361–370 of 731 posts
In Europe, it led to the creation of the competing Amadeus system which did not keep display preferences and now dominates the market.
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"Please scan this item with our app to see YOUR price" -ftfy
Somehow this doesn't scare me at all. Fast food restaurants have been doing this for like 8 years. Almost any order you could make normally, you could get a buck or two off of it if you order through their incredibly sluggish, bloated cross-platform-framework "app" and redeem a "deal." And they tell you this with giant ads. The function is to get incremental sales (and hopefully establish a pattern of repeat business…
https://nypost.com/2026/04/21/business/jetblue-x-post-sparks...
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eBay is my first go-to.
publicsurplus.com has everything a person might need and you are supporting local government. You can find yourself a nice laptop for cheap. "It's got a cop CPU, an i5 10th gen. It's got cop RAM, cop SSD, cop 12v power input."
Amazon is a net-negative overall but I don't think this understanding is correct: > The only purpose of the ads is to get you to pick an air fryer that isn’t that one (or for the best air fryer, to keep you on track to buy the one you wanted in the first place). The ads make the search worse. This is only true in extremely simply scenarios. In reality, most of the time individual consumers may prefer something other…
The solution to this is just what you described, a 3rd-party recommendation service. I don't think there's any reason Amazon should be able to make better recommendations than I can with a minute or two of research. Advertising giants only have a marketing profile on people, I think it's fairly limited in terms of how helpful it can be.
The problem with the "top 10" sites you mention is ironically that they are almost all actually advertisement sites, not genuine product recommendation sites. This means they get paid to place products and are essentially corrupt. I would guess the ecosystem is so universally horrible is because SEO costs money and requires them to aggressively monetize to exist. I've read that the Wirecutter is one of the only genuine sites and I find that it usually works fairly well at the price bracket they choose and for certain kinds of home goods.
This has been true for years on Amazon and is true for most big services now. Over time the concept of search has mutated from 'locate the exact item I'm looking for' to 'show me a list of semantic search results'. Somehow nobody noticed. Oh and of course those are not random results - you can literally feel how the platform is trying to nudge you into buying what IT wants, not what you wanted. The search is just pur…
> We're back to pre-google, but it's a lot worse now a lot is worse now, but not shopping. on amazon some very specific items may be hard to find, and the search will throw a lot of crap at you, but you're still free to refine, compare and explore. finding exactly what you need and making an informed purchase has never been easier, and you get next day delivery (most of the time) plus exceptional return/refund policy…
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"Please scan this item with our app to see YOUR price" -ftfy
Somehow this doesn't scare me at all. Fast food restaurants have been doing this for like 8 years. Almost any order you could make normally, you could get a buck or two off of it if you order through their incredibly sluggish, bloated cross-platform-framework "app" and redeem a "deal." And they tell you this with giant ads. The function is to get incremental sales (and hopefully establish a pattern of repeat business…
Some particularly skeevy car dealers were skewered many years ago for saying "Advertised price is less tax, title, and additional $2,000".
But they CAN get away with saying "The $8.99 burger is $11.99 unless you: - possess one of a range of sanctioned devices - have access to data services - are able to create and manage an account - are willing to opt in to whatever tracking/marketing gimmickry - can claim the "deal" in advance
Each of those steps is a funnel that opts out at least some potential customers from the deal. The 12-year-old who doesn't own a phone can't get the deal. The 85-year-old who can't operate Android can't. The person making impulse purchases and not pre-researching their meal selection misses the offer.
I feel like there's a argument for a precedent akin to "no purchase necessary to enter" for sweepstakes-- no additional purchase, software install, or commitment should be required to claim any advertised offer.
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You’re aware IBM was not just complicit but essentially made the Holocaust possible with their counting machines? Had technicians permanently staffed in the fucking camps ? The the numbers on people’s arms corresponded to IBM punch cards? Are you aware of the world you live in?
I wasn't aware of that, no. I can say that it wasn't a feature of our history lessons in school, nor in various Holocaust documentaries I have watched, nor something that came up in conversation with friends and colleagues, nor have I personally seen it when it's been posted to HackerNews (if this is anything to go by: https://hn.algolia.com/?query=IBM%20holocaust&sort=byDate&ty... ). I only learned about Oracle's co…
I would use it to question the premise
> we should divest from companies and organisations complicit in genocide
which in reality I decided was obviously wrong the first time I heard it, many years ago. In fact, I don't think this concept of "complicity" is morally valid at all.
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You’re aware IBM was not just complicit but essentially made the Holocaust possible with their counting machines? Had technicians permanently staffed in the fucking camps ? The the numbers on people’s arms corresponded to IBM punch cards? Are you aware of the world you live in?
> Are you aware of the world you live in? Certainly this world comprises many other things than the Holocaust and IBM's support of it. Perhaps your awareness is lacking if you think that is the main thing to be aware of in this world.
I don't think that's what GP was saying at all.
This has been true for years on Amazon and is true for most big services now. Over time the concept of search has mutated from 'locate the exact item I'm looking for' to 'show me a list of semantic search results'. Somehow nobody noticed. Oh and of course those are not random results - you can literally feel how the platform is trying to nudge you into buying what IT wants, not what you wanted. The search is just pur…
> search has mutated from 'locate the exact item I'm looking for' to 'show me a list of semantic search results'. Years ago Amazon intentionally nerfed their own on-site search into complete uselessness. A step at a time they removed the ability to exclude a term by prefixing a '-', then they removed grouping terms into a phrase either with quote marks or plus+signs. For years these all worked well. It's no longer pl…
It doesn't have to do with Amazon. It is just how ads work. Of course when you buy a product that is heavily advertised you know that you are paying for it, Amazon or not. That's why, when I see an ad campaign for a product I may want, it is a signal for me to look elsewhere. Some competitor may use what would be ad budget towards offering lower prices or better quality. As for Amazon, it is not cheap! It is convenie…
It's confusing to me that amazon is in the ads business at all though. They're a retail service, not an ad business and it seems that all the ad business does is burn goodwill. They do have goodwill to burn, but it cheapens the entire experience.