Counterfeits on Amazon cost Warren bird feeder business $1.5M

If Amazon retail imploded, it would affect their revenue greatly, but not their profitability. 75% of their profit comes from AWS.

Yes, they just need one feature which Amazon could never have in order to disrupt it. They also need feature/price parity.

I wonder if, to reach price parity, you would have to anti-sell as much as you sell. So people’s overall bills go down because they have less stuff but everything they have they really need.

The un-match-able feature could be personal attention from people in your local economy. That also increases the price so there would have to be excellent marketing to help keep your dollars in that economy: you’d get your beer from a local distributor, and they would also market other local products to you. This is extremely difficult to manage now, so part of the decentralized system would have to be helping make that easier.

Essentially, the killer feature is anti-McDonaldsificstion. McDonalds isn’t actually the best possible food in most people, but it is the best possible food you could sell most people and still channel the profits through one bank account.

Decentralized platforms, by not having that requirement, can offer something better.

Start reporting counterfeits at https://www.stopfakes.gov/article?id=Report-Fake-Goods

The following was taken from the DOJ's "Reporting Intellectual Property Crime: A Guide for Victims of Counterfeiting, Copyright Infringement, and Theft of Trade Secrets":

"Counterfeit Trademarks: The Trademark Counterfeiting Act, 18 U.S.C. § 2320(a), provides penalties of up to ten years imprisonment and a $2 million fine for a defendant who “intentionally traffics or attempts to traffic in goods or services and knowingly uses a counterfeit mark on or in connection with such goods or services.”

The key word there is "traffic".

"Counterfeit Labeling: The counterfeit labeling provisions of 18 U.S.C. § 2318 prohibit trafficking in counterfeit labels designed to be affixed to phono records, copies of computer programs, motion pictures and audiovisual works, as well as trafficking in counterfeit documentation or packaging for computer programs. Violations are punishable by up to 5 years imprisonment and a $250,000 fine."

Again, "trafficking". Just need to prove the "knowingly" part, which can't be done without establishing a clear pattern of trafficking in counterfeits.

"Why Should You Report Intellectual Property Crime? Intellectual property is an increasingly important part of the United States' economy, representing its fastest growing sector. For example, in 2002 copyright industries alone contributed approximately 6%, or $626 billion, to America’s gross domestic product, and employed 4% of America’s workforce, according to an economic study commissioned by the International Intellectual Property Alliance. As the nation continues to shift from an industrial economy to an information-based economy, the assets of the country are increasingly based in intellectual property. In recognition of this trend, the Department of Justice is waging the most aggressive campaign against the theft and counterfeiting of intellectual property in its history. The priority of criminal intellectual property investigations and prosecutions nationwide has been increased, and additional resources on both the prosecutive and investigative levels have been brought to bear on the growing problem of intellectual property theft. Effective prosecution of intellectual property crime, however, also requires substantial assistance from its victims.."

https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/olp/docs/ip_task...

From:

https://www.stopfakes.gov/welcome

Because these stores usually have a garden section, and bird feeders and bird seed are usually stocked in a garden section of a store. Presumably, the people who solve the optimization problem "given the amount of space available and the buying habits of our customers, how do we optimize our sales volume" have concluded that bird seed is one of the thousands of items they should stock.

This isn't the best source, but the claims are there: https://blog.aboutamazon.com/company-news/product-safety-and...

Only difference from what OP suggested is it doesn't seem they manually look at all initial listing. Apart from that it seems they claim having exactly the described system by OP in place.