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Amazon is stuffing its search results pages with ads

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Re: Amazon is stuffing its search results pages with ads

#551
post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://nccih.nih.gov/health/euroelder >Although some preliminary research indicates that elderberry may relieve flu symptoms, the evidence is not strong enough to support its use for this purpose. You may want to find a new doctor.

I upvoted you. I had tried to reply, but was throttled. The trouble with facts is they keep changing. It takes a lot time for the latest clinical results to become mainstream. My doctor is OCD about staying current. Think Dr Rhonda Patrick meets Dr Terry Wahls meets Tim Ferriss meets Dr Atul Gawanda. I'm still alive because of research, experimental treatments (seattlecca.org, fredhutch.org). I try a lot of things th…

Totally understand. I realize my original statement comes off a bit pithy, but I meant it when I said "may".

Re: Amazon is stuffing its search results pages with ads

#552
post #550

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...which matches my experience. Don't ever tell a patient to disregard personal experience. Someone who has suffered a chronic condition, and learned enough about it and her body to find an effective non-pharmacological treatment for it, knows more than a room full of physicians about how that condition is best treated in her body. Besides, don't we know by now that most studies (especially non-replicated ones on unp…

> Someone who has suffered a chronic condition, and learned enough about it and her body to find an effective non-pharmacological treatment for it, knows more than a room full of physicians about how that condition is best treated in her body. I'm sorry but this is terrible advice, and is precisely how people like Steve Jobs die for no reason.

Don't apologize to me, just don't be rude to patients. Finding some half-assed study that might apply is no excuse. Do you really consider whatever treatment Jobs got to have been "effective"?

Re: Amazon is stuffing its search results pages with ads

#553
post #63
post #19

Their basic underlying assumption appears to be that they're no longer in danger of losing customers and can now act accordingly. Now that they've captured 50%+ of US ecommerce, they've also raised many prices, to the point where they're far from the cheapest price in many cases. A random example... the cat litter I just purchased is $17.89 at Amazon, $13.49 at Walmart. Last week I bought a chair mat for $21.95 on Eb…

This is why I've been unhappy to see Bezos gaining steam. As his other products become more successful, you can expect a lot more of this. Alexa is not your friend, Alexa is a tool to make Amazon money. Amazon's move into media is not an effort to improve the media system, it's a recognition that there's a lot of money to be made by controlling the media that people consume. Same thing with the fire phone, it wasn't…

> Bezos is out to make an empire, everything else comes second.

Amazon investors just got a hard-on reading this.

Re: Amazon is stuffing its search results pages with ads

#554
post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a solved problem and not hard. Most brick and mortar chains in the UK have a buying policy that requires you to prove your goods are fit for purpose before they'll put it on the shelves and risk hurting their brand. I imagine most of Europe operates similarly. They will generally require suppliers to send examples of the range before being allowed in store, and they will test or examine a representative selectio…

Couldn’t malicious sellers circumvent this by sending quality product initially and then swapping it later on?

This is where trust in a brand kicks in. Brand represents product quality. They work so hard on making the brand, that it then becomes the product. Back to square one.

Re: Amazon is stuffing its search results pages with ads

#555
post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ever seen a Black Friday stampede? Price is king.

But a Black Friday stampede is not representative of a long-term stable customer base. Selling a crapload of stuff at a tiny margin doesn't say anything about your business's ability to make it to the next Black Friday.

My point is that—in the event they get significantly threatened—amazon has proven that they can run their entire retail business as a loss-leader until they re-establish a perception of price dominance.

Re: Amazon is stuffing its search results pages with ads

#556

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember reading easily a decade ago, when people were describing Amazon as a charity propped up by investors, that this was Amazon's long-term strategy--aggressively reinvest all profits, burn through cash making a loss in order to achieve monopoly or near-monopoly status, and then jack up prices once they'd captured the market. It looks more and more like they're following through.

People say the same thing about Uber today. I wonder if they'll be around as some massive mega-giant in 10 years, or turn into another eToys or MySpace.

uber is easily replaced, amazon's logistics choking out your logistics are not

Re: Amazon is stuffing its search results pages with ads

#557
post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought that was for airplane tickets?

