Live data from Hacker News

I'm sorry but I cannot fulfill this request it goes against OpenAI use policy

amazon.com

411–420 of 768 posts

Re: I'm sorry but I cannot fulfill this request it goes against OpenAI use policy

#411

Using Amazon for shopping is terrible, borderline unusable in 2024. They're hard to compete with because they're giant and have an amazing logistics network, but it also seems like there's a big vacuum in the market for an "everything store" that's actually good.

The worst thing for me is how the Amazon search algorithm seems to want to show you everything but the item you searched for. In many categories, even when explicitly searching for brand and model names, you’ll get dozens of off-brand substitutions and even random unrelated products appearing above it in the search results. Occasionally I’ve even noticed products that are available for sale (if you click on a direct…

Pro-tip: Amazon fills their page with that useless content from their ad network, just like any standard ad. uBlock Origin blocks all of it, and your search experience is restored to what you expect.

For the longest time, I couldn't understand what people were talking about when they said Amazon's search interface is terrible. People would tell me they search for a specific book or author, and get totally irrelevant results. My experience was totally opposite.

I had to finally see a screenshot from someone's browser to believe it. It turns out uBlock has been blocking this content the whole time, and I never noticed it at all.

Re: I'm sorry but I cannot fulfill this request it goes against OpenAI use policy

#412
post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rebranded .. I'm getting really annoyed with the same product, different prices, different brand names apparently generated by some China-based anagram generator

But.. that's how a lot of products have always worked. I think the difference is that before a lot of white-label product factories would cut territory-based deals with resellers, so in (for example) the US, that widget is called "Acme Widget" but in France that exact same widget is called "Le Widget Magnifique". Around the world there might be 100+ companies selling that same product but typically not competing with…

That's fine. I'm just waiting for the day when the Chinese brands will stop using that insipid default Latin alphabet serif font that they use 90% of the time for labeling buttons and GUIs.

Re: I'm sorry but I cannot fulfill this request it goes against OpenAI use policy

#413

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the problem is capitalism necessitates enshittification. you aren't getting a contender as long as the regulations are abhorrently lax about both the workers and the sellers. along with consumer rights. there just is no economic incentive to improve but rather dig the moat.

(1) Expand network of friends/family. (2) Buy only when you get a recommendation from friends/family. (3) profit? :) Asking the government to create regulations for product quality just means that the lobbyists who actually write those regulations are going to fuck you over yet again.

I would agree but [1] is likely one of the top 3 biggest exiatential issues facing mankind right now. We live in an age of increasingly weaker connections between people.

So while in paper these 3 items look easy, they're likely not.

Re: I'm sorry but I cannot fulfill this request it goes against OpenAI use policy

#414

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is definitely the worst thing about Amazon. I pay them $120/year or whatever, and I search a specific product by a specific brand, and the entire browser screen shows me brands and even products I didn't even search for. I should not get ads in a store that I pay to use, especially in search.

If they keep you showing you ads, and you keep paying them $120, then I can't see why they'd stop showing you ads.

If they stopped paying, then why they'd stop showing them ads either.

Re: I'm sorry but I cannot fulfill this request it goes against OpenAI use policy

#415

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wal-Mart and Target are the 'curated' everything stores. My biggest disappointment with them is that they never have what I want. I think I'm OK with Amazon being Aliexpress for the US market. Sometimes I want to get random crap from the depths of Shenzhen, and Amazon is that. What is unfortunate is that they can't get "real" brands to sell there, because of their counterfeiting issue. The "mistake" Amazon made (that…

> Wal-Mart and Target are the 'curated' everything stores. Are you talking in-store or online? If I go to walmart.com or target.com and search for "usb cable", I don't see a dozen cables that fit 95% of use cases like in the store. Walmart shows thousands of results, the vast majority of which are marketplace sellers selling through walmart.com. Target has "only" 753 results, 600+ of which I find are not actually sol…

Annoying but at least Walmart still has the option to filter out third party sellers (under Filters, select Retailer and then Walmart). IIRC Amazon used to support this, but not anymore. I guess it wouldn't even do you much good with the commingling issue.

Re: I'm sorry but I cannot fulfill this request it goes against OpenAI use policy

#416
post #401

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you seen any good translation tool from video to text yet? I'm trying to find something for Estonian to English and having little luck

Do you mean images in the video like how the Google Translate app can do with the camera, or do you mean the audio within the video?

The audio within the video

Re: I'm sorry but I cannot fulfill this request it goes against OpenAI use policy

#417

I get that this is basically fraud and spam, but this should really highlight the dangers of letting an unattended LLM do anything for your company at all. It can, and will, fuck up dramatically sooner or later.

What dangers? Nobody will see any consequences for this: not Amazon-- they're a monopoly, they don't give a shit-- and not the seller-- who probably won't see any impact whatsoever on their sales or reputation, and will just recreate under a new shell name if they do. The fact that LLMs drive the cost of junk text production to zero is a tremendous opportunity when there is no penalty for messing up. It's the same th…

Frequent run-ins with listings like this will definitely build (even more of) a reputation in some users' minds that Amazon is a spam-filled and unproductive place to look for things, but yes—it would take a lot to actually threaten their market position.

Re: I'm sorry but I cannot fulfill this request it goes against OpenAI use policy

#418

Using Amazon for shopping is terrible, borderline unusable in 2024. They're hard to compete with because they're giant and have an amazing logistics network, but it also seems like there's a big vacuum in the market for an "everything store" that's actually good.

They have a lot of things (excluding books) but they are only interesting in switzerland: Galaxus.ch (their site is available in english, german, italian and french). They have the best speed and filters i have tried. And the ui is relatively compact compare to other online retailers i have access to. Reichlt in Germany has good filters but they are very slow where i am accessing them from.

Unfortunately every retailer are also starting to be a platform for other shops as well, inflating their numbers and polluting their search results.

Amazon really has terrible filters and search.

Re: I'm sorry but I cannot fulfill this request it goes against OpenAI use policy

#419

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.amazon.com/complete-information-provided-provide... is still up. What even is this?

Well, according to the description, that cat is shock and water resistant with exceptional read/write speeds and high power efficiency!

This one deserves an archival. At this point I'm kind of hoping this is some massive trolling campaign.

https://web.archive.org/web/20240112192751/https://www.amazo...

Re: I'm sorry but I cannot fulfill this request it goes against OpenAI use policy

#420

Using Amazon for shopping is terrible, borderline unusable in 2024. They're hard to compete with because they're giant and have an amazing logistics network, but it also seems like there's a big vacuum in the market for an "everything store" that's actually good.

I've found that, at least on the mobile app, results are filtered by "Featured" which fills the results with irrelevant sponsored products. So each time I search for an item, I then have to go under Filters and select Best Rating, Highest Selling, etc. It's a bit tedious but seems to be a shortcut through all of the BS results they show you by default.
Post reply on HN