7 ms·

It's impossible for me to have a positive view of Amazon (the company) at this point. There's way too much evidence pointing to the contrary.

by arberx 5y ago

chad_strategic 5y ago
Your comment is a broad generalization, yet provides no examples of evidence.
- chad_strategic 5y ago
  Seriously? I get down-voted for calling someone out. Let me change the wording so we can see the hypocrisy. "It's impossible for me to have a positive view of White People (the company) at this point. There's way too much evidence pointing to the contrary."
  - arberx 5y ago
    A company is completely different from a group or race of individuals. A company is a single entity (individual).
    - InitialLastName 5y ago
      Not just that, but (slave labor aside) a company and its employees are voluntarily associated. Voluntary associations are the kind of thing we (as a society) are usually fine with judging people based on (as opposed to features that are relatively immutable like race).
      - jdavis703 5y ago
        In many US localities it’s illegal to discriminate against military veterans. Increasingly we’re seeing police being added to lists of “protected classes” too. This attitude is (unfortunately) changing in society.
        dragonwriter 5y ago
        > In many US localities it’s illegal to discriminate against military veterans Military veterans are federally protected against negative discrimination, and in most public employment at all levels, and many private employment contexts, are also beneficiaries of explicit positive discrimination.
        amyjess 5y ago
        > In many US localities it’s illegal to discriminate against military veterans. We also had a draft for a very long time, and I'm sure that when these laws were put into place, there were a large portion of draftees who were at risk for being discriminated against for something they were forced by the government to do.
      - chad_strategic 5y ago
        If you see slave labor, then you have an obligation to report it your local authorities. update: see above
        lmilcin 5y ago
        Can you point to the law or are you making the law as you go? I remind you, your parent comment says "Your comment is a broad generalization, yet provides no examples of evidence." So if you point out people not putting evidence, at least demand the same standard for your own posts.
        lovich 5y ago
        The slave labor I am aware of currently is being used by the authorities
      - chad_strategic 5y ago
        If you see slave labor, then you have an obligation to report it to your local authorities, but we all know your claim is baseless. The argument is a nice collection of words that unfortunately might buy you some "street cred" or should I say give a "woke" status with your liberal college associates. This type of carefully constructed dog whistle of a comment will “level up” your points here on this echo chamber that has become Hacker news. What is amusing is when placing those words in a sentence they fail to make a valid argument. The sheer fact you used the word “immutable” clearly shows the limitation of your vocabulary. “Immutable” in a conversation about race? Somebody learned a new vocabulary word and took a break from their (python) code and posted a comment on Hacker News. Now that I have successfully wasted my time getting drawn into a senseless debate, admittedly of my own creation. I should probably check on my AWS servers and maybe later today I will order something on Amazon, well because it allows me to spend more time with my family instead of tracking down some sprinkler parts at 5 different Home Depot burning up a bunch of fossil fuels. But as will nobody reading this comment, thread or Vice article, I won’t be canceling my AWS account or prime account because of the terrible injustices of one NLBR violation that a security officer committed at an Amazon warehouse. Wasn’t it Kennedy, who said: “Give Me Convenience or Give Me Death”.
        InitialLastName 5y ago
        The slave labor reference was an attempt to duck the troll who (absent it) would say "Slavery isn't a voluntary association with a company and X, Y, and Z are pretty much slavery so there". If you had bothered to engage with my actual point (that our social norms make it more acceptable to judge people on their voluntary associations and actions than on their involuntary features) you might be less frustrated.
        chad_strategic 5y ago
        There might be section missing. Regardless, I stand by what I said. "I recommend you get back to Object Oriented Immutable code before your economic provider involuntary associates your comments on this website via the intersectionality and "color" privilege of bias of your comments and declares you are wasting the time of economic organization!" In plain English, get back to writing code, brogrammer.
  - lmilcin 5y ago
    You are being downvoted for obvious and blatant disregard of frequent and abundant "examples of evidence" already available on HN. There is so many submissions on HN regarding Amazon that I pretty much expect it to get its own dedicated section pretty soon.
    - chad_strategic 5y ago
      That's not my interpretation of the article. One security officer took some confiscated "material". One incident.
      - lmilcin 5y ago
        The article described one incident, true. But the comment was aimed at the fact there are other incidents regularly posted on HN. If you can't use Google, try to learn it. It is really fun and useful. Certainly something I would do if I were you, before I posted any more on the topic.
        chad_strategic 5y ago
