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Sellers printing counterfeit books and selling under Amazon's brand

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Re: Sellers printing counterfeit books and selling under Amazon's brand

#91

Post by paulcole »

dlubarov wrote: post #84
paulcole wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>In the end Amazon has banned the two sellers, but moving forward it is difficult to police 3,000 listings so we have not been expanding what we are doing on there. Does the API still return offer count? If you're truly the only legit seller, set up an alert if offerCount >> 1. Even without the API this should be pretty trivial to scrape.

But the first sale doctrine means there can be other legit sellers. There's no way to be certain whether a third party seller is selling a counterfeit (except by buying it).

First, my suggestion was more an attempt to simplify the "how do I keep an eye on 3,000 listings" process. Second,

> first sale doctrine means there can be other legit sellers

This is not necessarily true on Amazon.

There are larger brands that make deals with Amazon, preventing their products from being sold as new by anyone but themselves. Other people can sell it, but it must be listed as used. An end-run around first sale, but that's the way it is.

Re: Sellers printing counterfeit books and selling under Amazon's brand

#92

Post by thejosh »

OJFord wrote: post #82
stagbeetle wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's the go to of the (small-business) entrepreneurs all over the web (TheFastlane, /r/entrepreneur, etc.). I'm fairly certain it started around 4 years ago with Matt Clark's "Amazon Selling Machine." A friend who paid the $1000 let me watch the course and it was a pretty simple (and old) tactic. Buy wholesale and sell at markup. Except this time you would have it under your own "private label" (i.e a Chinese factory…

> $1000 ... course Wow. Surely the best advice such a course could possibly give would be 'convince people you can teach them to make money, and charge a lot for it'.

Yeah a few years ago it was SEO courses , now Amazon selling courses which are way overpriced, next ... ?

Who gets rich in a goldfish, the miners or the person selling the tools?

Re: Sellers printing counterfeit books and selling under Amazon's brand

#93

Post by nommm-nommm »

HoppedUpMenace wrote: post #7

Its ridiculous the amount of energy and effort you have to waste in order to find a product that you don't suspect as being counterfeit on Amazon these days. The other day, I wanted a super bright flashlight that ran on AAA batteries and was of decent quality and price. I had to pour over the millions of listed flashlights, most looking physically identical, with the exception of the brand name printed on the flashli…

>Then I read about how these flashlights are all mass produced by the same manufacturer and re-branded after distribution, so essentially 100 different flashlight brands are essentially the same flashlight (sorry, did a google search on this, don't remember exact link).

This is called a "private label." You can find the exact un-branded product and order direct from China from either Alibaba or Ali-Express or eBay for like half the price of Amazon (if you don't mind waiting for something to ship from China)

Re: Sellers printing counterfeit books and selling under Amazon's brand

#94

Post by ams6110 »

zn44 wrote: post #76
HoppedUpMenace wrote: post #7

Its ridiculous the amount of energy and effort you have to waste in order to find a product that you don't suspect as being counterfeit on Amazon these days. The other day, I wanted a super bright flashlight that ran on AAA batteries and was of decent quality and price. I had to pour over the millions of listed flashlights, most looking physically identical, with the exception of the brand name printed on the flashli…

I wouldn't be too confident about quality or authenticity of products in brick and mortar retail spots

I wonder about that too. How do I really know that a pair of Levi jeans at Target is genuine?

Re: Sellers printing counterfeit books and selling under Amazon's brand

#95

Post by andyzweb »

jrnichols wrote: post #65
peterjlee wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I buy phone chargers from Amazon I intentionally avoid the manufacturer branded ones because I know it's going to be fake. I usually choose a well known 3rd party brand with good reviews.

poor experiences with cheap phone chargers/etc are the reason I've been sticking to the Amazon Basics line. and then Anker, because the cats won't chew through those.

>poor experiences with cheap phone chargers/etc are the reason I've been sticking to the Amazon Basics line.

This is a brilliant strategy on Amazon's part.

Re: Sellers printing counterfeit books and selling under Amazon's brand

#96

Post by dlubarov »

BubbleFett wrote: post #80
ghaff wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interestingly Kindle Direct Publishing does/did do some sort of content check. They flagged me because some of the book content in something I was publishing a few years back was adapted from various blog posts that I had written. I just had to send them some links and confirm that I was the copyright holder or otherwise had rights to use the material. As far as I remember though, the same book wasn't flagged by Crea…

I seem to recall an article that exposed Kindle authors who plagiarized old trade paperback romance novels and sold them for a profit, which might be why Kindle Direct Publishing does check content.

There's nothing wrong with selling public domain works for profit in general. (KDP has some restrictions - https://kdp.amazon.com/help?topicId=A2OHLJURFVK57Q) Were those authors pretending they were original works?

Re: Sellers printing counterfeit books and selling under Amazon's brand

#97

Post by nommm-nommm »

mhb wrote: post #39
jseliger wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah. A variation on my own story: http://seliger.com/2017/01/09/tools-continued-careful-buy-am... . It's definitely changed my buying habits. For example, I just got a Fujitsu SnapScan... from Office Depot. There's no way I'm buying a moderately expensive electronic item from Amazon anymore.

Agreed that Amazon should make it clearer when it is the actual seller, but, in your example, you knowingly bought from a third party. Why would this affect your future purchases from Amazon when Amazon is the seller?

Commingled inventory means that Amazon can sell and ship a knockoff sent in by a third party seller.

Re: Sellers printing counterfeit books and selling under Amazon's brand

#98

Post by bdrool »

blobbers wrote: post #63

Counterfeits in comingled inventory has become pretty common on Amazon these days. "Fulfillment by amazon" has led them to comingle inventories on common products, meaning every seller's product gets jumbled together. I've gotten counterfeit huggies diapers from amazon (invalid serial number for huggies 'points' and different build quality), Mach 3 razor blades, GE MWF Water filters, even a counterfeit baby bath. The…

I've stopped using Amazon for:

  - Anything eaten
  - Anything that consumes or stores power (too much fire risk)
  - Anything worn on the body (even socks)
And now, based on this article, it appears I'll have to stop using them for books, as how can I be sure it's word-for-word the same?

What's left?

Re: Sellers printing counterfeit books and selling under Amazon's brand

#99

Post by nommm-nommm »

Scaevolus wrote: post #8
HoppedUpMenace wrote: post #7

Its ridiculous the amount of energy and effort you have to waste in order to find a product that you don't suspect as being counterfeit on Amazon these days. The other day, I wanted a super bright flashlight that ran on AAA batteries and was of decent quality and price. I had to pour over the millions of listed flashlights, most looking physically identical, with the exception of the brand name printed on the flashli…

It was especially hilarious during the hoverboard craze-- there were hundreds of versions of the exact same item, being sold for $200-$1500.

Were there any hover boards that weren't private labels?

Re: Sellers printing counterfeit books and selling under Amazon's brand

#100

Post by r00fus »

Animats wrote: post #40

There's no way to report a counterfeit on Amazon unless you're claiming a violation of your own IP rights. I've complained about fake solid state relays. There are lots of fake "Fotek" solid state relays. UL has noticed.[1] The fakes are usually marked with much higher amp ratings than they can handle safely. Look at this "100 amp" fake "Fotek" relay on Amazon.[2] Fotek doesn't even make a 100 amp relay in that packa…

Apple has filed suit against an Amazon supplier as well [1]. Even Apple can't police Amazon's cruft.

The issue here remains, if Amazon profits from fake items, why are they not responsible for the outcomes?

Do they live in some alternate reality where they don't have to play by the same rules?

[1] http://www.computerworld.com/article/3133627/technology-law-...

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