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Reasons not to buy from Amazon

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Re: Reasons not to buy from Amazon

#121

Post by strictnein »

harrumph wrote: post #103
strictnein wrote: post #15

> "Amazon was a member of ALEC...." > "Amazon quit ALEC after public pressure in May 2012, but I am sure it still supports the same nasty policies and is waiting for a new tool to achieve them." Seriously? Come on.

I think RMS is correct here. Corporate membership in an organization whose purpose is to impose market and private mechanisms on whole populations by writing these into state and local law (this is precisely what ALEC does) should be interpreted as an irrevocable announcement that the management of the corporation does in fact endorse imposing its interests on whole populations using state and local law. Amazon left…

Large corporations are members of many groups. The idea that the entire leadership of Amazon should be replaced because Amazon was a member of ALEC is nonsensical. Jeff Bezos should step down because Amazon was a member of ALEC? Really? What about Steve Jobs and Apple? They were a member too.

ALEC isn't some super nefarious group, but I do understand it was the target of three minutes of internet hate, so people seem to ascribe some super evil to its intents.

Re: Reasons not to buy from Amazon

#122

Post by jakobegger »

amyjess wrote: post #109
baddox wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, and "dodging taxes" doesn't clearly distinguish between the too. Also note that a lot of people oppose perfectly legal tax avoidance techniques that they consider to be loopholes.

Agreed. I was going to put something in my post like "and that's why a good argument will make it clear which one you're talking about", but I ended up forgetting to put it in. Also, tax avoidance is just plain smart. Any for-profit business that doesn't practice tax avoidance is just throwing away money.

Paying taxes is not throwing away money, its contributing back to the society that you profit from. Contributing as little as legally possible is not 'sensible' it's greedy.

Re: Reasons not to buy from Amazon

#123

Post by chaosfactor »

jakobegger wrote: post #117
SquidMagnet wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it would be helpful to be clearer as to why you disagree with the analogy rather than simply calling it stupid. If I had to guess, I would suspect that your real issue is that you do not find the things being restricted to be comparable (i.e., human life/will vs. the use of software), rather than believing that the comparison is somehow invalid for other reasons.

First of all, it's not a good analogy. Software licenses are a contract that you can choose to agree to, whereas laws give you no choice. Second of all, it is highly debated wheter the restrictions imposed by the GPL are a worthwhile tradeoff; while noone in their right mind claims anybody has a right to own slaves... And lastly, by comparing the GPL to laws against slavery you are trying to evoke certain association…

The slavery analogy holds because in both cases we are talking about freedom. A word you aren't using.

Re: Reasons not to buy from Amazon

#124

Post by Lawtonfogle »

strictnein wrote: post #120
Lawtonfogle wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is probably one of the most reasonable disagreements that can be made. Take some random person and say they use to be a member of some bad organization. Let's pick the WBC (but you can pick many others). Now, say they quit, not because of a change of heart, but because of political pressure that was costing them money. Is this someone you would consider a decent person? I wouldn't.

I was mainly objecting to the weird conspiratorial bit about them waiting for a new tool to complete their nefarious goals. And the WBC? Come on. ALEC is nothing like that.

>And the WBC? Come on. ALEC is nothing like that.

Substitute any group where you feelings for them approaches Stallman's feelings about ALEC. The actual group picked is irrelevant to the argument.

Re: Reasons not to buy from Amazon

#126

Post by harrumph »

strictnein wrote: post #121
harrumph wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think RMS is correct here. Corporate membership in an organization whose purpose is to impose market and private mechanisms on whole populations by writing these into state and local law (this is precisely what ALEC does) should be interpreted as an irrevocable announcement that the management of the corporation does in fact endorse imposing its interests on whole populations using state and local law. Amazon left…

Large corporations are members of many groups. The idea that the entire leadership of Amazon should be replaced because Amazon was a member of ALEC is nonsensical. Jeff Bezos should step down because Amazon was a member of ALEC? Really? What about Steve Jobs and Apple? They were a member too. ALEC isn't some super nefarious group, but I do understand it was the target of three minutes of internet hate, so people seem…

>The idea that the entire leadership of Amazon should be replaced because Amazon was a member of ALEC is nonsensical.

That's a ridiculous reading of what I wrote. I said, effectively, that the same people who joined Amazon to ALEC are the same people who still run Amazon. This fairly suggests the same people still support the aims and work of the group, which is to spam state laws and impose market and private structures on entire populations.

You also ridiculously scoff at the idea that ALEC membership presents any problems or costs, even though Amazon itself left the group.

Silly.

