33 ms·

To be honest, the section of the city Amazon has "swallowed" was grass and weed filled parking lots 5 years ago as well as broken down buildings. While the cons

To be honest, the section of the city Amazon has "swallowed" was grass and weed filled parking lots 5 years ago as well as broken down buildings. While the construction has been a drag for drivers in that area, the city looks and feels so much better, IMO, due to their investments. Now, has Amazon invested enough in infrastructure to help the swelling population they are partly to blame for increasing (not to mention lack of houses, housing prices, student class sizes, etc.)? No, not really - but that's the price of being one of the fastest growing cities with the lowest unemployment in the country. But in terms of the city buildings and neighborhood - so much better.

flippyhead 10y ago
Yeah I don't get the complaints and honestly don't hear them much at least from my friends (I don't work for Amazon). I've lived here my whole life, seen the city change a lot. I used to think I'd probably move away some day. I've been to probably 40 countries now and the more I see of the world the more I see Seattle as ideal and heading (mostly) in the right direction.
- hinkley 10y ago
  I think people forget that Seattle was one of the first big cities to successfully revitalize their downtown. It started at Westlake Center and took twenty years to make it a mile north to South Lake Union.
techsupporter 10y ago
That's how I feel about Amazon, too. It cracks me up some of the things the author laments losing. No broken bottles? No cigarette trash? I like having at least one area of the city somewhat clean.
- ghaff 10y ago
  You hear this sort of thing about the "Disney-fication" of Times Square in NYC all the time. Not that I'm a fan of Times Square for a variety of reasons but anyone who looks nostalgically back to the 42nd Street on 1985 has some seriously rose-colored glasses.
- jandrese 10y ago
  It's the dreaded gentrification. If your neighborhood isn't kept in its run down and decrepit state the land values might go up and push out people who can no longer afford to pay rent.
  - csydas 10y ago
    I don't think there's a need to be sardonic; the full paragraph that I believe you're referencing goes on to talk about other common sights and elements of various Seattle districts; the complaint that some Seattlelites are putting forward isn't "we want a decrepit city" it's they want their decrepit city. The complaint about the changes Amazon and other companies are making is not about keeping the city in a state of disarray and filthiness, it's about control over the tone and feel of the city, preferring that a single corporate entity not be able to set or dictate the tone/feel to accommodate their interests. Even if there is a net positive as a result, the local residents have no choice in the matter - as was written in the article, those parts of the city are no longer Seattle in some people's minds, it's Amazon's territory. I'm not condemning or condoning this position - I did live in the Seattle area for about 5 years, and while I loved it, didn't really have the same historical attachment most Seattle folk have, and they love their city, what it was, is, and what it can be. It's not too difficult to empathize with the position either; suppose, in a rather silly example, that a wealthy business whose owners had a love for early 1900's german expressionism moved to your city (which you feel a connection to); over the course of a few years, a large part of your city begins to take the form of stills from The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari or from Metropolis. The owners clean up the area very well and bring in new trendy restaurants that meet their aesthetic vision. Even if you agree that the area has been changed for the better in terms of infrastructure and economics, are you really satisfied with having expressionism forced on you? Again, this isn't to say that feelings should override progress with civil infrastructure improvement, but there's a bit more to the gentrification effect, specifically from the tech world, than just a bunch of grumpy people angry about losing their run down and decrepit land. People have seen what happened with San Francisco and they're scared, and rightfully so; while the standard of living in Seattle is decent, the average wages are no match for SV style tech money.
    - 10y ago
- hinkley 10y ago
  The only thing that neighborhood lost of any value was the Jones Soda bottling plant.
djsumdog 10y ago
I've actually stopped shopping at Amazon. I'll pay and extra $10 for high ticket items to avoid that retailer. I'm sure many of the higher ups there don't have any ill-will, but they have unintentionally (or maybe intentionally; I dunno) become America's new Wal-Mart. That's a bad thing. Consumerist culture erodes long term sustainability. Laptop/cellphone replacement cycles need to be 10 years, not 2. Old electronics need to be recycled--like actually recycled and not shipped to Africa where teenagers rip out and smelter what components they can. I'm not saying Amazon is intentionally causing more consumerism, but it is a result of their type of industry. And the effects bleed out in a way you can see in its home city of Seattle.
- blahi 10y ago
  Have you considered that maybe the prices of some products are so low because of planned obsolescence? If you want quality, buy Miele. You have a life time guarantee. And you won't have to use it. People who can't afford the quality can buy Samsung. Or do you think people who don't have $10k for a fridge shouldn't have one?
  - makomk 10y ago
    I think Miele has planned obsolescence now too, at least on most of its washing machines. It also seems unlikely the prices are low because of planned obsolescence - there's only so much you can cut from something before it starts failing within the warranty period. Most of the cost savings seem to be from newer, more automated and efficient mass production techniques. Planned obsolescence is a separate and intentional design decision.