        I just googled amazon... This is what I found. 1. AWS is an incredible software/suite /cloud service that I use and millions of others use on regular basis. 2. Amazon prime allows me to purchase products at my convenience. 3. Amazon Fresh allows me to grocery shop with out having to leave the house, as grocery shopping can be time-consuming. 4. Amazon Prime Video isn't too great, but it provides healthy competition to NBC, CBS, NetFlix, etc... 5. If it wasn't for Amazon, Walmart would have become the only and number 1 relatier in America in the early 2000's. 6. We still have high unemployment in America and not enough workers. I didn’t like my job a few years ago, so I quit and these people can to. But just a warning Mr. Amazon hater. Sounds like you got an axe to grind, but hey that’s cool. Let me give you a tip, it’s actually a stock tip. Get on the phone and call your financial advisor and tell him that you want to return all the profits you have made off of AMZN, because you feel bad the NLBR violation. What is that? You don’t have own AMZN stock? Do you own an index stock? SPY, QQQ? Yeap you profited. Try to explain to your financial advisor how to give those profits back. Look at your hands… you are part of the problem. So you might want to tone down your liberal hype, well cause you are just making your argument look weak.
- davidcbc 5y ago
  The link they are commenting on is part of the evidence, which I assume is why they commented on it
- ahoy 5y ago
  This is the comments section on that very evidence.
paxys 5y ago
Is it possible to have a positive view of any large company? They are all doing a lot of good things and a few bad things. Beyond that it depends on how good their PR department is.
- Apocryphon 5y ago
  Would like to know if there are any large companies that actually defy this general rule. Costco is a common counter-example, but even they’re imperfect: https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/11/business/costco-5-dollar-chicken/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/11/business/costco-5-dollar-chic...
  - pseudalopex 5y ago
    Few people expect perfection.
- arberx 5y ago
  Hmm maybe "positive view" is the wrong approach. I think "impossible to not have a negative view" is better wording. Indiffernce is generally how I feel about a lot of companies. My perspective on Amazon is negative.
- Causality1 5y ago
  Cox Cable fought for their customers. What did it get them? A billion dollar fine.
newsyyswen 5y ago
I wonder when the change happened. It seems like there's a fairly broad consensus now, but different people seem to cite different time periods for when things took a bad turn. I had consistently great experiences ~3-8 years ago, but I remember needing to be careful about 3rd party sellers towards the end of that time period. Thing is, I stopped ordering online about a year before the pandemic started. When I returned to Amazon 18 months ago, it felt like the balance had shifted towards the majority of listings being fraud/low quality/unexpectedly comingled/etc. Personally, I blame a shift in perspective. It feels like their retail teams' views on who "The Customer" was shifted from the person placing the order, to the 3rd-party sellers. When do y'all think that happened? 2015? 2017? 2019?
- onli 5y ago
  For me I can restore it in my blog. At the beginning of 2019 a first article about how Amazon might not be the best option to buy everything anymore, citing the bad quality of user reviews, the potential problem with fakes and the subpar experience with the website (specifically: The search evidently being skewed towards sponsored and not towards good offers, and missing filters to find products by their properties). Then summer 2019 a report on a disastrous support experience (in a case that included a received obvious fake) and the decision to not buy there anymore. That was very fast, in retrospective. I liked Amazon quite a bit before that, the early 2019 articles even clearly reads like that. No criticism before that. Instead a few positive support experiences. But that's just me, and not necessarily a US perspective. The fake problem for example I thought to be more prominent outside of Europe. On the other hand, that amazon seemed to fight against unions had been reported here before, to boycott the site because of that was a fairly common position. Also, I wonder how it would have been if I had been more invested into the ecosystem - there is no Kindle in my home, no Echo, and I started to buy there relatively late. Though a site of mine used their affiliate marketing program even back in 2011...
- ashtonkem 5y ago
  It’s not just views on Amazon as a company to do business with. Attitudes around these parts have soured on Amazon as a company to work for too.
alfalfasprout 5y ago
Thing is, at this point Amazon has mastered the art of getting away with employee-hostile practices. Take, as a separate example, their PIP culture. The bar to get into amazon is fairly low (compared to peer companies) and so they tend to use PIP to maintain a high turnover and filter out unproductive employees. There's no shortage of engineers wanting to apply to Amazon (increasingly from overseas) and this churn seems to be OK because they have very good systems in place to onboard employees fast. For an engineer early in their career having AMZN on their resume can be worth the pain. At least among my peers in senior and staff/principal levels there's very little desire to jump ship to amazon though. Similarly, they can treat warehouse workers like crap because there are others willing to line up to take their place. Regardless of the conditions. What it boils down to is that many of amazon's employees simply don't have a better choice. And I'm not sure what can really help with that.
- cratermoon 5y ago
  I spent a year working at a very large company that's well known in my part of the country, not because I wanted to work there, but because it was nice to have on my resume. But at least their compensation wasn't back-loaded.
- omegaworks 5y ago
  >I'm not sure what can really help with that. A basic social safety net. If companies are forced to compete with minimum living standards that are guaranteed to all people, it prevents their worst excesses.

