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The article talks about how counterfeits benefit Amazon, but its not the full picture. There is a negative affect of counterfiets on Amazon as well, and that is

The article talks about how counterfeits benefit Amazon, but its not the full picture. There is a negative affect of counterfiets on Amazon as well, and that is (1) reputation (customers not trusting Amazon anymore as a site that has honest opinions) (2) competition (other online retailers growing in the trusted-products-selling business) and (3) reliance on one country only (if this continues, and Amazon makes short term profits because of it, they will end of becoming a front end for china manufacturers only, risking their supply line. With one rule, china can ban Chinese products to be sold via Amazon, and Amazon can go broke). So it is in Amazon's interest to solve this problem, and not focus on the short term gains, but I wonder why they are not making any moves to solve this? That's the weird part.

B1FF_PSUVM 8y ago
> they will end of becoming a front end for china manufacturers only And there's AliExpress.com already doing a good job of that. Actually, a better job, apparently, because on AliExpress you know which seller will ship your purchase.
- justtopost 8y ago
  You also don't have to question if it is counterfit. You can just assume it is. Petty theft from engineers, by engineers. It is an unusual world.
  - fjsolwmv 8y ago
    You call it counterfeit, China calls it commodity. When you buy generic sugar in USA, is it "counterfeit"?
    - L-four 8y ago
      When you buy sugar in China it might be.
      - crankylinuxuser 8y ago
        Yeah I wouldn't put it against them if they tried selling "sugar" as lead acetate. It sells a banned sweetener, tastes great, and gets rid of contaminants all in 1 motion.
  - GuB-42 8y ago
    If you are buying Chinese brands, you still need to be careful but it is usually genuine.
fmajid 8y ago
Yes, I've stopped buying from Amazon because of their stickerless commingled inventory program and get all my electronics from B&H Photo, and more and more other goods from Target.com. Amazon is getting to eBay levels of lawlessness.
- ipqk 8y ago
  I, too, stopped buying there because I can never assume anything I buy there is authentic. And I actually canceled my Prime subscription that I've had since the Prime program started. The only thing I really still buy from Amazon is Toilet Paper, which seems unlikely to be counterfeited (so far).
  - gambiting 8y ago
    I keep hearing about these issues all the time, but I guess they are US-only? I buy loads and loads of stuff off Amazon here in UK and I've never had a single counterfeit item. I always buy items marked as "sold and shipped by Amazon" and never had any issues. I guess on this side of the pond Amazon doesn't comingle the inventory with 3rd party inventory?
    - stevekemp 8y ago
      When I lived in the UK I did receive a couple of counterfeit items, one was a "Global" knife, and the rest were all compact-flash cards. Handling the returns was mostly painless, but if I were to live in a country with a local Amazon-site I would only use it for books/similar these days.
    - bosie 8y ago
      Also uk based, I stopped buying clothing as it just doesn't seem reliable. Ordered the same shirt with quantity 3 and got 3 (slightly) different shirts. pair of Levis jeans also feels very different than the same pair bought at House of Fraser. Don't know what is going on there.
      - jghn 8y ago
sorokod 8y ago
So it is in Amazon's interest to solve this problem, and not focus on the short term gains, but I wonder why they are not making any moves to solve this? That's the weird part. They looks at the gain, the loss and the balance. Ultimately actions or lack of actions are driven by the balance. You can draw your own conclusions from the lack of actions.
toss1 8y ago
As a customer/user, there are already entire classes of products I won't even consider buying on Amazon. This includes Batteries, Cables, most common electronic goods. As a business user, I won't consider signing up for their business account, for which they keep pestering me with popups. As a vendor, I've held off on putting products on Amazon for exactly this reason of getting hosed by the counterfeiters and knowing that Amazon will not only not have my back as a vendor that is helping them profit, but will actively fight against me on any attempt to force Amazon to responsibly police their warehouses. I may still take the risk in order to access Amazon's huge customer base, but I'll certainly be costly taking costly countermeasures from the start, and factoring those into the decision of how profitable it might be to sell on Amazon vs or in addition to directly. They really have a significant problem, and are sadly, becoming another big tech firm that is creating increasing levels of problems in our society and economic environment. The question is when those problems will exceed the benefit they bring to society. IMO, FB is well past the bad/good breakeven point, GOOG & AMZN are still on the good side, but trending badly.
- platinium 8y ago
  Amazon has tipped to bad -- all these dumb services like Pantry box, Fresh now, etc, all offered outside of the now $130 premium for Prime. I'm going to call in a few days to cancel my Prime. Amazon as a whole is just not worth investing in anymore as a customer. I will also move off all my photos from Amazon photos and onto my own manual drives until better cloud solutions come out (not goog).

