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I Fell Victim to a $1,500 Used Camera Lens Scam on Amazon

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Re: I Fell Victim to a $1,500 Used Camera Lens Scam on Amazon

#261

Post by gbl08ma »

curun1r wrote: post #253
haburka wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Liking zero indexed lists is such a dumb programmer meme. Lists are for humans to read and therefore should use the natural numbers, which start at one. Arrays are zero indexed because the first item of the array starts with zero offset.

And it's because of dumb non-programmers that we have 12am immediately following 11pm. If we were to, instead, recognize the beginning/middle of the day as 0, the am/pm transitions would be sensible. Starting at 0 is almost always correct, teaching people to start counting at 1 isn't. Why do we continually come up with convoluted workarounds simply because we educate children incorrectly?

I believe that hours going up to 12 instead of going 0 .. 11 is because you can't quite hear a bell strike zero times, no?

Re: I Fell Victim to a $1,500 Used Camera Lens Scam on Amazon

#262

Post by wongarsu »

haburka wrote: post #192
softwarefounder wrote: post #12

I like how this list is zero-indexed.

Liking zero indexed lists is such a dumb programmer meme. Lists are for humans to read and therefore should use the natural numbers, which start at one. Arrays are zero indexed because the first item of the array starts with zero offset.

>Lists are for humans to read and therefore should use the natural numbers

Depending on who you ask, the natural numbers do contain zero. Notably ISO 80000-2 is of that opinion. In university, half my professors included 0 in the natural numbers, half excluded it.

For lists, starting them at 1 makes sense, but I would argue that's purely because that way the words "first", "second", "fiftieth" etc. line up with the numbering. It has nothing to do with human consumption.

For example floor numbers are made for humans too, but the European scheme of labeling floors -2, -1, 0, 1, 2, 3 makes much more sense than leaving out 0, leading to awkward -2, -1, 1, 2, 3, 4. Years are made for humans too, but most people are confused about the ordering of years because having the year -1 followed by year 1 just seems weird and makes date math difficult (for humans).

Re: I Fell Victim to a $1,500 Used Camera Lens Scam on Amazon

#263

Post by kuschku »

haburka wrote: post #192
softwarefounder wrote: post #12

I like how this list is zero-indexed.

Liking zero indexed lists is such a dumb programmer meme. Lists are for humans to read and therefore should use the natural numbers, which start at one. Arrays are zero indexed because the first item of the array starts with zero offset.

Hours go 0:00 to 23:59

Elevators use 0 for ground floor, negative for basements, and positive for upper floors.

Just two examples of zero indexed lists in real life.

Re: I Fell Victim to a $1,500 Used Camera Lens Scam on Amazon

#264

Post by Simon_says »

ceejayoz wrote: post #88
pjc50 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're saying that disputing with Amazon will pull all your kindle books ? I don't think that would fly in countries with consumer rights. Bear in mind this is also a Marketplace seller and not the real Amazon.

Steam happily bans accounts that make chargebacks, so it's apparently legal (or at least get-away-with-it-able) in the US. I'm really not willing to take that risk with Amazon.

You know, I think I just decided never to use Steam again. Thanks.

Re: I Fell Victim to a $1,500 Used Camera Lens Scam on Amazon

#267

Post by snowwrestler »

jjoonathan wrote: post #247
dingaling wrote: post #3

Recap as I understand it, since the blog post isn't 0. Buyer purchased item from third-party seller on Amazon 1. Seller picked a name and address in buyer's town, from an obituary, and sent parcel containing two baking mats thereto ( instead of camera lens ) 2. Occupant of that address signed for it believing it to be for the deceased relative 3. USPS updated status to 'delivered' with signature and address recorded…

I got hit with the same-zip-code scam for a $6000 VNA on eaby and the response was completely different. Customer service immediately shuffled me off to a special claims department that investigated and got my money back within about a week. At no point did I encounter anything resembling the Kafkaesque web of strategic incompetence that I half expected. They followed up every step of the way with courtesy and profes…

I have shifted all my budget and used buying from Amazon Marketplace to eBay.

At this point it seems like there are new stories about Amazon Marketplace scams almost daily. Does anyone think Marketplace is a priority for Amazon leadership these days? Does Bezos even know it is still operating? It's not getting the A team, obviously.

Meanwhile connecting sellers and buyers is all eBay does. They don't make devices, produce TV shows, run cloud services, etc. etc. Of course their support is good. It has to be.

Re: I Fell Victim to a $1,500 Used Camera Lens Scam on Amazon

#268

Post by DaiPlusPlus »

ballenf wrote: post #187
simcop2387 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One potential problem with that is that Amazon can retaliate by closing the users's account if they didn't agree with the charge-back even if they're unsuccessful at fighting it. That can be really difficult to deal with if you're also using AWS for hosting or other things.

FWIW, I've had Amazon instruct me to file a chargeback in one instance that they had already identified as fraud. It was a very different situation, however: someone had my CC info and loaded it onto a new account and made a large purchase. Oddly when I inquired Amazon said they had already flagged the fraud and I needed to send a chargeback. It appeared that they were not going to proactively let me (or my cc compan…

That's weird, as issuing a CC refund is cheaper for everyone than a chargeback.

Re: I Fell Victim to a $1,500 Used Camera Lens Scam on Amazon

#269

Post by megablast »

> The description of the used lens indicated the lens is in excellent condition and the price seemed very good… maybe too good

If the lens sell for $1,500, and he got it for $1,490, why does he say he thinks the price may have been too good? It seems like it would be an accurate price for it.

Re: I Fell Victim to a $1,500 Used Camera Lens Scam on Amazon

#270

Post by emodendroket »

kristianc wrote: post #223
emodendroket wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Didn't I read that Prime loses them money most of the time? I don't think the membership fee is a real replacement for regular revenue streams; it seems to me like the point is more to encourage people to "get their money's worth" by buying from Amazon more.

People do really get their money's worth from Prime: "40% of Amazon Prime members spend over $1,000 a year on Amazon, while only 8% of non-Prime shoppers do so." I'd be really interested to see what Amazon's numbers as a whole would look like if Prime didn't exist, clearly it is profitable enough for Amazon to be able to keep bundling "free" stuff into the package like video / music, file storage etc.

I think a similar effect is at work with Costco memberships.
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