Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day • Hacker News Board

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

#521

Post by rapind » Sat, Jul 20, 2019, 5:39 PM UTC

jrs235 wrote: post #513

rapind wrote: post #500

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By unfettered capitalism I just mean a system where you end up with disparities of 500x, massive multinationals, and horrible behaviour by many (yesterday we had an article about Cargill for example) that's too hidden or abstract for most of society to fully realize. I believe it's unsustainable and will inevitably come crashing down. Personally I'm in favour of worker coops with a capped pay disparity between the le…

>a system where you end up with disparities of 500x, massive multinationals, and horrible behaviour by many That's not unfettered capitalism though. That's captured markets via regulation and laws picking winners and protecting incumbents. That's due to corporatism... when corporations, via imaginary person-hood, are given the same rights as humans. What I label as corporatism.

Well whatever you want to call it, it's what we've got. Pure free market can't work because of externalities (dumping chemicals upstream of your town), so we have regulation, and yeah it gets captured.

I think people would get more value out of work if they had a stake and a voice, instead of being peons for a super rich board of investors. I suspect we'd make longer term decisions, instead of cutting corners. We elect our leaders (antipathy aside), why can't democracy extend to the workplace? It can and does work already, so let's have more of it. More experiments, more critical thinking about the way things are. Subsidize co-ops the same as incorporations (or just get rid of subsidies entirely) so it's an even playing field.

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

#522

Post by JetSpiegel » Sun, Jul 21, 2019, 1:48 PM UTC

foldr wrote: post #398

tsbertalan wrote: post #383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, and it's not morally wrong for a mosquito to bite you, and no one would say that the bug "should have known better", but we do our best to prevent it anyway. Both entities will go precisely as far as we allow them to.

When companies like Amazon do things that are morally wrong, you never see people making this claim that moral concepts don't apply to companies. They only say it when it's convenient for them (i.e., when they want to take advantage of Amazon rather than vice versa). To compare a company's actions to those of a mosquito strikes me as quite silly. Amazon is run by people who make conscious choices and who are responsi…

> When companies like Amazon do things that are morally wrong

Companies don't "do things". The managers (and ultimately Bezos as the top manager) are the moral actors here. "Amazon" is just shortcut name for all the people that work there, this set is ever changing.

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

#523

Post by JetSpiegel » Sun, Jul 21, 2019, 1:51 PM UTC

bko wrote: post #406

michaelt wrote: post #356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I have $0.50 cash and someone reaches into my wallet and takes it, is that any different to if I've got a lottery ticket with an expected value of $0.50, and the draw occurs and its value drops to $0 when it doesn't win? Some would say that in the first case it's morally wrong to steal my cash, whereas in the latter case I consented to the risk of my ticket losing when I purchased it; and therefore performing a lo…

Yes, if the Amazon model doesn't work out and you lose value, that's not immoral. It just happened like your lottery. If the value decreases from people stealing from Amazon then it is the same as going in your wallet and taking the cash.

How is this "stealing", if Amazon advertised the price they sold the product at?

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

#524

Post by qntty » Mon, Jul 22, 2019, 4:55 PM UTC

WalterBright wrote: post #518

qntty wrote: post #510

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, and I think it's wrong to steal from people

Stealing from corporations is stealing from people. Otherwise, I could justify stealing hubcaps from your car as stealing from the car, not you, so it's ok. Besides, if you have a moral code that specifies who it is ok to steal from, you'll need to accept another's moral code that says it's ok to steal from you.

This is obviously false if you think about it for like a minute.

> Stealing from corporations is stealing from people.

Sure, whatever. It's still not immoral. I also think it's okay to steal slaves from plantations. "But stealing from plantations is stealing from people!" Sure, whatever, it's still not immoral.

> Besides, if you have a moral code that specifies who it is ok to steal from, you'll need to accept another's moral code that says it's ok to steal from you.

Total non-sequitur. Let's try this: Marxists think that capitalism is stealing from workers. You think that it's moral. Therefore, if you have a moral code that says that it's okay to steal from workers, you'll need to accept another's moral code that says it's okay to steal from you. Makes sense, right? No.

It's awfully coincidental that your concept of legitimate ownership just so happens to align with the concept given to your by legal and cultural authorities. It's almost like you haven't actually bothered to think about it for yourself. Can you give me an example of a kind of ownership that you think is illegitimate?

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

#525

Post by madrox » Mon, Jul 22, 2019, 10:56 PM UTC

m463 wrote: post #26

madrox wrote: post #20

I remember something similar happened at Best Buy 15 years ago with a high end nvidia card. I bought one, but Best Buy obviously chose not to fulfill on the glitch. I wasn't surprised or disappointed. I was surprised at how many people felt entitled to it, though. The number of calls to boycott Best Buy over it seemed insane. I wonder how many people will feel entitled to Amazon honoring this glitch.

I thought there were advertising laws that required stores to honor their flyers, but I don't know how that translated to the online world. The idea was, print a "price glitch", people come into stores, "so sorry that was a mistake", people still buy stuff... Then laws were enacted.

I don't know either, but I know I didn't get my video card and got refunded.

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

#526

Post by admax88q » Thu, Jul 25, 2019, 5:38 AM UTC

jtuente wrote: post #451

tripzilch wrote: post #365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except you did't have $2000 cash because you invested it in Amazon, whose value dropped to $0.

Cash is simply the physical form that the government has deemed legal tender that must be accepted for payment. In the case of countries like 1920s Weimar Republic, that cash can lose value due to hyperinflation in currency trading markets.

/r/iamverysmart