Ugh. Do you have any source / evidence for that?

it's easily verifiable, spoof your h/w,s/w and connection and visit a webpage you just viewed. the prices will be different. there are even use cases of buying return tickets from the destination country being cheaper than buying it from where you are. it's such common knowledge that even popular youtubers are making videos about it - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Utsnt6GFrKo (linus tech tips-6 minute watch) VPNs are quickly becoming compulsory tools to save mucho dinero

Re: Amazon is stuffing its search results pages with ads

#558

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Constitutionally, states can't tax interstate commerce. That is a federal power. A lot of states have created "use taxes" on goods purchased in another state and imported by the buyer. This is because requiring companies to withhold taxes for states in which they do not have a substantial business presence would be overly burdensome on interstate commerce. These use taxes are likely unconstitutional, but states ask t…

This isn't taxing interstate commerce. This is applying the applicable sales tax. There is always point of sale, in one state or the other. Some states choose to interpret that point of sale as being where the buyer is standing when making the purchase (ie the delivery address). Other states would say that it is wherever the server is (Nevada, ie gambling). A state demanding that online purchasers pay a sales tax is…

The sales tax is not applicable on purchases that span multiple states. It doesn't matter how hard you argue that one state or the other should have the ability to tax a transaction, whenever there are multiple states in the equation, none of them are constitutionally able to do so. If there's an endpoint in one state, and an endpoint in another state, it crossed a border somewhere and earned the "interstate" adjective.

The state only has the power to tax intrastate commerce, where both buyer and seller are standing within its borders. If you are loud enough and persistent enough, you can even convince a seller to not withhold sales tax on a purchase where you are physically present, by making a solemnized claim that you intend to immediately export the goods you are buying out of the state. Businesses do this all the time. (But then they pay use tax for their own state, because it's cheaper and more certain than arguing their case all the way to SCotUS.)

The tax is an excise on the buyer. Sellers subject to the state's jurisdiction must collect it, by law, on behalf of the state, whenever they are able to do so. It is an undue burden on sellers to be forced to operate as tax-collection agents for all of the states, including those they have not directly chosen to do business in, by establishing some kind of persistent operation there. There are hundreds of individual jurisdictions able to levy sales taxes on the domiciled residents of their state making purchases within the borders of their jurisdiction. What a towering barrier to entry it would be if, in order to operate so much as a catalog mail-order lemonade stand, a business had to purchase software licenses or tax-handling services able to resolve taxes for all the states and territories, and all of their tax districts, and possibly also an alternate rate within that district.

Re: Amazon is stuffing its search results pages with ads

#559
post #550

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Someone who has suffered a chronic condition, and learned enough about it and her body to find an effective non-pharmacological treatment for it, knows more than a room full of physicians about how that condition is best treated in her body. I'm sorry but this is terrible advice, and is precisely how people like Steve Jobs die for no reason.

Don't apologize to me, just don't be rude to patients. Finding some half-assed study that might apply is no excuse. Do you really consider whatever treatment Jobs got to have been "effective"?

>just don't be rude to patients

I wasn't.

> Finding some half-assed study that might apply is no excuse.

You're clearly not worth arguing with if you can't even be bothered to read the things you're commenting on. The only thing half-assed here are your arguments.

Re: Amazon is stuffing its search results pages with ads

#560
post #559

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't apologize to me, just don't be rude to patients. Finding some half-assed study that might apply is no excuse. Do you really consider whatever treatment Jobs got to have been "effective"?

>just don't be rude to patients I wasn't. > Finding some half-assed study that might apply is no excuse. You're clearly not worth arguing with if you can't even be bothered to read the things you're commenting on. The only thing half-assed here are your arguments.

Some other part of the plant might cause nausea and vomiting? Looks pretty half-assed to me. As if there's no way to harvest one part of a plant separately from the rest of the plant. As if the patient wouldn't notice nausea and vomiting. As if these aren't very common side effects for any number of pharmaceuticals. As if a physician wouldn't be qualified to weigh such side effects against the benefits of the treatment. As if a patient wouldn't be qualified to weigh such side effects against the benefits of the treatment.

But sure, tell a patient to find a new doctor, when you know absolutely nothing about the situation. If I seem somewhat inflexible on this issue, it's because I (and friends of mine) have been pressured to avoid nonpharmaceutical treatments that experience has shown to be effective. On this topic I am not indifferent.

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