4 ms·

I've been saying this a lot, and hopefully I don't get downvoted because this is too "political", but... Essentially, Amazon is no longer a business. It is inf

I've been saying this a lot, and hopefully I don't get downvoted because this is too "political", but... Essentially, Amazon is no longer a business. It is infrastructure. Every citizen should have the right to complain if something goes wrong. There could be a little office in every bigger city where you pull a number and get to talk to a real human. And if the dispute isn't settled, you should be able to take your case to a real court. Note I don't want to expropriate anybody. Congratulations Jeff, you won capitalism! Give the man a billion and make him Secretary of Shipment or something. But the whole structure he created has become so important, that it should be subject to the same scrutiny that a wing of government would be (should be)... parliamental control, transparence and accountability, separation of powers, etc..

niij 10y ago
I'm curious what your thoughts are on other page businesses? Walmart, FedEx, Ebay?
- webmaven 10y ago
  "page businesses"?
  - niij 10y ago
    *big businesses
- llvihearsevil 10y ago
  Walmart actually has really good customer service.
- captainmuon 10y ago
  Good question. It's indeed hard to tell where to draw the line. If you are going for a "social market economy" kind of society - e.g. a free market but elements of what would be called "socialist" in the US - then there is a place for huge businesses that are run privately (i.e. not state controlled). E.g. Wallmart, Ford, Microsoft... I would say the government should step in, that is the public should gain control, if the enterprise becomes utility-like. If you "need" their services to participate in society at a reasonable level. Or if many people build their businesses on them. This feature of "being essential" is not neccessarily the same question as whether a company is a monopoly or not. The end 1990s Microsoft was maybe a monopoly, but it was not a utility or infrastructure. OTOH, I'm not sure you could classify Google or Amazon legally as Monopolies, but they have created awesome (in both senses of the word) infrastructure. I don't think this infrastructure should be entirely in the hands of a company or a few people. We also don't let owners of toll roads make the rules of the road. So I wouldn't neccessarily nationalize Walmart, FedEx, Ebay. But I would regulate large Telcos for example. The model here in Germany seems to work quite OK. The market is deregulated, most of the infrastructure is still owned by the former state companies (Deutsche Bahn, Telekom, ...), and these rent the resources to other companies. But there are regulatory bodies that ensure that e.g. the prices are fair. It's not perfect, but it seems the resulting situation is preferable for customers (having lived in the US and Germany, I'd say both public transport and telecommunication is on average cheaper and better in Germany, and I think it is a result of this model.) Twitter is a possible target. It doesn't seem profitable as a business anyway. But if someone decided that we as a society needed "a twitter" (I don't know if we do...), then maybe it could continue in this way.
  - pc86 10y ago
    > If you "need" their services to participate in society at a reasonable level. Except by your own reasoning you don't "need" Amazon. > Twitter is a possible target. Please.
gdulli 10y ago
I don't get this. I got turned off of Amazon a few years ago and have been buying elsewhere. Because Amazon doesn't subsidize buyers with aggressive lowest prices the way they used to you can even find the same or better deals elsewhere. It's not hard at all to live without Amazon unless you choose to submit to it.
- captainmuon 10y ago
  Sure it's not hard. I prefer to buy elsewhere when I have the time (to support local businesses, or because they have better service). But it's a pity that other companies can't use this great "technology" of next or same day delivery. It may sound silly, but it is a real organizational marvel. It makes me think of the aztec relay messengers, or the early US postal service delivering mail to the frontier. There is "fulfilment by Amazon", which is great, but Amazon gets to dictate the conditions, which are not very favorable to other businesses as I understand. Also, Amazon is said to not pay their workers very well. I'd love to have the option to use something just like Amazon, but where I pay a few percent more, and the workers get paid more fairly. I'd love to vote with my wallet on these issues, or (crazy!) actually with my vote, but I can't. I don't want to boycott Amazon, as little as I want to boycott the interstate system or air travel and go by carriage, although there are things I might want to improve with either.
  - gdulli 10y ago
    Boycotting Amazon is easy. I'm sure only a percentage of the time you use same or next day shipping, you actually need it. More often it's about impulse buying or impatience. The times you do need it, better planning could often have obviated the need for it. The rare times you still need it, there's always real stores you can go to for most categories of items. The remaining times it's still needed should be very rare. You can think of Amazon as a fallback you only need in rare times of desperation than your go-to place for buying in general.
bb611 10y ago
I don't agree, although I do appreciate your point. The test of infrastructure is whether society would grind to a halt if it disappeared tomorrow. So let's assume as of midnight tonight, Amazon ceases to operate. What happens? It's annoying, but everyone just shops at a different place, probably in person because there isn't a great online competitor to Amazon (at least in the US). It's not a critical part of society the way power, water, roads, and the internet are. All businesses make errors like this, the key is to push them to have better processes to deal with them, rather than outsourced and unhelpful customer support.
- velocitypsycho 10y ago
  Considering how much of the web is under AWS, there would most likely be far reaching consequences.
- virgilp 10y ago
  if AWS ceased to operate? Oh jeez, there'd be at the very least an economic meltdown - lots of companies would cease to run, some pretty big ones too.

