Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan
theatlantic.com
Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan
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Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan
#2I like this detour into economics:
>Bezos’s enterprise upends long-held precepts about the fundamental nature of capitalism—especially an idea enshrined by the great Austrian economist Friedrich Hayek[, who] argued that no bureaucracy could ever match the miracle of markets, which spontaneously and efficiently aggregate the knowledge of a society.
>Amazon, however, has acquired the God’s-eye view of the economy that Hayek never imagined any single entity could hope to achieve. [...] With its logistics business—and its growing network of trucks and planes—it has an understanding of the flow of goods around the world. In other words, if Marxist revolutionaries ever seized power in the United States, they could nationalize Amazon and call it a day.
Perhaps we need to break up Amazon because communism? /s
Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan
#3Interesting article. I thought Bezos was just another greedy, power-mad megalomaniac. That he's also a dewy-eyed Trekkie who rationalizes his greed with dreams of space colonization makes it even sillier. Who knew Gene Roddenberry was more dangerous than any economic theorist?
Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan
#4I'd guess... Make enough money to cure baldness and disdain for working people.
Only half sarcastic...
Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan
#5Interesting article. I thought Bezos was just another greedy, power-mad megalomaniac. That he's also a dewy-eyed Trekkie who rationalizes his greed with dreams of space colonization makes it even sillier. Who knew Gene Roddenberry was more dangerous than any economic theorist?
>That he's also a dewy-eyed Trekkie who rationalizes his greed with dreams of space colonization makes it even sillier.
Space colonization is a form of greed: it's basically saying this world is not enough. So I don't see this as a rationalization: in fact, the article heavily suggests that his dream of space colonization was what led to his greed.
Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan
#6I like this detour into economics: > Bezos’s enterprise upends long-held precepts about the fundamental nature of capitalism—especially an idea enshrined by the great Austrian economist Friedrich Hayek[, who] argued that no bureaucracy could ever match the miracle of markets, which spontaneously and efficiently aggregate the knowledge of a society. > Amazon, however, has acquired the God’s-eye view of the economy tha…
Maybe this is what you were drawing attention to, but that part of the article misinterprets centralised planning. What it describes is the logistics of getting something from one place to another.
Centralised planning is when a government planner decides the source, the destination and the good without giving final power to a consumer. Amazon doesn't have the final word on what people buy (or the destination of goods for that matter) so it isn't a centrally planned system in that sense.
Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan
#7Bezos on climate: "While others might fret that climate change will soon make the planet uninhabitable, the billionaire (Bezos) wrings his hands over the prospects of diminished growth. But the scenario he describes is indeed grim. Without enough energy to go around, rationing and starvation will ensue."
As Lovelock as said, currently the only answer is nuclear energy and that's largely rejected while the non-Western countries increase their fossil fuel use 'up to but not beyond' Western levels. They have a way to go and it seems not to involve cutting back whatever words emerge.
Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan
#8I am a sci-fi enthusiast like Bezos, however he seems to cherry pick the themes that he likes to apply to himself and Amazon e.g. driving mankind towards the stars and solving energy crises.
There are however plenty of dystopian concepts in science fiction which his company seem to be propelling us toward:
* Compression of labour wages by replacing/augmenting with robots.
* Building an evil mega-corp (think Tyrell, Liandri, UAC, Weyland Yutani) that has its tentacles in every market.
* Facilitating the demise of human privacy laws
* Encouraging consumerism and subsequent pollution.
I am sure there are other themes in sci-fi that could be applied to Amazon.
Looking forward to my subdermal Alexa powered chip!
Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan
#9Interesting article. I thought Bezos was just another greedy, power-mad megalomaniac. That he's also a dewy-eyed Trekkie who rationalizes his greed with dreams of space colonization makes it even sillier. Who knew Gene Roddenberry was more dangerous than any economic theorist?
> greedy, power-mad megalomaniac
Why do you think that of him?
Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan
#10Interesting article. I thought Bezos was just another greedy, power-mad megalomaniac. That he's also a dewy-eyed Trekkie who rationalizes his greed with dreams of space colonization makes it even sillier. Who knew Gene Roddenberry was more dangerous than any economic theorist?
> greedy, power-mad megalomaniac Why do you think that of him?
Rich person bad