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Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

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Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#341

Post by john_minsk »

want2know wrote: post #244
mikorym wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that if Amazon does ship these (and it seems some already did) it's actually pretty neat advertisement for them. Any publicity is good publicity, right? I wonder how much an advertisement campaign with this amount of buzz usually costs.

Yes but it has more costs involved than just this. For example the statistics of the brands Sony and Canon are now wrong and the budget of advertising is still as it was yesterday. So the bookkeepers have a lot of exta work to get this straight.

They won't even notice that. Data collection at this scale is anyway not 100% accurate. Especially for marketing purposes.

On the flip side if their data collection is that good they can see who was on the fence to purchase high-end gear for photo shooting, but bought the deal. That can lead to opening new demographics or targeting them with features people want from top models. Only having full information, you could argue which option is better.

I definitely hope that they don't have data at this level.

Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#342

Post by danbruc »

sgift wrote: post #249
Mirioron wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's talking about it from the moral standpoint. Most customers will be able to tell that something is off when camera gear is that cheap.

Amazon is not a person, it's a company. Attributing moral to a transaction with non-person entities is frail itself. Does moral even apply here? What does it mean?

There is no attempt to apply moral concepts to a company, it is the customer holding the believe that some errors should be corrected while others should not. The fact that Amazon is a company and the debate about whether moral concepts can be applied to such entities is therefore irrelevant in this case.

Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#343

Post by crispyambulance »

sagebird wrote: post #239

It’s kind of interesting- the asymmetry of moral expectations and entitlement. If you accidentally purchased a bag of M&Ms from Amazon for 500 dollars instead of 5, they will let you undo it. On the other hand, if the matter is reversed, Amazon is expected to be a good sport and take the loss — even if the purchase was made in bad faith (ie- knowing Amazon mis-priced it but purchasing it anyways.) I’m not going to en…

    > It’s kind of interesting- the asymmetry of moral expectations and entitlement.
Amazon made a relatively small mistake considering their scale. It's OK. They can mitigate this by stopping orders that haven't shipped.

For the items that did ship, they can contact the buyers and ask nicely for them to return the items, perhaps in exchange for an amazon gift card.

I don't think it's reasonable to put consumer "morality" in question here.

Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#344

Post by jrs235 »

kartan wrote: post #288
sagebird wrote: post #239

It’s kind of interesting- the asymmetry of moral expectations and entitlement. If you accidentally purchased a bag of M&Ms from Amazon for 500 dollars instead of 5, they will let you undo it. On the other hand, if the matter is reversed, Amazon is expected to be a good sport and take the loss — even if the purchase was made in bad faith (ie- knowing Amazon mis-priced it but purchasing it anyways.) I’m not going to en…

> It’s kind of interesting- the asymmetry of moral expectations and entitlement. First, there is an asymmetry in power too. Amazon can afford to double check or triple check everything if it makes economic sense. Secondly, companies does not have morals. If you allow big corporations to change prices as they see fit because there is a "mistake". Companies will exploit that to their advantage with psychopathic precisi…

>if the purchase was made in bad faith (ie- knowing Amazon mis-priced it but purchasing it anyways.)

>The same behavior would happen with a company with better public trust and respect. And it’s not like anyone is selling those cameras to donate money to a warehouse worker in need.

>I just think it’s amazing how frail people’s morality is, how it goes out the window when certain conditions are met.

The parent wasn't talking about companies, they were talking about us people and how morality is shit these days. As to your focus in companies, they derive their morality from the people that run them. What's shit for the goose is shit for the gander.

People taking the high road makes a better world.

Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#345

Post by ashelmire »

sagebird wrote: post #239

It’s kind of interesting- the asymmetry of moral expectations and entitlement. If you accidentally purchased a bag of M&Ms from Amazon for 500 dollars instead of 5, they will let you undo it. On the other hand, if the matter is reversed, Amazon is expected to be a good sport and take the loss — even if the purchase was made in bad faith (ie- knowing Amazon mis-priced it but purchasing it anyways.) I’m not going to en…

We have laws about truth in advertising so that people don't get shafted by these big companies. Sure, they could say it was a mistake, but then they might have to fight it... and it really is a drop in the bucket for them. Amazon still made billions in revenue each of those days.

Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#346

Post by Slartie »

normalhuman wrote: post #289
sagebird wrote: post #239

It’s kind of interesting- the asymmetry of moral expectations and entitlement. If you accidentally purchased a bag of M&Ms from Amazon for 500 dollars instead of 5, they will let you undo it. On the other hand, if the matter is reversed, Amazon is expected to be a good sport and take the loss — even if the purchase was made in bad faith (ie- knowing Amazon mis-priced it but purchasing it anyways.) I’m not going to en…

> If you accidentally purchased a bag of M&Ms from Amazon for 500 dollars instead of 5, they will let you undo it. Of course, and they do it out of self-interest. On one hand, 495 dollars are not worth losing a client for life. More importantly, it is not in their interest to scare people away from using their service. The story could spread and cause significant damage to their reputation. > On the other hand, if th…

> The customer taking advantage of a mistake to receive an unfair deal and Amazon not paying taxes are more or less the same behavior.

