4 ms·

Dumb question: why is this not allowed? Presumably, Apple paid Amazon to reduce the number of ads. What's so wrong about that? All companies allow large ente

Dumb question: why is this not allowed? Presumably, Apple paid Amazon to reduce the number of ads. What's so wrong about that? All companies allow large enterprise customers (who drive high revenue), to have custom / tailored offerings based on their requests.

neogodless 3y ago
It's allowed. The word in the article was scrutiny. The law suit is not about the ads, per se. It's about price-fixing, which you can probably agree should not be allowed.
kube-system 3y ago
When a company controls a large part of a market, regulators give extra scrutiny to any efforts that company may make that harms competition.
- scarface_74 3y ago
  You mean 36% of e-commerce and an even smaller portion of all retail?
  - kube-system 3y ago
    Yes, 36% (I believe it's actually 37.6%) of e-commerce is a large portion. It is 587% larger than the second place competitor.
    - scarface_74 3y ago
      Yes because Amazon used unfair practices to crush small competitors like Walmart…
      - kube-system 3y ago
        No, I don't think I've seen that being claimed. It has been claimed that they have used their anticompetitive practices against others. Having Walmart as a competitor doesn't mean that they don't have a dominant market position with power to abuse at their disposal.
        MichaelZuo 3y ago
        How do they have the 'power to abuse' with only 37.6% of the e-commerce marketshare? And probably less than 15% of overall retail marketshare?
        kube-system 3y ago
        That is plenty large enough of a chunk to have significant economic influence. As a reference point, it's about the same percent marketshare OPEC has on the oil market. Even though the topics are frequently discussed together, anticompetitive behavior is something different than being a monopoly and one does not require the other.
        IntelMiner 3y ago
        What's Walmart's market share of online retail? Conversely what's Amazon's share of physical detail? (Preferably excluding whole foods since that's an arguably different business to selling cheap electronics and other junk) It's as if the two companies operate in... different spheres!
        MichaelZuo 3y ago
        Did you mistake my comment with someone else’s?
        CyberDildonics 3y ago
        Their comment is a completely clear and coherent reply to yours, there is no reason to think this is a mistake.
  - vkou 3y ago
    Someone who owned 36% of all the land in the United States would certainly be considered to 'controlling a large share of real estate'. In the case of Amazon, it's even worse, because despite a 'mere' 36% market share, there is a lot of evidence that they have market-moving pricing power. They generally exercise it by restricting the prices sellers can charge in other stores. This happens to almost all sellers on Amazon.
paxys 3y ago
The issue is primarily about counterfeiting, which is illegal regardless of the companies involved and the deals between them. Samsung has an Amazon store, and other companies bid for ad spots shown right on the official store page which link to illegal knockoffs of Samsung products. Samsung complains, and Amazon says "sorry we can't help it, that's just how things work". Then Apple comes along, and Amazon magically cleans up their store page (demonstrating that they have the ability to do so), but leaves the rest of them as-is. So now the take away is – if you don't sign an exclusive agreement with Amazon they will give counterfeiters full access to your products and customers, and that can be easily challenged in court (which is exactly what the FTC is doing right now).
- scarface_74 3y ago
  Apple doesn’t have an exclusive agreement with Amazon for online sales. I agree though bidding on a trademark where you can advertise as a competitor when someone explicitly searches for a brand should be considered copyright infringement. It’s definitely a horrible user experience - Apple, Google, and Amazon all do it
  - fragmede 3y ago
    why would it be copyright infringement and not trademark infringement?
    - scarface_74 3y ago
      You are absolutely correct.
  - lovepronmostly 3y ago
    Apple does it in the app store. At least for me, search for any app by name, the top 1 or 2 results is never the app who's name I typed in exactly. Just searched for "Netflix". First result is some app called "Chewy" (with [ad]) next to it. Search for "GitHub". First result is some app called "ServerCat". Search for "Grand Theft Auto". First result is some app call "One State RP". Search for "23andMe". First result is for "BodyFast: ..."

neogodless 3y ago

It's allowed. The word in the article was scrutiny. The law suit is not about the ads, per se. It's about price-fixing, which you can probably agree should not be allowed.

kube-system 3y ago

When a company controls a large part of a market, regulators give extra scrutiny to any efforts that company may make that harms competition.

scarface_74 3y ago
You mean 36% of e-commerce and an even smaller portion of all retail?
- kube-system 3y ago
  Yes, 36% (I believe it's actually 37.6%) of e-commerce is a large portion. It is 587% larger than the second place competitor.
  - scarface_74 3y ago
    Yes because Amazon used unfair practices to crush small competitors like Walmart…
    - kube-system 3y ago
      No, I don't think I've seen that being claimed. It has been claimed that they have used their anticompetitive practices against others. Having Walmart as a competitor doesn't mean that they don't have a dominant market position with power to abuse at their disposal.
      - MichaelZuo 3y ago
        How do they have the 'power to abuse' with only 37.6% of the e-commerce marketshare? And probably less than 15% of overall retail marketshare?
        kube-system 3y ago
        That is plenty large enough of a chunk to have significant economic influence. As a reference point, it's about the same percent marketshare OPEC has on the oil market. Even though the topics are frequently discussed together, anticompetitive behavior is something different than being a monopoly and one does not require the other.
        IntelMiner 3y ago
        What's Walmart's market share of online retail? Conversely what's Amazon's share of physical detail? (Preferably excluding whole foods since that's an arguably different business to selling cheap electronics and other junk) It's as if the two companies operate in... different spheres!
        MichaelZuo 3y ago
        Did you mistake my comment with someone else’s?
        CyberDildonics 3y ago
        Their comment is a completely clear and coherent reply to yours, there is no reason to think this is a mistake.
- vkou 3y ago
  Someone who owned 36% of all the land in the United States would certainly be considered to 'controlling a large share of real estate'. In the case of Amazon, it's even worse, because despite a 'mere' 36% market share, there is a lot of evidence that they have market-moving pricing power. They generally exercise it by restricting the prices sellers can charge in other stores. This happens to almost all sellers on Amazon.

paxys 3y ago

The issue is primarily about counterfeiting, which is illegal regardless of the companies involved and the deals between them. Samsung has an Amazon store, and other companies bid for ad spots shown right on the official store page which link to illegal knockoffs of Samsung products. Samsung complains, and Amazon says "sorry we can't help it, that's just how things work". Then Apple comes along, and Amazon magically cleans up their store page (demonstrating that they have the ability to do so), but leaves the rest of them as-is. So now the take away is – if you don't sign an exclusive agreement with Amazon they will give counterfeiters full access to your products and customers, and that can be easily challenged in court (which is exactly what the FTC is doing right now).

scarface_74 3y ago
Apple doesn’t have an exclusive agreement with Amazon for online sales. I agree though bidding on a trademark where you can advertise as a competitor when someone explicitly searches for a brand should be considered copyright infringement. It’s definitely a horrible user experience - Apple, Google, and Amazon all do it
- fragmede 3y ago
  why would it be copyright infringement and not trademark infringement?
  - scarface_74 3y ago
    You are absolutely correct.
- lovepronmostly 3y ago
  Apple does it in the app store. At least for me, search for any app by name, the top 1 or 2 results is never the app who's name I typed in exactly. Just searched for "Netflix". First result is some app called "Chewy" (with [ad]) next to it. Search for "GitHub". First result is some app called "ServerCat". Search for "Grand Theft Auto". First result is some app call "One State RP". Search for "23andMe". First result is for "BodyFast: ..."