    - blahi 10y ago
      > It also seems unlikely the prices are low because of planned obsolescence As someone who does pricing strategy for a living, no it does not seem unlikely.
- Grishnakh 10y ago
  There are plenty of valid concerns and complaints about Amazon (I'll list some of mine below), but I don't see why you're blaming them for electronics recycling and lifetimes, or "Walmartification". Amazon has done a pretty good job of being an all-in-one place to shop online and having very low prices overall. For cellphone replacement cycles, I have absolutely no idea where you get the idea that Amazon has anything to do with this. AFAIK, most Americans still "buy" cellphones at cellphone stores run by the big 4. You can blame them for the 2-year subsidization scheme. And phones are lasting longer now. I have a 3-year-old Galaxy S4 that works great. For a while, there were huge changes in the hardware, but it's plateauing now. For laptop replacement cycles, again I have no idea why you'd blame Amazon in particular, but here especially, people simply are not replacing laptops in 2 years like they did 10+ years ago. It's a real "problem" for the PC industry in fact, because people are keeping their PCs around a lot longer than they used to. I've got a few laptops ranging from probably 4-6 years old, and lots of people have desktops quite a bit older than that. New computers just aren't any faster than old ones, they only consume a little less power. Consumerism is something you can only really blame society in general for. And these days, with this crummy economy, I think it's probably less than it used to be: with rents so high nationwide, and salaries stagnant, and underemployment rampant, people aren't spending as much on trinkets and junk as they used to. Some things still are popular to spend on, like phones (but not computers), but overall I would imagine there's less "consumerism" right now than there was back in 1999 because we are not in a booming economy. When people have extra money to spend, they spend more; when things are tight, they don't. As for valid (IMO) complaints about Amazon, here's my list: 1) they jerk their prices around a LOT. I have stuff in my "save for later" cart that keeps jumping up and down by huge factors (one pen in particular keeps jumping between $5-something and $9.99). Many things seem to start out at a low price, and then when I put them in my cart but don't buy them right away, they just keep going up and up and up. It really feels like a ploy to extract more money. 2) their prices are frequently not that low anymore. I always try to shop around for stuff, and will frequently (but not always) find better deals at smaller sellers. 3) a lot of stuff they sell is junk shipped from China, and it's not immediately obvious that it's being shipped from out of the country. For a lot of small knick-knacks that I need (for instance, I needed a new windshield washer nozzle recently), I'm finding that Ebay is actually the best place to go, strangely enough. Independent online stores (even ones owned by companies selling on Ebay) usually cost about the same, maybe slightly less, but then have high shipping charges which isn't helpful if you're only buying one thing, and it's really easy to punch in a part number and find something on Ebay. You can find it on Amazon too, but it usually seems to be a much worse deal, though I'm not sure why. I wonder if Ebay has lower fees for large-volume sellers than Amazon. The main thing Amazon is really, really good for is the reviews. And even these are suspect these days because for certain classes of items, many of the reviews are shill reviews, or at least suspect, because someone was given the item at a reduced price in exchange for writing a review.
troydavis 10y ago
This, many times over. Yes, Seattle's South Lake Union now looks a lot like downtown San Jose. It's a completely different world from 10 years ago, though, and so much better. We missed out on a chance to have a giant urban park ("Seattle Commons": http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&File_Id=8252 http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&...), but credit to Paul Allen for executing an unbelievable plan B. [Bloomberg's article focuses more on Amazon's new HQ in downtown Seattle, but Amazon's impact today is mostly in South Lake Union. Background: http://www.seattletimes.com/business/real-estate/amazon-will-add-troy-block-towers-to-its-seattle-office-empire/ http://www.seattletimes.com/business/real-estate/amazon-will...] (Source: Born in Seattle and have lived within ~0.5 miles for 10+ years)
- bbgm 10y ago
  Wasn't a biotech hub plan B originally? That never panned out. For reference I've worked in SLU for the better part of a decade, first at Rosetta Biosoftware (ISB is in that building now) and at AWS for the last 8 years.
  - cwe 10y ago
    There is quite a bit of biotech in the area, isn't there? UW Medicine and Novonordisk, as well as Fred Hutch etc.
    - bbgm 10y ago
      There were plans for a lot more commercial biotech back in the day. Some of it has rebounded, but Seattle never really became a competitor to Cambridge (MA), San Diego, or the Bay Area. The non-profit side is pretty good.
- robertbenjamin 10y ago
  Sorry for my ignorance, but what's Paul Allen's "plan B"?
  - 10y ago
rconti 10y ago
To be fair, the article was complaining about Amazon advancing towards the real downtown, not the Mercer St wasteland Amazon's development fixed. OTOH they're talking about having space for 50k employees at SLU so I'm not sure why the author thinks Amazon is advancing downtonw...
- hinkley 10y ago
  They have 4 city blocks on Westlake Avenue, around 6th and 7th Ave. That's right on the edge of what people would call Downtown.

