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Retail, search and Amazon’s $40B ‘advertising’ business

ben-evans.com

191–200 of 289 posts

Re: Retail, search and Amazon’s $40B ‘advertising’ business

#191
post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It could be if it makes up the entire market...

Except it doesn't, not even remotely; there are dozens of other ways of buying things online, people just choose not to.

Except the issue isn't whether there are "dozens of other ways of buying things online, people just choose not to" but whether Amazon's market share is so large as to prohibit anyone from being able to compete with it.

Re: Retail, search and Amazon’s $40B ‘advertising’ business

#192
post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What interest is conflicting, exactly? Seems like interests would be pretty perfectly aligned to maximize revenue.

Yes, at the expwnse of their customers and the law. Thats what conflict of onterest means

That doesn’t make sense, because if their costumer isn’t satisfied, they can use another online store.

Re: Retail, search and Amazon’s $40B ‘advertising’ business

#193
post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except it doesn't, not even remotely; there are dozens of other ways of buying things online, people just choose not to.

Except the issue isn't whether there are "dozens of other ways of buying things online, people just choose not to" but whether Amazon's market share is so large as to prohibit anyone from being able to compete with it.

That’s an obvious, “No”, as there are many competitors to Amazon…

Re: Retail, search and Amazon’s $40B ‘advertising’ business

#194

From https://www.amazon.jobs/content/en/our-workplace/leadership-... > Leaders start with the customer and work backwards. They work vigorously to earn and keep customer trust. What do you do when a product serves two customers (shoppers and advertisers?)

Profit?

Re: Retail, search and Amazon’s $40B ‘advertising’ business

#195

I never encountered ads on Amazon, so out of curiosity I disabled uBlock Origin and visited Amazon. It seems that the ads are for products sold on Amazon. Clicking an ad redirects you to the product page. Until now I thought that sites where you go to spend money are free of ads. This is a new low. What's next, ads on banking apps? Ads on the revenue service website? I think ads play the biggest part in why the Inter…

Re: banks, you can find the ads under "___ offers".[1] Ditto any "special" partnership they have, e.g., TrueCar is a popular one right now.

[1]: https://thepointsguy.com/credit-cards/credit-card-merchant-o...

Re: Retail, search and Amazon’s $40B ‘advertising’ business

#196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> undermining a lot of what makes us comfortable in modern life under capitalism I read Wealth of Nations, did I miss the part where it says: "you should have a single global company control most of the market"? Every economist writes about importance of competition. If you want to keep around giant monopolies, you are not capitalist.

On a global scale, it helps if your country is where all the biggest companies are coming from, especially to compete with big companies from other countries.

You could make the same argument fir trade barriers, protectionism, subsidies, etc.

It also comes across as "two wrongs make a right"

Re: Retail, search and Amazon’s $40B ‘advertising’ business

#197

> the ‘retail media’ gold rush: the realisation that a high-traffic website or app could be ad inventory even if you’re not a media company, that you have very relevant ‘consented’ first party data (at the very least intent if not broader profiles) and probably purchase attribution too, that all of this now has more relative value given the push against cookies and third party data everywhere else - and that advertis…

For Expedia, it used to be the case that they made more from someone booking via an ad on the site than they did via direct purchases. Same model as Amazon Ads, really.

Re: Retail, search and Amazon’s $40B ‘advertising’ business

#198
post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except the issue isn't whether there are "dozens of other ways of buying things online, people just choose not to" but whether Amazon's market share is so large as to prohibit anyone from being able to compete with it.

That’s an obvious, “No”, as there are many competitors to Amazon…

I'm not aware of any but okay, if you insist

Re: Retail, search and Amazon’s $40B ‘advertising’ business

#199
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The most satisfying experience for me at the moment is the suggestions I get on a new tab in chrome on Android. Not because the suggestions are amazingly good - sometimes they're ok - but because when they lead to some crap-infested site I can click to not see that site any more. That ability to cull keeps the suggestions workable for me. I genuinely think the Google would benefit hugely by making this a possibility…

I use Edge browser on Android because it allows me to block ads. I also use NewPipe instead of the normal YouTube app and I can enjoy essentially an adless experience on Android.

Firefox + uBlock Origin + Video Background Play Fix.

This has been the best way to watch YouTube on Android. The video keeps playing in the background too and no ads of course.

Re: Retail, search and Amazon’s $40B ‘advertising’ business

#200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sponsored segments on YouTube. Billboards. Sponsored texts in newspapers. "YC XXX is hiring" on HN. I use Firefox + uBlock Origin + Sponsorblock and a few others. Ads are still everywhere. Not as everywhere as they'd be without it, but it's not like adblocks get rid of them all together.

Its trivial to skip ahead of the sponsor reads in youtube vids, or to scroll past the "is hiring" posts. Frankly, these are minor annoyances. The people who get emotionally overwhelmed by them perhaps should resolve that internally rather than externally. Life is never going to be free from minor annoyances.

The only point I'm trying to make here is that they're still ads that adblocks don't protect you from. Web without an adblock is worse, but web with an adblock doesn't equal ad-free experience.

> The people who get emotionally overwhelmed by them perhaps should resolve that internally rather than externally.

What you're insinuating here is quite frankly insulting, brings nothing of value to what I was trying to say and the only thing I can offer you in return is to tell you to go fuck yourself.

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