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I guess you're not familiar with the social-minded European person. They often prefer local businesses with a personality (I go to the book store and have a cha

by adrianb 13y ago

I guess you're not familiar with the social-minded European person. They often prefer local businesses with a personality (I go to the book store and have a chat with the owner and other customers... maybe drink a tea, read something right there...) to the big corporation, even when the big corporation offers the same products cheaper.

davidw 13y ago
Which is why Amazon was really struggling in France?
pauletienney 13y ago
You are not totally right. A lot a book sellers are suffering because of Internet competition (especially Amazon), in France.
GeorgeOrr 13y ago
If that's the case, why do they need to pass a law preventing giving the customers a discount? Apparently, it's the competition that doesn't like it. Oddly, customers like discounts and free shipping. Good thing the French government is there to set them straight.
- rustynails 13y ago
  Should we ban anti-dumping laws? Think about your post for a moment - if a company can afford to run at a loss long enough to destroy the competition, is that good in any way? There is always a balance between service and price ... If there is competition and a level playing field.
icebraining 13y ago
That's a great fairy tale. In reality, at least where I live, is that local businesses don't have accommodations for reading (unlike chain stores like Fnac), the employees can't tell Dostoyevsky from Dan Brown and the selection is simply terrible. So what's been happening is that chain stores have been eating independent book stores alive well before online shopping was widespread.
spongle 13y ago
That's what people portray us social minded Europeans as but realistically, the majority will tell local businesses to get fucked when it comes down to it. Why? Price, poor products and service and "blame it on the customer" culture. Local businesses have been hanging themselves for years on these fronts. Amazon sorts the above perfectly and you don't have to leave your house.
- yardie 13y ago
  Silly me. I bought a 50euro mouse from a local chain. I took it home and after 20 minutes didn't like the ergonomics. Then I got into a 20 minute battle of wits with the clerk (the clerk, not the manager or the owner!) because I had the gall to take it out the box and try and use it. The entire time in the back of my mind I'm thinking I could have bought the damn thing on Amazon for cheaper and would not have to put up with this bullshit. As an American in Europe I'm sympathetic to some of these stores, but a lot of them are going out of business through their own incompetence. Now I have a 50euro credit to a chain of stores that is bankrupt.
rmc 13y ago
Counter-Example: IKEA
- wuliwong 13y ago
  LOL. This is one of my favorite page of article comments I've ever seen on HN.
wuliwong 13y ago
The proof against what you are saying is the fact that the French government passed a law to force the market to be more "socially minded." If the "social-minded" European person was the majority, we wouldn't even be having this discussion.
- cabalamat 13y ago
  > If the "social-minded" European person was the majority, we wouldn't even be having this discussion. If the social-minded person wasn't the majority, they wouldn't have elected a government that would pass such a law. It's a co-ordination problem: if one person does X, nothing much happens, but if everyone does X, it makes a difference. So each person, thinking as an individual, can rationally say, "It doesn't make sense for me to do X", but the same person can also rationally say "it does make sense for everyone to do X".
  - ahomescu1 13y ago
    What you described sounds exactly like a prisoner's dilemma [1]. 1 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prisoner%27s_dilemma http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prisoner%27s_dilemma
  - wuliwong 13y ago
    You are kidding, right? The correlation between the elected officials in a country and the what the citizens want is much lower than the correlation between what an individual in that country wants and buys!
LekkoscPiwa 13y ago
No they don't prefer that. They vote with their money for Amazon. They vote with their money for Starbucks. Not for the local stores. The solution would be to let the free market forces work and force lazy buffons at local bookstores get their asses to work and be more competitive. Offer more than Amazon or Starbucks. But we can't do this, right? We cna't force local french people to work! That would be horrible! So we will subsidize them with that stupid law. At the end everyone wins here except for the reader who won't get what they want.
- nraynaud 13y ago
  it's the great fracture in French society, we see how toxic American life is, we don't want to go there, but we are lured there by the short term economic forces and Hollywood culture. Because on the short term economies of scale reduce the price, but on the long term they destroy standards of living, the fabric of the society (through individualism) and the economic resilience (economic inefficiencies are also local buffers against mishaps, think of local stocks, semi-finished products standing on a shelf).
  - LekkoscPiwa 13y ago
    well, if that's all true - sounds like socialist politician speech propaganda to me - then why regular French person on a street would rather go to Starbucks or buy at Amazon? What you clearly don't understand is that if you prevent laws like this from occurring, then French cafe owners or bookstore owners would be forced by the market force - competition - to innovate. Create better service or product for their customers. If a cafe owner would succeed - and not be penalized with 75% tax - then he could open more and more cafes, having a franchise, succesfully competing with Starbucks. And if his innovative ideas were good enough, he could even start threating Starbucks position in the US. But that will never happen. Why? Because with Government protection on his side there will be no market force (i.e. customers who prefer competition) to force him to innovate. He will just sit there 8-5 like rest of the French society thinking that a GOvernment edict can somehow change the world in which he's living. It can't. Because people already voted with their money clearly showing winners and losers. And unless losers get to work, they'll be just that. Loosers.

by adrianb 13y ago

davidw 13y ago

Which is why Amazon was really struggling in France?

pauletienney 13y ago

You are not totally right. A lot a book sellers are suffering because of Internet competition (especially Amazon), in France.

