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The key difference between Amazon and eBay is the amount of risk to the consumer. There is NONE with Amazon. There is zero chance that you will lose your mone

The key difference between Amazon and eBay is the amount of risk to the consumer. There is NONE with Amazon. There is zero chance that you will lose your money if you get scammed by someone into a bad product. Everything else that people complain about is a function of selection vs curation: the more selection Amazon adds the more likely there is to be low-quality junk. I'm sure if they aggressively curated stuff, we'd see HackerNews stories get 1000 upvotes with headlines like "Amazon won't list my startup's products!" and people will be screaming about how it's not Amazon's job to censor or to curate, they should just be the "Everything Store", and let intelligent consumers like us decide.

lotsofpulp 5y ago
No one is asking Amazon to curate. Just a simple filter option to only show stuff sourced by Amazon itself (which they removed years ago), that is NOT commingled with other random sellers’ junk, would be sufficient. In other words, do the job that a retailer should be doing. Of course, Amazon does not want to be a low profit margin retailer, which is fine, but then it also deserves to be called a more expensive Aliexpress.
everforward 5y ago
My impression as an outsider was that eBay is pretty close on that front if you pay with PayPal. From what I've heard, PayPal aggressively sides with the buyer, to the point where there are all kinds of scams you can run as a buyer. Also, the risk isn't zero. https://www.newsweek.com/man-buys-7000-camera-amazon-receives-two-empty-boxes-instead-1594970 https://www.newsweek.com/man-buys-7000-camera-amazon-receive... There are others, but that's the one that stuck in my head. > Everything else that people complain about is a function of selection vs curation: the more selection Amazon adds the more likely there is to be low-quality junk. I'm sure if they aggressively curated stuff, we'd see HackerNews stories get 1000 upvotes with headlines like "Amazon won't list my startup's products!" and people will be screaming about how it's not Amazon's job to censor or to curate, they should just be the "Everything Store", and let intelligent consumers like us decide. This is an over-simplification of the issue. I don't mind that Amazon sells crappy products; I buy some of the crappy products because I only need them to work once or for a week. What I do mind is their total lack of competence in stopping people from passing off shitty products as good ones. I don't even know where to start the complaints on that. Inventory comingling resulting in people getting fake products or even empty boxes. Recycling ASIN's resulting in a shitty product inheriting a good product's reviews, or even inheriting reviews from an entirely unrelated product. Allowing user reviews, and then doing such a poor job of policing them that they're actively unhelpful due to gaming them. They're basically digitized Walmart, except they allow people to use their brand to pretend their cheap crap isn't cheap crap. I'm at the point where I only buy from Amazon if I'm intending to buy cheap junk, because I don't feel like dealing with the hassle of figuring out which items are dropshipped at a 10x markup and which are legitimately worthwhile.
buildbot 5y ago
Nope, I lost 2.5K due to an empty box being shipped to me, and then amazon denying the return and lying during the subsequent chargeback.

lotsofpulp 5y ago

No one is asking Amazon to curate. Just a simple filter option to only show stuff sourced by Amazon itself (which they removed years ago), that is NOT commingled with other random sellers’ junk, would be sufficient. In other words, do the job that a retailer should be doing. Of course, Amazon does not want to be a low profit margin retailer, which is fine, but then it also deserves to be called a more expensive Aliexpress.

everforward 5y ago

My impression as an outsider was that eBay is pretty close on that front if you pay with PayPal. From what I've heard, PayPal aggressively sides with the buyer, to the point where there are all kinds of scams you can run as a buyer. Also, the risk isn't zero. https://www.newsweek.com/man-buys-7000-camera-amazon-receives-two-empty-boxes-instead-1594970 https://www.newsweek.com/man-buys-7000-camera-amazon-receive... There are others, but that's the one that stuck in my head. > Everything else that people complain about is a function of selection vs curation: the more selection Amazon adds the more likely there is to be low-quality junk. I'm sure if they aggressively curated stuff, we'd see HackerNews stories get 1000 upvotes with headlines like "Amazon won't list my startup's products!" and people will be screaming about how it's not Amazon's job to censor or to curate, they should just be the "Everything Store", and let intelligent consumers like us decide. This is an over-simplification of the issue. I don't mind that Amazon sells crappy products; I buy some of the crappy products because I only need them to work once or for a week. What I do mind is their total lack of competence in stopping people from passing off shitty products as good ones. I don't even know where to start the complaints on that. Inventory comingling resulting in people getting fake products or even empty boxes. Recycling ASIN's resulting in a shitty product inheriting a good product's reviews, or even inheriting reviews from an entirely unrelated product. Allowing user reviews, and then doing such a poor job of policing them that they're actively unhelpful due to gaming them. They're basically digitized Walmart, except they allow people to use their brand to pretend their cheap crap isn't cheap crap. I'm at the point where I only buy from Amazon if I'm intending to buy cheap junk, because I don't feel like dealing with the hassle of figuring out which items are dropshipped at a 10x markup and which are legitimately worthwhile.

buildbot 5y ago

Nope, I lost 2.5K due to an empty box being shipped to me, and then amazon denying the return and lying during the subsequent chargeback.