Amazon, Amid Crackdown on Seller Scams, Fires Employees Over Data Leak • Hacker News Board

Re: Amazon, Amid Crackdown on Seller Scams, Fires Employees Over Data Leak

#101

Post by oblib » Tue, Dec 11, 2018, 6:34 PM UTC

This time last year I ordered some Rose Oil from "Essential Oil Labs" at Amazon. What I got wasn't Rose Oil, it was garbage.

Amazon issued I refund but when I looked into it further I found reviews from others who got crap from them as well, but those reviews were well buried. Because I'd requested a refund I wasn't allowed to post a review that warned others about them. That felt to me like Amazon was shielding the vendor from negative reviews.

As a result of how this was handled I've not bought anything from Amazon this year and I canceled our "Prime" membership this month when it expired.

This "crackdown" feels like too little too late, and it will be a long time before I go back there, if ever.

Re: Amazon, Amid Crackdown on Seller Scams, Fires Employees Over Data Leak

#102

Post by secabeen » Tue, Dec 11, 2018, 6:35 PM UTC

Wowfunhappy wrote: post #63

secabeen wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reality is is that shipping an amazon item costs between $3-7. For expensive items, they can cover that cost out of the wholesale/retail markup, so you don't really have to pay it. For cheaper items, or items without that much of a markup, it starts showing up in the price. Now, sometimes a manufacturer will want to buy some market share, so they'll sell an item to Amazon cheaper to reduce that impact, and then i…

It's the products that suddenly shoot up to 2-3x normal retail that throw me, not the ones that change by a few dollars. But the products that double in price have made more sensitive to the ones that change by a few dollars, because I'm now on high alert for price changes in general.

Yeah, the doubling in price is usually when the low-cost vendor sells out, and only high-cost vendors are left, but you're totally right; I also refrain from purchasing via dash button, Echo commands, or any option where I can't evaluate how reasonable the price is.

Re: Amazon, Amid Crackdown on Seller Scams, Fires Employees Over Data Leak

#103

Post by reaperducer » Tue, Dec 11, 2018, 6:35 PM UTC

52-6F-62 wrote: post #88

roymurdock wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

problem with uber from a customer perspective is if you are a single woman taking a ride, the drivers are not full time cab employees that can possibly be fired/lose their cab medallion/permits. some women i know are considering switching to licensed cabs due to the harassment they get from uber drivers with no good mechanism to report and avoid those drivers aside from never traveling alone. as a guy, i've only had…

> as a guy, i've only had good experiences (except for the opaque surge pricing which always feels extortionate) Totally off the main topic here, but I'm also a guy and I've had one ride that was a little hair-raising. I wasn't harassed, mind. I was riding with two girls (downtown Toronto) in an Uber and the driver was clearly on speed. He was extremely chatty, actually quite friendly, but very frantic. Took many las…

FWIW, in the market where I drove, it was very common for taxi drivers who were so bad they lost their taxi jobs (think about that) to just turn around and drive for Uber.

Re: Amazon, Amid Crackdown on Seller Scams, Fires Employees Over Data Leak

#104

Post by roymurdock » Tue, Dec 11, 2018, 6:37 PM UTC

plankers wrote: post #93

roymurdock wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

nah i wouldn't go that far, banking employees and shareholders of recapitalized companies in 2007/2008 privatized gains and socialized losses when they were mostly bailed out with taxpayer money/federal reserve credibility instead of going under, but uber/airbnb/aws are pure efficiency plays. they increase the utilization of (what used to be) private cars, real estate, and servers respectively. there are trade offs b…

If uber/lyft are pure efficiency plays, then why do they have their own programs to finance the purchase of new cars just so people can drive for uber/lyft? By the same token, but much harder to substantiate, why are people buying property just to rent it out with airbnb? The negative externalities are there. You just have to know where to look.

neither of those examples are negative externalities

the heart and core of each company is just more efficient matching with less regulation and more technology between renters and owners of capital

Re: Amazon, Amid Crackdown on Seller Scams, Fires Employees Over Data Leak

#105

Post by plankers » Tue, Dec 11, 2018, 6:37 PM UTC

reaperducer wrote: post #95

trevyn wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uber/Fiverr/Upwork automate the trust aspect, so I can be assured decent service or I’ll get a refund and the provider’s reputation will be dinged. Outright scams are hard to pull off in this environment. Amazon... I can only speculate what’s going on there. Maybe the resulting price pressure turns the screws on suppliers? And honestly I’ve never gotten a branded product from them that I thought was fake. This could…

Amazon... I can only speculate what’s going on there. Maybe the resulting price pressure turns the screws on suppliers? Scammers looking for places to scam, which Amazon provides by relying on customer ratings to police its suppliers, which clearly doesn't work. Most of the recent SV business models only work in a hypothetical place where everyone is good and altruistic. Look at self-driving cars. There are thousands…

Oh man, can't wait to see the future graffiti all over self-driving cars. Tech dystopia, here we come!

But for real, it's for these reasons that Google et al. place such a high value on systems to identify and deanonymize people. In a world where all of your biometric data can be easily identified and linked back to you, there won't be much room for bad behavior. The real question is who gets to decide what behavior qualifies as "bad."