B1FF_PSUVM 8y ago

> they will end of becoming a front end for china manufacturers only And there's AliExpress.com already doing a good job of that. Actually, a better job, apparently, because on AliExpress you know which seller will ship your purchase.

justtopost 8y ago
You also don't have to question if it is counterfit. You can just assume it is. Petty theft from engineers, by engineers. It is an unusual world.
- fjsolwmv 8y ago
  You call it counterfeit, China calls it commodity. When you buy generic sugar in USA, is it "counterfeit"?
  - L-four 8y ago
    When you buy sugar in China it might be.
    - crankylinuxuser 8y ago
      Yeah I wouldn't put it against them if they tried selling "sugar" as lead acetate. It sells a banned sweetener, tastes great, and gets rid of contaminants all in 1 motion.
- GuB-42 8y ago
  If you are buying Chinese brands, you still need to be careful but it is usually genuine.

fmajid 8y ago

Yes, I've stopped buying from Amazon because of their stickerless commingled inventory program and get all my electronics from B&H Photo, and more and more other goods from Target.com. Amazon is getting to eBay levels of lawlessness.

ipqk 8y ago
I, too, stopped buying there because I can never assume anything I buy there is authentic. And I actually canceled my Prime subscription that I've had since the Prime program started. The only thing I really still buy from Amazon is Toilet Paper, which seems unlikely to be counterfeited (so far).
- gambiting 8y ago
  I keep hearing about these issues all the time, but I guess they are US-only? I buy loads and loads of stuff off Amazon here in UK and I've never had a single counterfeit item. I always buy items marked as "sold and shipped by Amazon" and never had any issues. I guess on this side of the pond Amazon doesn't comingle the inventory with 3rd party inventory?
  - stevekemp 8y ago
    When I lived in the UK I did receive a couple of counterfeit items, one was a "Global" knife, and the rest were all compact-flash cards. Handling the returns was mostly painless, but if I were to live in a country with a local Amazon-site I would only use it for books/similar these days.
  - bosie 8y ago
    Also uk based, I stopped buying clothing as it just doesn't seem reliable. Ordered the same shirt with quantity 3 and got 3 (slightly) different shirts. pair of Levis jeans also feels very different than the same pair bought at House of Fraser. Don't know what is going on there.
    - jghn 8y ago

sorokod 8y ago

So it is in Amazon's interest to solve this problem, and not focus on the short term gains, but I wonder why they are not making any moves to solve this? That's the weird part. They looks at the gain, the loss and the balance. Ultimately actions or lack of actions are driven by the balance. You can draw your own conclusions from the lack of actions.

toss1 8y ago

As a customer/user, there are already entire classes of products I won't even consider buying on Amazon. This includes Batteries, Cables, most common electronic goods. As a business user, I won't consider signing up for their business account, for which they keep pestering me with popups. As a vendor, I've held off on putting products on Amazon for exactly this reason of getting hosed by the counterfeiters and knowing that Amazon will not only not have my back as a vendor that is helping them profit, but will actively fight against me on any attempt to force Amazon to responsibly police their warehouses. I may still take the risk in order to access Amazon's huge customer base, but I'll certainly be costly taking costly countermeasures from the start, and factoring those into the decision of how profitable it might be to sell on Amazon vs or in addition to directly. They really have a significant problem, and are sadly, becoming another big tech firm that is creating increasing levels of problems in our society and economic environment. The question is when those problems will exceed the benefit they bring to society. IMO, FB is well past the bad/good breakeven point, GOOG & AMZN are still on the good side, but trending badly.

platinium 8y ago
Amazon has tipped to bad -- all these dumb services like Pantry box, Fresh now, etc, all offered outside of the now $130 premium for Prime. I'm going to call in a few days to cancel my Prime. Amazon as a whole is just not worth investing in anymore as a customer. I will also move off all my photos from Amazon photos and onto my own manual drives until better cloud solutions come out (not goog).