It's impossible for me to have a positive view of Amazon (the company) at this point. There's way too much evidence pointing to the contrary.

by arberx 5y ago

It's impossible for me to have a positive view of Amazon (the company) at this point. There's way too much evidence pointing to the contrary.

chad_strategic 5y ago

Your comment is a broad generalization, yet provides no examples of evidence.

chad_strategic 5y ago
Seriously? I get down-voted for calling someone out. Let me change the wording so we can see the hypocrisy. "It's impossible for me to have a positive view of White People (the company) at this point. There's way too much evidence pointing to the contrary."
- arberx 5y ago
  A company is completely different from a group or race of individuals. A company is a single entity (individual).
  - InitialLastName 5y ago
    Not just that, but (slave labor aside) a company and its employees are voluntarily associated. Voluntary associations are the kind of thing we (as a society) are usually fine with judging people based on (as opposed to features that are relatively immutable like race).
    - jdavis703 5y ago
      In many US localities it’s illegal to discriminate against military veterans. Increasingly we’re seeing police being added to lists of “protected classes” too. This attitude is (unfortunately) changing in society.
      - dragonwriter 5y ago
        > In many US localities it’s illegal to discriminate against military veterans Military veterans are federally protected against negative discrimination, and in most public employment at all levels, and many private employment contexts, are also beneficiaries of explicit positive discrimination.
      - amyjess 5y ago
        > In many US localities it’s illegal to discriminate against military veterans. We also had a draft for a very long time, and I'm sure that when these laws were put into place, there were a large portion of draftees who were at risk for being discriminated against for something they were forced by the government to do.
    - chad_strategic 5y ago
      If you see slave labor, then you have an obligation to report it your local authorities. update: see above
      - lmilcin 5y ago
        Can you point to the law or are you making the law as you go? I remind you, your parent comment says "Your comment is a broad generalization, yet provides no examples of evidence." So if you point out people not putting evidence, at least demand the same standard for your own posts.
      - lovich 5y ago
        The slave labor I am aware of currently is being used by the authorities
    - chad_strategic 5y ago
      If you see slave labor, then you have an obligation to report it to your local authorities, but we all know your claim is baseless. The argument is a nice collection of words that unfortunately might buy you some "street cred" or should I say give a "woke" status with your liberal college associates. This type of carefully constructed dog whistle of a comment will “level up” your points here on this echo chamber that has become Hacker news. What is amusing is when placing those words in a sentence they fail to make a valid argument. The sheer fact you used the word “immutable” clearly shows the limitation of your vocabulary. “Immutable” in a conversation about race? Somebody learned a new vocabulary word and took a break from their (python) code and posted a comment on Hacker News. Now that I have successfully wasted my time getting drawn into a senseless debate, admittedly of my own creation. I should probably check on my AWS servers and maybe later today I will order something on Amazon, well because it allows me to spend more time with my family instead of tracking down some sprinkler parts at 5 different Home Depot burning up a bunch of fossil fuels. But as will nobody reading this comment, thread or Vice article, I won’t be canceling my AWS account or prime account because of the terrible injustices of one NLBR violation that a security officer committed at an Amazon warehouse. Wasn’t it Kennedy, who said: “Give Me Convenience or Give Me Death”.
      - InitialLastName 5y ago
        The slave labor reference was an attempt to duck the troll who (absent it) would say "Slavery isn't a voluntary association with a company and X, Y, and Z are pretty much slavery so there". If you had bothered to engage with my actual point (that our social norms make it more acceptable to judge people on their voluntary associations and actions than on their involuntary features) you might be less frustrated.
        chad_strategic 5y ago
        There might be section missing. Regardless, I stand by what I said. "I recommend you get back to Object Oriented Immutable code before your economic provider involuntary associates your comments on this website via the intersectionality and "color" privilege of bias of your comments and declares you are wasting the time of economic organization!" In plain English, get back to writing code, brogrammer.
- lmilcin 5y ago
  You are being downvoted for obvious and blatant disregard of frequent and abundant "examples of evidence" already available on HN. There is so many submissions on HN regarding Amazon that I pretty much expect it to get its own dedicated section pretty soon.
  - chad_strategic 5y ago
    That's not my interpretation of the article. One security officer took some confiscated "material". One incident.
    - lmilcin 5y ago
      The article described one incident, true. But the comment was aimed at the fact there are other incidents regularly posted on HN. If you can't use Google, try to learn it. It is really fun and useful. Certainly something I would do if I were you, before I posted any more on the topic.
      - chad_strategic 5y ago
        I just googled amazon... This is what I found. 1. AWS is an incredible software/suite /cloud service that I use and millions of others use on regular basis. 2. Amazon prime allows me to purchase products at my convenience. 3. Amazon Fresh allows me to grocery shop with out having to leave the house, as grocery shopping can be time-consuming. 4. Amazon Prime Video isn't too great, but it provides healthy competition to NBC, CBS, NetFlix, etc... 5. If it wasn't for Amazon, Walmart would have become the only and number 1 relatier in America in the early 2000's. 6. We still have high unemployment in America and not enough workers. I didn’t like my job a few years ago, so I quit and these people can to. But just a warning Mr. Amazon hater. Sounds like you got an axe to grind, but hey that’s cool. Let me give you a tip, it’s actually a stock tip. Get on the phone and call your financial advisor and tell him that you want to return all the profits you have made off of AMZN, because you feel bad the NLBR violation. What is that? You don’t have own AMZN stock? Do you own an index stock? SPY, QQQ? Yeap you profited. Try to explain to your financial advisor how to give those profits back. Look at your hands… you are part of the problem. So you might want to tone down your liberal hype, well cause you are just making your argument look weak.
davidcbc 5y ago
The link they are commenting on is part of the evidence, which I assume is why they commented on it
ahoy 5y ago
This is the comments section on that very evidence.

