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Amazon cancels my account after exposing account lockout for “racist doorbell” [video]

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Re: Amazon cancels my account after exposing account lockout for “racist doorbell” [video]

#401

Post by brightlancer »

onetrickwolf wrote: post #340
DeathArrow wrote: post #67

Of course, it's not cool that Amazon can terminate anyone's account as they please. But I suppose it's their right. The real problem is Amazon having monopoly. If there were some true competition, I couldn't care less about Amazon closing my account as I could go to a competitor.

I don't know if Amazon should have the right to terminate anyone's account to be honest. I feel like people are afraid to regulate anything these days but I mean some people's entire lives are dependent on these corporate accounts. You can't just have me build up a livelihood on Amazon or have my whole house running on Amazon smart products and then just terminate the account. If there was more competition or these t…

If Amazon and Google and other Big Companies were prevented from deleting accounts, what else would happen? How would the Big Companies game the system? Would that harm smaller companies (as regulation usually does)? Would we even see the benefits that were promised?

Regulation often makes things worse, so we can't just look at the potential benefits without considering the potential (and likely) negative consequences.

That doesn't mean folks are scared of regulation. It means they're _smart_ about it.

Re: Amazon cancels my account after exposing account lockout for “racist doorbell” [video]

#402

Post by ignite »

SpaceNoodled wrote: post #228
bilalq wrote: post #172

To use Amazon's terminology here, it really feels like they're becoming a Day Two company. It took decades to cultivate the perception that Amazon cares about customers more than any other company. It takes so much less to destroy that image. Google has already started paying the price for their customer-hostile behavior. It's a meme at this point how unreliable Google is for anything. Amazon and AWS have consistentl…

It was Day Two at Amazon by the time Jassy took over, roughly the same time they began paying lip service to being the "most customer centric" company on their "leadership principles" rather than actually just doing it. It became more and more apparent every month and precipitated my exit.

Nothing shows this like the switch from showing recommended books/products to showing ads.

Ads generate more revenue today, but I can't find good books to buy an Amazon, so I go elsewhere.

It's clear which is better for the customer (and for Amazon long term), but they can't give up on the revenue stream, even if it will eventually kill them (since it drives their customers to other platforms, and provides a place for competitors to grow).

Re: Amazon cancels my account after exposing account lockout for “racist doorbell” [video]

#403

Post by brightlancer »

soItGoesAgain wrote: post #132
kossTKR wrote: post #5

So Amazon wrongly accuses some random dude of racism after he says "Excuse me how can i help you" from their robotic doorbell, then bricks all of his amazon smarthome products remotely, then bans this man from their associates program for even making a video about it on youtube after 10 years. Are we living inside of the movie demolition man now? I absolutely hate large corporations. Racism off course is never ok, bu…

[flagged]

That sounds like satire, but many of the under-30 crowd might support it:

¨However, Americans under the age of 30 stand out when it comes to 1984‐ style in‐ home government surveillance cameras. 3 in 10 (29 percent) Americans under 30 favor “the government installing surveillance cameras in every household” in order to “reduce domestic violence, abuse, and other illegal activity.” Support declines with age, dropping to 20 percent among 30–44 year olds and dropping considerably to 6 percent among those over the age of 45.¨

https://www.cato.org/blog/nearly-third-gen-z-favors-home-gov...

As someone else put it, the younger folks live so much of their lives online where they can contact a corporate nanny to remove speech they dislike and ban users, it makes sense they'd carry those ideas into meatspace and want the same done.

Re: Amazon cancels my account after exposing account lockout for “racist doorbell” [video]

#404

Post by brightlancer »

Lutger wrote: post #73
kossTKR wrote: post #5

So Amazon wrongly accuses some random dude of racism after he says "Excuse me how can i help you" from their robotic doorbell, then bricks all of his amazon smarthome products remotely, then bans this man from their associates program for even making a video about it on youtube after 10 years. Are we living inside of the movie demolition man now? I absolutely hate large corporations. Racism off course is never ok, bu…

The Chinese point system is exactly what this reminds me of. It is ironic that unrestrained capitalism actually ends in a variant of communism where it are the corporations, rather than the party, that rule society.

> The Chinese point system is exactly what this reminds me of. It is ironic that unrestrained capitalism actually ends in a variant of communism where it are the corporations, rather than the party, that rule society.