This is the key insight. The customer takes advantage of Amazons' inability to deal with its highly complex and huge pricing system of millions of articles without occasionally making fatal errors, while Amazon is taking advantage of the world's population's inability to deal with the highly complex tax rule interplay between many different countries which still want to interface with each other (= do trade) and thus occasionally create loopholes that can be exploited. The latter is impossible for the consumer due to scale (there's millions of consumers paying tiny amounts of taxes each, exploiting loopholes doesn't scale down that much), and the former is impossible for Amazon due to its scale (there's just one Amazon with a giant cash flow, to exploit a pricing failure of another online store in a way that makes a difference to this cash flow is impossible for several reasons, most importantly that there is no other online store large enough).

Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#347

Post by HeavyStorm »

kartan wrote: post #288
sagebird wrote: post #239

It’s kind of interesting- the asymmetry of moral expectations and entitlement. If you accidentally purchased a bag of M&Ms from Amazon for 500 dollars instead of 5, they will let you undo it. On the other hand, if the matter is reversed, Amazon is expected to be a good sport and take the loss — even if the purchase was made in bad faith (ie- knowing Amazon mis-priced it but purchasing it anyways.) I’m not going to en…

> It’s kind of interesting- the asymmetry of moral expectations and entitlement. First, there is an asymmetry in power too. Amazon can afford to double check or triple check everything if it makes economic sense. Secondly, companies does not have morals. If you allow big corporations to change prices as they see fit because there is a "mistake". Companies will exploit that to their advantage with psychopathic precisi…

> companies doesn't have morals

Call it whatever you want, the way big companies like Amazon operate has moral implications and, therefore, Amazon has a moral. The fact that is isn't a single living organism but a sum of many doesn't mean it has no morals whatsoever.

I do understand your line of thinking - how do we create a law that can't be exploited? Because, after all, we expect it to be exploited at some point.

Although in my country the rules are the same (the lowest announced price has to be honored) there was a issue a few years ago that a product was announced at a much lower price. A judge ruled in favor of the seller. I don't really recall the details but I think the ruling was based on the fact that the law was supposed to avoid sellers exploiting buyers, but the announced price was a clear mistake.

Common sense above all, I guess.

Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#348

Post by nickjj »

Freak_NL wrote: post #228
want2know wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the Netherlands this also happened some times on webshops. And everytime a judge ruled people had to bring the goods back or should pay the full amount. The reason is that it is very clear for the buyer it is a mistake. And almost all webshops have a legal notice about wrong or false prices.

If I remember correctly, in these cases (bunk beds and televisions) the orders were never fulfilled. The court ruled that a sales contract is not binding if the buyer can reasonably suspect that the price shown is so absurdly low that an error on the side of the seller is apparent. That is, you can try to order the item, but the seller has no legal obligation of fulfilling it if they can proof beyond reasonable doubt…

> The court ruled that a sales contract is not binding if the buyer can reasonably suspect that the price shown is so absurdly low that an error on the side of the seller is apparent.

How can you prove something like that in court in this camera case?

For example, let's say you were just getting into photography and were window shopping by browsing around Amazon's site.

You run into a camera that has a 4.7 average rating with 3,000+ reviews and the example pictures that people were posting look great to you. You have no idea about camera specs but you see it for $149, so you buy it. That doesn't seem too unrealistic, especially not when phones cost $1,000. You could totally think "oh, well $150 for just a camera sounds about right".

Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#349

Post by msiyer »

sagebird wrote: post #239

It’s kind of interesting- the asymmetry of moral expectations and entitlement. If you accidentally purchased a bag of M&Ms from Amazon for 500 dollars instead of 5, they will let you undo it. On the other hand, if the matter is reversed, Amazon is expected to be a good sport and take the loss — even if the purchase was made in bad faith (ie- knowing Amazon mis-priced it but purchasing it anyways.) I’m not going to en…

Morality has no place when dealing with a corporation. Legality is the only thing that counts.

>> If you accidentally purchased a bag of M&Ms from Amazon for 500 dollars instead of 5, they will let you undo it

If it is technically possible, then it is the seller's mistake and the customer deserves a refund. The seller may choose to not undo. The customer may choose to sue them. It is a PR nightmare in today's world. It is illegal.

>> On the other hand, if the matter is reversed, Amazon is expected to be a good sport and take the loss — even if the purchase was made in bad faith (ie- knowing Amazon mis-priced it but purchasing it anyways.)

If it is technically possible, and if the customer has not hacked the system in any way, it is the seller's mistake. The customer should not care. Once the sale is made, it is legally over. The seller has no legal way of recovering the money from the customer. The seller should have verified the prices.

Re: Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day

#350

Post by dsr_ »

lagadu wrote: post #322
sagebird wrote: post #239

It’s kind of interesting- the asymmetry of moral expectations and entitlement. If you accidentally purchased a bag of M&Ms from Amazon for 500 dollars instead of 5, they will let you undo it. On the other hand, if the matter is reversed, Amazon is expected to be a good sport and take the loss — even if the purchase was made in bad faith (ie- knowing Amazon mis-priced it but purchasing it anyways.) I’m not going to en…

You seem to be operating under the impression that we as a society have the same expectations of people and of corporations. Let me be very clear: we do not. Corporations are allowed to operate at the pleasure of the people; I was going to say that they're effectively second-class citizens but they're not citizens, they're just a tool that we allow to exist. Because of that we put more burdens on them than we do on p…

The prices will reflect the percentage of people who use this right -- and this is also valuable information to the seller.
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