. Hogs love rolling in shit.
I only roll in yours, because apparently it doesn’t stink…
I don’t think I’m expressing myself clearly. I understand the fixed income part and what 50 bucks can do to a person’s living situation. No issue there.
On the front end of your decision, you’re starting with “I need X with Y and Z”. None of these variables are negotiable? The “need” isn’t negotiable? Or are they not as negotiable as the care for the company’s awful business practices?
The systemic issues are the primary concern, but it is worth thinking about and examining within ourselves. We are ill-equipped to make informed decisions prior to every purchase. However, once we know how a particular purchase supports degrading the world around us, where is the line we won’t cross for a good deal?
I"m sorry my horse apparently doesn’t go as high as yours… 🙄
That’s needlessly insulting after I’ve been nothing but cordial with you. Me bringing up things that bring you discomfort to think about doesn’t mean I’m the bad guy here. Have a nice day, and enjoy your TV.
clip clop, clip clop, clip clop…
Aren’t most people on a fixed income?
Is such a TV… necessary?
Have you considered saving some for a few months and then buy the TV?What do you think I’ve been doing? That took me four months.
There are a lot of people online who think that 100% abstinence from The Bad is the only way to be good.
But if you can shift 10% of your former Amazon spending, do it. And keep looking for a way to get to 15%, then 20%, and so on.
Like, I’m probably never going to be a strict vegetarian. I love a good burger, or a nicely-cooked steak, or a big bowl of chicken and dumplings. But I eat vegetarian for more than 75% of my meals. And that’s good enough for me.
It was also the implied “Poor people shouldn’t have nice things” That ticked me off.
Aren’t most people on a fixed income?
No, most people are on broken incomes.
Not to leave out they’re easy to return stuff too.
Indeed.
I find the Amazon experience and prices to often be worse than elsewhere
Supposing the prices they charge are still less than what you would pay for the convenience of purchasing a product with no extra effort, why would you switch?
I have myself had aspirations to buy fewer things from Amazon. However. Even including stuff like this, I am happy to pay $10 extra to not have to dick around.
I hope Amazon has to pay money for this and that it hurts their business model, bit as a customer they are still scratching my itch 2 times out of 3.