Re: Reasons not to buy from Amazon

#127

Post by atomi »

specialk wrote: post #16

> "Amazon cut off service to Wikileaks, claiming that whistleblowing violates its terms of service. It had no need to go to court to prove this, because if you rent a server from Amazon, you have no rights." I find it highly amusing that RMS doesn't seem to agree with Amazon's restrictive ToS agreement but his GNU software license is one of the most restrictive licenses out there. If I include a GNU licensed library…

Your thinking is short-sighted and selfish. Tell us what it says about the GPL that GNU tools are still actively used and maintained decades later?

Re: Reasons not to buy from Amazon

#128

Post by strictnein »

strictnein wrote: post #121
harrumph wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think RMS is correct here. Corporate membership in an organization whose purpose is to impose market and private mechanisms on whole populations by writing these into state and local law (this is precisely what ALEC does) should be interpreted as an irrevocable announcement that the management of the corporation does in fact endorse imposing its interests on whole populations using state and local law. Amazon left…

Large corporations are members of many groups. The idea that the entire leadership of Amazon should be replaced because Amazon was a member of ALEC is nonsensical. Jeff Bezos should step down because Amazon was a member of ALEC? Really? What about Steve Jobs and Apple? They were a member too. ALEC isn't some super nefarious group, but I do understand it was the target of three minutes of internet hate, so people seem…

I really don't understand how it's ridiculous reading of what you wrote:

> "Amazon left ALEC but did not also replace its leadership at the same time"

Amazon's leadership includes Jeff Bezos. Apple's leadership included Steve Jobs and Tim Cook.

In fact, what you said first mirrors what you just said:

> "I said, effectively, that the same people who joined Amazon to ALEC are the same people who still run Amazon."

The leadership of Apple is still mainly in place as well. Should they all be gotten rid of? Or is there just a specific list of people who should be dumped?

> "You also ridiculously scoff at the idea that ALEC membership presents any problems or costs, even though Amazon itself left the group."

No, I didn't in any way say that. I just said they weren't "super nefarious". Amazon left ALEC precisely because they determined it was presenting a problem.

> "Then you completely ignored ALEC's purpose as I accurately described it."

In what way? By saying their weren't "super nefarious"? I guess you think they are "super nefarious", but I just think they're sub-optimal.

Re: Reasons not to buy from Amazon

#129

Post by baddox »

jakobegger wrote: post #122
amyjess wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. I was going to put something in my post like "and that's why a good argument will make it clear which one you're talking about", but I ended up forgetting to put it in. Also, tax avoidance is just plain smart. Any for-profit business that doesn't practice tax avoidance is just throwing away money.

Paying taxes is not throwing away money, its contributing back to the society that you profit from. Contributing as little as legally possible is not 'sensible' it's greedy.

So why not give more? You can donate directly to the US Treasury. What are the odds that the tax laws get exactly the optimal revenue?

Re: Reasons not to buy from Amazon

#130

Post by harrumph »

strictnein wrote: post #128
strictnein wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Large corporations are members of many groups. The idea that the entire leadership of Amazon should be replaced because Amazon was a member of ALEC is nonsensical. Jeff Bezos should step down because Amazon was a member of ALEC? Really? What about Steve Jobs and Apple? They were a member too. ALEC isn't some super nefarious group, but I do understand it was the target of three minutes of internet hate, so people seem…

I really don't understand how it's ridiculous reading of what you wrote: > "Amazon left ALEC but did not also replace its leadership at the same time" Amazon's leadership includes Jeff Bezos. Apple's leadership included Steve Jobs and Tim Cook. In fact, what you said first mirrors what you just said: > "I said, effectively, that the same people who joined Amazon to ALEC are the same people who still run Amazon." The…

>I really don't understand how it's ridiculous reading of what you wrote:

Let me help: I indicated that a corporate culture exists that openly accepted and endorsed what ALEC does, which necessarily indicates that said culture is capable of accepting and endorsing the imposition of private and market structures on entire populations by writing and passing state laws to do so. That is exactly what ALEC does.

Amazon's reversal of a decision to join ALEC without a concomitant reversal or update of that same corporate culture should not be read as a repudiation of that organization's aims and goals.

I think you're scoffing in the wrong direction: Amazon conducts itself repeatedly as antagonistic to regulation and taxation in every way and just about as intensely as a corporation can. The idea that they really don't want their business aims written into state law just because they backed away from ALEC fails every test of plausibility. They're the same boardroom. They act in their own interest exclusively. It's far more plausible that they saw that being an ALEC member (and taking the public relations costs associated with that) wasn't necessary to benefit from what ALEC does on behalf of business interests generally.

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