paxys 5y ago

Is it possible to have a positive view of any large company? They are all doing a lot of good things and a few bad things. Beyond that it depends on how good their PR department is.

Apocryphon 5y ago
Would like to know if there are any large companies that actually defy this general rule. Costco is a common counter-example, but even they’re imperfect: https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/11/business/costco-5-dollar-chicken/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/11/business/costco-5-dollar-chic...
- pseudalopex 5y ago
  Few people expect perfection.
arberx 5y ago
Hmm maybe "positive view" is the wrong approach. I think "impossible to not have a negative view" is better wording. Indiffernce is generally how I feel about a lot of companies. My perspective on Amazon is negative.
Causality1 5y ago
Cox Cable fought for their customers. What did it get them? A billion dollar fine.

newsyyswen 5y ago

I wonder when the change happened. It seems like there's a fairly broad consensus now, but different people seem to cite different time periods for when things took a bad turn. I had consistently great experiences ~3-8 years ago, but I remember needing to be careful about 3rd party sellers towards the end of that time period. Thing is, I stopped ordering online about a year before the pandemic started. When I returned to Amazon 18 months ago, it felt like the balance had shifted towards the majority of listings being fraud/low quality/unexpectedly comingled/etc. Personally, I blame a shift in perspective. It feels like their retail teams' views on who "The Customer" was shifted from the person placing the order, to the 3rd-party sellers. When do y'all think that happened? 2015? 2017? 2019?

onli 5y ago
For me I can restore it in my blog. At the beginning of 2019 a first article about how Amazon might not be the best option to buy everything anymore, citing the bad quality of user reviews, the potential problem with fakes and the subpar experience with the website (specifically: The search evidently being skewed towards sponsored and not towards good offers, and missing filters to find products by their properties). Then summer 2019 a report on a disastrous support experience (in a case that included a received obvious fake) and the decision to not buy there anymore. That was very fast, in retrospective. I liked Amazon quite a bit before that, the early 2019 articles even clearly reads like that. No criticism before that. Instead a few positive support experiences. But that's just me, and not necessarily a US perspective. The fake problem for example I thought to be more prominent outside of Europe. On the other hand, that amazon seemed to fight against unions had been reported here before, to boycott the site because of that was a fairly common position. Also, I wonder how it would have been if I had been more invested into the ecosystem - there is no Kindle in my home, no Echo, and I started to buy there relatively late. Though a site of mine used their affiliate marketing program even back in 2011...
ashtonkem 5y ago
It’s not just views on Amazon as a company to do business with. Attitudes around these parts have soured on Amazon as a company to work for too.

alfalfasprout 5y ago

Thing is, at this point Amazon has mastered the art of getting away with employee-hostile practices. Take, as a separate example, their PIP culture. The bar to get into amazon is fairly low (compared to peer companies) and so they tend to use PIP to maintain a high turnover and filter out unproductive employees. There's no shortage of engineers wanting to apply to Amazon (increasingly from overseas) and this churn seems to be OK because they have very good systems in place to onboard employees fast. For an engineer early in their career having AMZN on their resume can be worth the pain. At least among my peers in senior and staff/principal levels there's very little desire to jump ship to amazon though. Similarly, they can treat warehouse workers like crap because there are others willing to line up to take their place. Regardless of the conditions. What it boils down to is that many of amazon's employees simply don't have a better choice. And I'm not sure what can really help with that.

cratermoon 5y ago
I spent a year working at a very large company that's well known in my part of the country, not because I wanted to work there, but because it was nice to have on my resume. But at least their compensation wasn't back-loaded.
omegaworks 5y ago
>I'm not sure what can really help with that. A basic social safety net. If companies are forced to compete with minimum living standards that are guaranteed to all people, it prevents their worst excesses.