niij 10y ago

I'm curious what your thoughts are on other page businesses? Walmart, FedEx, Ebay?

webmaven 10y ago
"page businesses"?
- niij 10y ago
  *big businesses
llvihearsevil 10y ago
Walmart actually has really good customer service.
captainmuon 10y ago
Good question. It's indeed hard to tell where to draw the line. If you are going for a "social market economy" kind of society - e.g. a free market but elements of what would be called "socialist" in the US - then there is a place for huge businesses that are run privately (i.e. not state controlled). E.g. Wallmart, Ford, Microsoft... I would say the government should step in, that is the public should gain control, if the enterprise becomes utility-like. If you "need" their services to participate in society at a reasonable level. Or if many people build their businesses on them. This feature of "being essential" is not neccessarily the same question as whether a company is a monopoly or not. The end 1990s Microsoft was maybe a monopoly, but it was not a utility or infrastructure. OTOH, I'm not sure you could classify Google or Amazon legally as Monopolies, but they have created awesome (in both senses of the word) infrastructure. I don't think this infrastructure should be entirely in the hands of a company or a few people. We also don't let owners of toll roads make the rules of the road. So I wouldn't neccessarily nationalize Walmart, FedEx, Ebay. But I would regulate large Telcos for example. The model here in Germany seems to work quite OK. The market is deregulated, most of the infrastructure is still owned by the former state companies (Deutsche Bahn, Telekom, ...), and these rent the resources to other companies. But there are regulatory bodies that ensure that e.g. the prices are fair. It's not perfect, but it seems the resulting situation is preferable for customers (having lived in the US and Germany, I'd say both public transport and telecommunication is on average cheaper and better in Germany, and I think it is a result of this model.) Twitter is a possible target. It doesn't seem profitable as a business anyway. But if someone decided that we as a society needed "a twitter" (I don't know if we do...), then maybe it could continue in this way.
- pc86 10y ago
  > If you "need" their services to participate in society at a reasonable level. Except by your own reasoning you don't "need" Amazon. > Twitter is a possible target. Please.

gdulli 10y ago

I don't get this. I got turned off of Amazon a few years ago and have been buying elsewhere. Because Amazon doesn't subsidize buyers with aggressive lowest prices the way they used to you can even find the same or better deals elsewhere. It's not hard at all to live without Amazon unless you choose to submit to it.

captainmuon 10y ago
Sure it's not hard. I prefer to buy elsewhere when I have the time (to support local businesses, or because they have better service). But it's a pity that other companies can't use this great "technology" of next or same day delivery. It may sound silly, but it is a real organizational marvel. It makes me think of the aztec relay messengers, or the early US postal service delivering mail to the frontier. There is "fulfilment by Amazon", which is great, but Amazon gets to dictate the conditions, which are not very favorable to other businesses as I understand. Also, Amazon is said to not pay their workers very well. I'd love to have the option to use something just like Amazon, but where I pay a few percent more, and the workers get paid more fairly. I'd love to vote with my wallet on these issues, or (crazy!) actually with my vote, but I can't. I don't want to boycott Amazon, as little as I want to boycott the interstate system or air travel and go by carriage, although there are things I might want to improve with either.
- gdulli 10y ago
  Boycotting Amazon is easy. I'm sure only a percentage of the time you use same or next day shipping, you actually need it. More often it's about impulse buying or impatience. The times you do need it, better planning could often have obviated the need for it. The rare times you still need it, there's always real stores you can go to for most categories of items. The remaining times it's still needed should be very rare. You can think of Amazon as a fallback you only need in rare times of desperation than your go-to place for buying in general.

bb611 10y ago

I don't agree, although I do appreciate your point. The test of infrastructure is whether society would grind to a halt if it disappeared tomorrow. So let's assume as of midnight tonight, Amazon ceases to operate. What happens? It's annoying, but everyone just shops at a different place, probably in person because there isn't a great online competitor to Amazon (at least in the US). It's not a critical part of society the way power, water, roads, and the internet are. All businesses make errors like this, the key is to push them to have better processes to deal with them, rather than outsourced and unhelpful customer support.

velocitypsycho 10y ago
Considering how much of the web is under AWS, there would most likely be far reaching consequences.
virgilp 10y ago
if AWS ceased to operate? Oh jeez, there'd be at the very least an economic meltdown - lots of companies would cease to run, some pretty big ones too.