> The only way to compete is to sell used stuff or make your own products (or provide a marketplace for those things). The fat head (large incumbents) and the l

> The only way to compete is to sell used stuff or make your own products (or provide a marketplace for those things). The fat head (large incumbents) and the long tail (artisanal shops) will thrive, but the middle of the distribution will suffer. This is so far from being true. Scale isn't always a winner. You can pick a product category that is sold by Amazon, Walmart, Home Depot, etc, that makes up a minuscule fraction of their total business and turn it into a business that does $10-50 million in sales. You can buy things cheaper than they can, you can sell things for more money. You can focus on being the best darn seller of widgets that's out there. The problem is that this kind of e-commerce isn't really that sexy. It also relies on a lot more skills than your normal technical person possesses. If you can manage customer service, distribution, 3rd party fulfillment, global sourcing, vendor relations, etc., etc., you might just be able to put a kick-ass website in front of this and sell a lot of products.