That's not what happened in China.

The revolution in China was a _Communist_ one. Maoism is "Communism with Chinese characteristics". That's when 10s of millions of Chinese men, women and children were murdered to further the Communist utopia.

After Mao's death, Deng instituted many reforms and it would be arguable that it was no longer Communist -- but it would be rubbish to call it Capitalism. The government runs _everything_. Where they don't own corporations outright, they install party members to oversee them or own them "individually".

Look at what happened to Jack Ma to see exactly how NOT capitalist the country is.

Re: Amazon cancels my account after exposing account lockout for “racist doorbell” [video]

#405

Post by amelius »

DeathArrow wrote: post #67

Of course, it's not cool that Amazon can terminate anyone's account as they please. But I suppose it's their right. The real problem is Amazon having monopoly. If there were some true competition, I couldn't care less about Amazon closing my account as I could go to a competitor.

This only works if there is _zero_ vendor lock in.

If you're dependent on Amazon for e.g. your e-reader files, AWS account, or even your wishlist and taking your data elsewhere is a pain, then your argument doesn't hold.

They can't have it both ways.

Re: Amazon cancels my account after exposing account lockout for “racist doorbell” [video]

#406

Post by brightlancer »

BrotherBisquick wrote: post #369
throwawaymedia wrote: post #319

"racist trees", "racist doorbell", "racist photos"... my god, when will all this nonsense stop? When will the mass media stop feeding people with that crap? As a lesson, every single news company that writes about racism more than twice a year must be canceled from all the platforms out there. This shit is out of control and has damaged many people's brains. Or is that coming from politicians who love the "Divide & C…

> When will the mass media stop feeding people with that crap? They won't, and that's why I think we, as a society, need to move past journalism. That sounds like sarcasm, but it isn't. And I know what you're thinking- "oh but a free press is one of the legs of the tripod of society!" Well it was, decades ago. Now it's literally all tabloids and propaganda. It's time let it go. We have various tools that allow indivi…

By definition, the "free press" isn't limited to government credentialed organizations.

A free press is essential to a liberal society (real liberal, not leftist authoritarianism). Ben Franklin didn't publish for free, so we should recognize a free press includes for-profit press. And long before there were bloggers, there were pamphleteers. We need all of it.

Re: Amazon cancels my account after exposing account lockout for “racist doorbell” [video]

#407

Post by guerrilla »

B1FF_PSUVM wrote: post #345
croes wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You work for both but only one is good. And it's not silly just reality.

> only one is good Er ... which one? The one where fund managers who get bonuses for quarterly performance decide stuff? Seriously, we're getting into "banality of evil" territory ...

> Seriously, we're getting into "banality of evil" territory ...

And what? That means it's fine to just dismiss as if it's not a problem?

Re: Amazon cancels my account after exposing account lockout for “racist doorbell” [video]

#408

Post by guerrilla »

ddalex wrote: post #109
DeathArrow wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't work for the CEO, you work for people owning the company, which means the share holders.

That's why I buy a share of any company I go to, so I'm a share holder, which means I'm working for myself.

Are there people that can outvote you consistently? Then you do not work for yourself.

Re: Amazon cancels my account after exposing account lockout for “racist doorbell” [video]

#409

Post by cubefox »

andsoitis wrote: post #84
DeathArrow wrote: post #67

Of course, it's not cool that Amazon can terminate anyone's account as they please. But I suppose it's their right. The real problem is Amazon having monopoly. If there were some true competition, I couldn't care less about Amazon closing my account as I could go to a competitor.

> The real problem is Amazon having monopoly. What does Amazon have a monopoly on?

They have an extremely market dominating position in retail, similar to Google for search.

Re: Amazon cancels my account after exposing account lockout for “racist doorbell” [video]

#410

Post by lost_tourist »

Garvi wrote: post #260

A few years back I bought a new Motorolla phone(for the replaceable battery) from the official Motorolla US Amazon store. I received a broken device with the packaging seal broken and the antenna not working at all. It was clearly a previously returned device that I also sent back. So that's the reality of how they do business.

n=1 is a bad statistic to base decisions on. I've had a couple of duds from Amazon out of hundreds of things ordered. No problem returning broken things at all.
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