4 ms·

Amazon treating humans like servers. When you need to scale fast you fire up some more and when you're done you shut them down. That's basically what's happenin

Amazon treating humans like servers. When you need to scale fast you fire up some more and when you're done you shut them down. That's basically what's happening here. Question is, are we OK with it...?

mcguire 5y ago
Apparently: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27664846 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27664846
booleandilemma 5y ago
Like cattle not people?
tyingq 5y ago
I would guess this only works for so long. I'm sure there's a big supply of people that will fall for it, but it's not an infinite supply.
sschueller 5y ago
In essence financial slavery...
- npteljes 5y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage_slavery https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage_slavery
zouhair 5y ago
Seeing the amount of people still using Amazon I'd say as a society we are more than OK with it. Some life destroyed is worth the price of having my toilet paper sent to my home diligently.
- Clubber 5y ago
  There are other ways of inducing reform than boycotting the company. Maybe we can pressure our politicians for better workers rights rather than worse like we've gotten over the last 4 decades.
  - pjerem 5y ago
    I agree with that. While I don’t morally agree with Amazon policies, we must understand that companies will always optimize to win the capitalism’s game whatever the human cost. However, as a society, our role is not to ask Amazon (or whatever misbehaving company) to stop being bad guys, but to change the rules of the game so that immoral behavior ceases to be a competitive advantage.
    - FredPret 5y ago
      Publicly-traded companies are owned by a subset of society. Sure we can tell them to stop being bad guys. Ever hear of activist shareholders?
      - Clubber 5y ago
        The only activist shareholders I'm aware of, like Carl Icahn are activists for themselves. Plus, you really have to have 50% + 1 to make a difference, and then there are still mechanisms against you. You just need to come up with half of $1.74 trillion as of today, and of course enough people who want to sell. No, I think there are more effective strategies than that.
        FredPret 5y ago
        It's only ineffective because it hasn't been tried at scale. If you can co-ordinate enough voters to move an election, you can co-ordinate enough money to influence corporate governance. A lot of AGMs are simply rubber-stamping exercises (look at how many directors are voted in again and again with 80-95% of the vote?!) It does not have to be this way. You don't have to literally own Amazon to change their ways - in theory you can buy one share and ask some pointed questions at the AGM. If the other shareholders see that change is in their best interest, they will vote accordingly. Sadly, most are asleep at the wheel.
- FredPret 5y ago
  I don't know about that. A lot of people don't know how awful they are yet. Personally I've been a very enthusiastic Amazon shopper until I started seeing the recent surge of Amazon job reviews.
  - 29083011397778 5y ago
    It was never a big thing until a package showed up two-days after it was ordered, on a Sunday. From then on Amazon has been the Rube Goldberg-esque machine that runs on human suffering between my girlfriend and I. While it had been mentioned in the past, it was the delivery on a Sunday that really helped drive the point home, somehow.
  - zouhair 5y ago
    I didn't buy a thing from Amazon since 2005/6 and I am still alive. Doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things but matters to me.
- npteljes 5y ago
  I doubt people have the capacity to care like that. I mean, humans as species. What's able to salvage this is good regulation.
fogetti 5y ago
I would say you are probably talking to the wrong audience here. Apparently those flex drivers were OK with it, for unknown reasons.

mcguire 5y ago

Apparently: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27664846 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27664846

booleandilemma 5y ago

Like cattle not people?

tyingq 5y ago

I would guess this only works for so long. I'm sure there's a big supply of people that will fall for it, but it's not an infinite supply.

sschueller 5y ago

In essence financial slavery...

npteljes 5y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage_slavery https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage_slavery

zouhair 5y ago

Seeing the amount of people still using Amazon I'd say as a society we are more than OK with it. Some life destroyed is worth the price of having my toilet paper sent to my home diligently.

Clubber 5y ago
There are other ways of inducing reform than boycotting the company. Maybe we can pressure our politicians for better workers rights rather than worse like we've gotten over the last 4 decades.
- pjerem 5y ago
  I agree with that. While I don’t morally agree with Amazon policies, we must understand that companies will always optimize to win the capitalism’s game whatever the human cost. However, as a society, our role is not to ask Amazon (or whatever misbehaving company) to stop being bad guys, but to change the rules of the game so that immoral behavior ceases to be a competitive advantage.
  - FredPret 5y ago
    Publicly-traded companies are owned by a subset of society. Sure we can tell them to stop being bad guys. Ever hear of activist shareholders?
    - Clubber 5y ago
      The only activist shareholders I'm aware of, like Carl Icahn are activists for themselves. Plus, you really have to have 50% + 1 to make a difference, and then there are still mechanisms against you. You just need to come up with half of $1.74 trillion as of today, and of course enough people who want to sell. No, I think there are more effective strategies than that.
      - FredPret 5y ago
        It's only ineffective because it hasn't been tried at scale. If you can co-ordinate enough voters to move an election, you can co-ordinate enough money to influence corporate governance. A lot of AGMs are simply rubber-stamping exercises (look at how many directors are voted in again and again with 80-95% of the vote?!) It does not have to be this way. You don't have to literally own Amazon to change their ways - in theory you can buy one share and ask some pointed questions at the AGM. If the other shareholders see that change is in their best interest, they will vote accordingly. Sadly, most are asleep at the wheel.
FredPret 5y ago
I don't know about that. A lot of people don't know how awful they are yet. Personally I've been a very enthusiastic Amazon shopper until I started seeing the recent surge of Amazon job reviews.
- 29083011397778 5y ago
  It was never a big thing until a package showed up two-days after it was ordered, on a Sunday. From then on Amazon has been the Rube Goldberg-esque machine that runs on human suffering between my girlfriend and I. While it had been mentioned in the past, it was the delivery on a Sunday that really helped drive the point home, somehow.
- zouhair 5y ago
  I didn't buy a thing from Amazon since 2005/6 and I am still alive. Doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things but matters to me.
npteljes 5y ago
I doubt people have the capacity to care like that. I mean, humans as species. What's able to salvage this is good regulation.

fogetti 5y ago

I would say you are probably talking to the wrong audience here. Apparently those flex drivers were OK with it, for unknown reasons.