flippyhead 10y ago

Yeah I don't get the complaints and honestly don't hear them much at least from my friends (I don't work for Amazon). I've lived here my whole life, seen the city change a lot. I used to think I'd probably move away some day. I've been to probably 40 countries now and the more I see of the world the more I see Seattle as ideal and heading (mostly) in the right direction.

hinkley 10y ago
I think people forget that Seattle was one of the first big cities to successfully revitalize their downtown. It started at Westlake Center and took twenty years to make it a mile north to South Lake Union.

techsupporter 10y ago

That's how I feel about Amazon, too. It cracks me up some of the things the author laments losing. No broken bottles? No cigarette trash? I like having at least one area of the city somewhat clean.

ghaff 10y ago
You hear this sort of thing about the "Disney-fication" of Times Square in NYC all the time. Not that I'm a fan of Times Square for a variety of reasons but anyone who looks nostalgically back to the 42nd Street on 1985 has some seriously rose-colored glasses.
jandrese 10y ago
It's the dreaded gentrification. If your neighborhood isn't kept in its run down and decrepit state the land values might go up and push out people who can no longer afford to pay rent.
- csydas 10y ago
  I don't think there's a need to be sardonic; the full paragraph that I believe you're referencing goes on to talk about other common sights and elements of various Seattle districts; the complaint that some Seattlelites are putting forward isn't "we want a decrepit city" it's they want their decrepit city. The complaint about the changes Amazon and other companies are making is not about keeping the city in a state of disarray and filthiness, it's about control over the tone and feel of the city, preferring that a single corporate entity not be able to set or dictate the tone/feel to accommodate their interests. Even if there is a net positive as a result, the local residents have no choice in the matter - as was written in the article, those parts of the city are no longer Seattle in some people's minds, it's Amazon's territory. I'm not condemning or condoning this position - I did live in the Seattle area for about 5 years, and while I loved it, didn't really have the same historical attachment most Seattle folk have, and they love their city, what it was, is, and what it can be. It's not too difficult to empathize with the position either; suppose, in a rather silly example, that a wealthy business whose owners had a love for early 1900's german expressionism moved to your city (which you feel a connection to); over the course of a few years, a large part of your city begins to take the form of stills from The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari or from Metropolis. The owners clean up the area very well and bring in new trendy restaurants that meet their aesthetic vision. Even if you agree that the area has been changed for the better in terms of infrastructure and economics, are you really satisfied with having expressionism forced on you? Again, this isn't to say that feelings should override progress with civil infrastructure improvement, but there's a bit more to the gentrification effect, specifically from the tech world, than just a bunch of grumpy people angry about losing their run down and decrepit land. People have seen what happened with San Francisco and they're scared, and rightfully so; while the standard of living in Seattle is decent, the average wages are no match for SV style tech money.
  - 10y ago
hinkley 10y ago
The only thing that neighborhood lost of any value was the Jones Soda bottling plant.

djsumdog 10y ago

I've actually stopped shopping at Amazon. I'll pay and extra $10 for high ticket items to avoid that retailer. I'm sure many of the higher ups there don't have any ill-will, but they have unintentionally (or maybe intentionally; I dunno) become America's new Wal-Mart. That's a bad thing. Consumerist culture erodes long term sustainability. Laptop/cellphone replacement cycles need to be 10 years, not 2. Old electronics need to be recycled--like actually recycled and not shipped to Africa where teenagers rip out and smelter what components they can. I'm not saying Amazon is intentionally causing more consumerism, but it is a result of their type of industry. And the effects bleed out in a way you can see in its home city of Seattle.