GeorgeOrr 13y ago

If that's the case, why do they need to pass a law preventing giving the customers a discount? Apparently, it's the competition that doesn't like it. Oddly, customers like discounts and free shipping. Good thing the French government is there to set them straight.

rustynails 13y ago
Should we ban anti-dumping laws? Think about your post for a moment - if a company can afford to run at a loss long enough to destroy the competition, is that good in any way? There is always a balance between service and price ... If there is competition and a level playing field.

icebraining 13y ago

That's a great fairy tale. In reality, at least where I live, is that local businesses don't have accommodations for reading (unlike chain stores like Fnac), the employees can't tell Dostoyevsky from Dan Brown and the selection is simply terrible. So what's been happening is that chain stores have been eating independent book stores alive well before online shopping was widespread.

spongle 13y ago

That's what people portray us social minded Europeans as but realistically, the majority will tell local businesses to get fucked when it comes down to it. Why? Price, poor products and service and "blame it on the customer" culture. Local businesses have been hanging themselves for years on these fronts. Amazon sorts the above perfectly and you don't have to leave your house.

yardie 13y ago
Silly me. I bought a 50euro mouse from a local chain. I took it home and after 20 minutes didn't like the ergonomics. Then I got into a 20 minute battle of wits with the clerk (the clerk, not the manager or the owner!) because I had the gall to take it out the box and try and use it. The entire time in the back of my mind I'm thinking I could have bought the damn thing on Amazon for cheaper and would not have to put up with this bullshit. As an American in Europe I'm sympathetic to some of these stores, but a lot of them are going out of business through their own incompetence. Now I have a 50euro credit to a chain of stores that is bankrupt.

rmc 13y ago

Counter-Example: IKEA

wuliwong 13y ago
LOL. This is one of my favorite page of article comments I've ever seen on HN.

wuliwong 13y ago

The proof against what you are saying is the fact that the French government passed a law to force the market to be more "socially minded." If the "social-minded" European person was the majority, we wouldn't even be having this discussion.

cabalamat 13y ago
> If the "social-minded" European person was the majority, we wouldn't even be having this discussion. If the social-minded person wasn't the majority, they wouldn't have elected a government that would pass such a law. It's a co-ordination problem: if one person does X, nothing much happens, but if everyone does X, it makes a difference. So each person, thinking as an individual, can rationally say, "It doesn't make sense for me to do X", but the same person can also rationally say "it does make sense for everyone to do X".
- ahomescu1 13y ago
  What you described sounds exactly like a prisoner's dilemma [1]. 1 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prisoner%27s_dilemma http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prisoner%27s_dilemma
- wuliwong 13y ago
  You are kidding, right? The correlation between the elected officials in a country and the what the citizens want is much lower than the correlation between what an individual in that country wants and buys!

LekkoscPiwa 13y ago

No they don't prefer that. They vote with their money for Amazon. They vote with their money for Starbucks. Not for the local stores. The solution would be to let the free market forces work and force lazy buffons at local bookstores get their asses to work and be more competitive. Offer more than Amazon or Starbucks. But we can't do this, right? We cna't force local french people to work! That would be horrible! So we will subsidize them with that stupid law. At the end everyone wins here except for the reader who won't get what they want.

nraynaud 13y ago
it's the great fracture in French society, we see how toxic American life is, we don't want to go there, but we are lured there by the short term economic forces and Hollywood culture. Because on the short term economies of scale reduce the price, but on the long term they destroy standards of living, the fabric of the society (through individualism) and the economic resilience (economic inefficiencies are also local buffers against mishaps, think of local stocks, semi-finished products standing on a shelf).
- LekkoscPiwa 13y ago
  well, if that's all true - sounds like socialist politician speech propaganda to me - then why regular French person on a street would rather go to Starbucks or buy at Amazon? What you clearly don't understand is that if you prevent laws like this from occurring, then French cafe owners or bookstore owners would be forced by the market force - competition - to innovate. Create better service or product for their customers. If a cafe owner would succeed - and not be penalized with 75% tax - then he could open more and more cafes, having a franchise, succesfully competing with Starbucks. And if his innovative ideas were good enough, he could even start threating Starbucks position in the US. But that will never happen. Why? Because with Government protection on his side there will be no market force (i.e. customers who prefer competition) to force him to innovate. He will just sit there 8-5 like rest of the French society thinking that a GOvernment edict can somehow change the world in which he's living. It can't. Because people already voted with their money clearly showing winners and losers. And unless losers get to work, they'll be just that. Loosers.