Re: Amazon, Amid Crackdown on Seller Scams, Fires Employees Over Data Leak

#106

Post by reaperducer » Tue, Dec 11, 2018, 6:37 PM UTC

wnkrshm wrote: post #32

rchaud wrote: post #24

One of the first things I remember about moving to a rich country was the absence of knockoff products sold in retail stores. It seemed amazing to me that companies would deal only with authorized distributors. These days, I feel like I'm in a twilight zone where 'wealth creation' is happening by putting a fresh face on 3rd-world country business models. First it was Uber with the "hire a random guy off the street to…

> These days, I feel like I'm in a twilight zone where 'wealth creation' is happening by putting a fresh face on 3rd-world country business models. Or maybe making those that scale well more accessible and socially accepted in the service economy. Is there maybe some source that you've read, someone who has analyzed that statement (3rd-world country business models = gig economy) in more detail? I don't have much tim…

Sounds like he's spent a lot of time living in third-world countries, so he's speaking from experience.

I've spend a good amount of time in third-world countries, and my experience aligns with his.

Re: Amazon, Amid Crackdown on Seller Scams, Fires Employees Over Data Leak

#107

Post by decebalus1 » Tue, Dec 11, 2018, 6:38 PM UTC

gizmo686 wrote: post #69

decebalus1 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "socializing losses, privatizing gains" Never seen this formulated as such but I really like it. I was reading a book which tangentially dealt with that [0]. It changed my perspective on how new businesses are increasingly externalizing their costs to the consumers. [0] https://www.amazon.com/Shadow-Work-Unpaid-Unseen-Jobs/dp/161...

I don't think "externalizing their costs to the consumers" really makes sense. In an idealized market, costs should be passed onto the consumer. From what I can tell, the book you reference is just complaining that this cost changed from money to labor. It is also worth noting that, in many cases, this results in a net win for the consumer. Eg, whwn I buy from a full service gas station, I am paying someone to pump m…

The book is arguing about using a service which costs X. The business then makes the service more efficient by reducing labor costs for itself and not passing the savings back to the consumer but instead keeping the same price while making the service shittier by having the consumer do more work. So for the same price, you get less service, need to do more work while the business hoards the money.

Re: Amazon, Amid Crackdown on Seller Scams, Fires Employees Over Data Leak

#108

Post by thereisnospork » Tue, Dec 11, 2018, 6:38 PM UTC

plankers wrote: post #93

roymurdock wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

nah i wouldn't go that far, banking employees and shareholders of recapitalized companies in 2007/2008 privatized gains and socialized losses when they were mostly bailed out with taxpayer money/federal reserve credibility instead of going under, but uber/airbnb/aws are pure efficiency plays. they increase the utilization of (what used to be) private cars, real estate, and servers respectively. there are trade offs b…

If uber/lyft are pure efficiency plays, then why do they have their own programs to finance the purchase of new cars just so people can drive for uber/lyft? By the same token, but much harder to substantiate, why are people buying property just to rent it out with airbnb? The negative externalities are there. You just have to know where to look.

Because the regulatory environment around taxis and hotels are so onorous that doing something a reasonable person might find absurd actually improves the efficiency of car services/boarding.

Re: Amazon, Amid Crackdown on Seller Scams, Fires Employees Over Data Leak

#109

Post by stcredzero » Tue, Dec 11, 2018, 6:40 PM UTC

rchaud wrote: post #24

One of the first things I remember about moving to a rich country was the absence of knockoff products sold in retail stores. It seemed amazing to me that companies would deal only with authorized distributors. These days, I feel like I'm in a twilight zone where 'wealth creation' is happening by putting a fresh face on 3rd-world country business models. First it was Uber with the "hire a random guy off the street to…

...putting a fresh face on 3rd-world country business models...Now it's Amazon selling bootleg crap at scale.

Why does Amazon have to be limited to stores? What if they could put the right near field detection technology into a portable form factor? Like, a blanket spread on the sidewalk?

Re: Amazon, Amid Crackdown on Seller Scams, Fires Employees Over Data Leak

#110

Post by hatchnyc » Tue, Dec 11, 2018, 6:41 PM UTC

paulie_a wrote: post #91

cookingrobot wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some of that seems right, but I don’t agree with the Uber example. Ride sharing has been a much more convenient and reliable service than taxis, and with less fraud (broken meters or credit card machines) and less discrimination (actually willing to drive me to the neighborhood I want). And with Uber I have a record of who drove me where. This seems pretty different from being picked up by a random person on the stre…

Personally I love Uber and avoid taxis as much as possible. The worst Uber ride was still far better than the best taxi I've taken. A driver might be chatty and you have a great conversation, or they just stay quiet. Either ways a much better experience than the angry cab driver. I was a little shocked when Uber sent me my stats for last year 1000+ rides.

I've noticed that Uber drivers tend to drive much slower and more cautiously than taxi drivers, and break traffic laws far less often. As a result when I really need to get somewhere quickly I do tend to look for a taxi first.