blahi 10y ago
Have you considered that maybe the prices of some products are so low because of planned obsolescence? If you want quality, buy Miele. You have a life time guarantee. And you won't have to use it. People who can't afford the quality can buy Samsung. Or do you think people who don't have $10k for a fridge shouldn't have one?
- makomk 10y ago
  I think Miele has planned obsolescence now too, at least on most of its washing machines. It also seems unlikely the prices are low because of planned obsolescence - there's only so much you can cut from something before it starts failing within the warranty period. Most of the cost savings seem to be from newer, more automated and efficient mass production techniques. Planned obsolescence is a separate and intentional design decision.
  - blahi 10y ago
    > It also seems unlikely the prices are low because of planned obsolescence As someone who does pricing strategy for a living, no it does not seem unlikely.
Grishnakh 10y ago
There are plenty of valid concerns and complaints about Amazon (I'll list some of mine below), but I don't see why you're blaming them for electronics recycling and lifetimes, or "Walmartification". Amazon has done a pretty good job of being an all-in-one place to shop online and having very low prices overall. For cellphone replacement cycles, I have absolutely no idea where you get the idea that Amazon has anything to do with this. AFAIK, most Americans still "buy" cellphones at cellphone stores run by the big 4. You can blame them for the 2-year subsidization scheme. And phones are lasting longer now. I have a 3-year-old Galaxy S4 that works great. For a while, there were huge changes in the hardware, but it's plateauing now. For laptop replacement cycles, again I have no idea why you'd blame Amazon in particular, but here especially, people simply are not replacing laptops in 2 years like they did 10+ years ago. It's a real "problem" for the PC industry in fact, because people are keeping their PCs around a lot longer than they used to. I've got a few laptops ranging from probably 4-6 years old, and lots of people have desktops quite a bit older than that. New computers just aren't any faster than old ones, they only consume a little less power. Consumerism is something you can only really blame society in general for. And these days, with this crummy economy, I think it's probably less than it used to be: with rents so high nationwide, and salaries stagnant, and underemployment rampant, people aren't spending as much on trinkets and junk as they used to. Some things still are popular to spend on, like phones (but not computers), but overall I would imagine there's less "consumerism" right now than there was back in 1999 because we are not in a booming economy. When people have extra money to spend, they spend more; when things are tight, they don't. As for valid (IMO) complaints about Amazon, here's my list: 1) they jerk their prices around a LOT. I have stuff in my "save for later" cart that keeps jumping up and down by huge factors (one pen in particular keeps jumping between $5-something and $9.99). Many things seem to start out at a low price, and then when I put them in my cart but don't buy them right away, they just keep going up and up and up. It really feels like a ploy to extract more money. 2) their prices are frequently not that low anymore. I always try to shop around for stuff, and will frequently (but not always) find better deals at smaller sellers. 3) a lot of stuff they sell is junk shipped from China, and it's not immediately obvious that it's being shipped from out of the country. For a lot of small knick-knacks that I need (for instance, I needed a new windshield washer nozzle recently), I'm finding that Ebay is actually the best place to go, strangely enough. Independent online stores (even ones owned by companies selling on Ebay) usually cost about the same, maybe slightly less, but then have high shipping charges which isn't helpful if you're only buying one thing, and it's really easy to punch in a part number and find something on Ebay. You can find it on Amazon too, but it usually seems to be a much worse deal, though I'm not sure why. I wonder if Ebay has lower fees for large-volume sellers than Amazon. The main thing Amazon is really, really good for is the reviews. And even these are suspect these days because for certain classes of items, many of the reviews are shill reviews, or at least suspect, because someone was given the item at a reduced price in exchange for writing a review.

troydavis 10y ago

This, many times over. Yes, Seattle's South Lake Union now looks a lot like downtown San Jose. It's a completely different world from 10 years ago, though, and so much better. We missed out on a chance to have a giant urban park ("Seattle Commons": http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&File_Id=8252 http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&...), but credit to Paul Allen for executing an unbelievable plan B. [Bloomberg's article focuses more on Amazon's new HQ in downtown Seattle, but Amazon's impact today is mostly in South Lake Union. Background: http://www.seattletimes.com/business/real-estate/amazon-will-add-troy-block-towers-to-its-seattle-office-empire/ http://www.seattletimes.com/business/real-estate/amazon-will...] (Source: Born in Seattle and have lived within ~0.5 miles for 10+ years)

bbgm 10y ago
Wasn't a biotech hub plan B originally? That never panned out. For reference I've worked in SLU for the better part of a decade, first at Rosetta Biosoftware (ISB is in that building now) and at AWS for the last 8 years.
- cwe 10y ago
  There is quite a bit of biotech in the area, isn't there? UW Medicine and Novonordisk, as well as Fred Hutch etc.
  - bbgm 10y ago
    There were plans for a lot more commercial biotech back in the day. Some of it has rebounded, but Seattle never really became a competitor to Cambridge (MA), San Diego, or the Bay Area. The non-profit side is pretty good.
robertbenjamin 10y ago
Sorry for my ignorance, but what's Paul Allen's "plan B"?
- 10y ago

rconti 10y ago

To be fair, the article was complaining about Amazon advancing towards the real downtown, not the Mercer St wasteland Amazon's development fixed. OTOH they're talking about having space for 50k employees at SLU so I'm not sure why the author thinks Amazon is advancing downtonw...

hinkley 10y ago
They have 4 city blocks on Westlake Avenue, around 6th and 7th Ave. That's right on the edge of what people would call Downtown.