• Refurbished Refurbisher
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    641 year ago

    It shouldn’t be on the individual consumers to avoid monopolies; we need antitrust enforcement; we need to break up Amazon.

    • Zloubida
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      241 year ago

      It shouldn’t be indeed, but unfortunately it is. We can’t just hide our personal responsibility behind the State when the State is deficient.

      • Refurbished Refurbisher
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        211 year ago

        Unfortunately, organizing on the scale necessary to defeat Amazon is damn near impossible. I think doing so politically is our best bet.

      • @[email protected]
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        171 year ago

        Our personal responsibility is to make the State not deficient though, not a boycott of amazon.com or whatever you’re suggesting. A boycott of even their digital and physical storefronts probably wouldn’t even change much, since Amazon makes most of their profit via AWS. Something like 33% of all internet traffic goes through AWS in some fashion, so boycotting that is even harder. The only real option I can see is to make the State regulate them in some manner because all the people in the world can’t fight a trillion dollar company themselves.

        • @[email protected]
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          1 year ago

          Why not both? I’m happy to avoid buying Amazon (do I really need to avoid walking to the store?) while advocating for crackdowns on them.

      • @Tavarin
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        101 year ago

        There are certain things I can’t get anywhere near me from anyone other than Amazon, and I live in a city of 6 million people. Sadly I need to use Amazon about once a month. Getting groceries from them is ridiculous though.

        • @[email protected]
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          41 year ago

          Aren’t there any online shopping alternatives to amazon? Are they really the only online vendor who is allowed to mail stuff to your 6 million people city?

          • @Tavarin
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            21 year ago

            Not ones that can get me the things I need within the month.

        • Hup!
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          1 year ago

          Nah you’re just bad at online shopping.

          • @Tavarin
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            21 year ago

            Nah, some shit would take weeks to get to me from the few other alternate vendors, and I;m not waiting that long.

            • @drenchtoast
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              -11 year ago

              I think you just proved their point lol.

              • @Tavarin
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                41 year ago

                Hey, if anyone else or any store can get me the things I need within the week I 100% go there. but no one else is stocking specific temperature controllers anywhere near me. I can’t get 3D printer resin anywhere that isn’t a 40 minute drive away. Specific wiring I need, AliExpress is the only other company with it. Amazon stocks a lot of niche things that no one else is carrying.

                • @LukeMedia
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                  11 year ago

                  I wish RadioShack survived

                  • @Tavarin
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                    21 year ago

                    Same. I also used to have a great store near me that carried random electronic parts, motors, hobby shit, bits of hardware. Any time I needed to fix something, or wanted to make a little device I could go there for supplies. RIP Active Surplus.

    • @[email protected]
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      141 year ago

      It’s not just about the monopoly though. Their site is rife with counterfeits and is basically Wish now. Want a GE lightbulb? There’s a 50/50 chance you’re getting a counterfeit that isn’t UL tested so you don’t know it’s safe, and that’s if you can even find the product at all hidden between the random name generator company listings for random garbage that’s slightly similar to the search term you entered.

      • Refurbished Refurbisher
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        1 year ago

        And if there was a competitor that sold only legit products without having to compete with AmazonBasics (who just steals designs and sells them for a cheaper price) or from JSOIY (who also steals designs, and yes, I made up that name), people would use them instead of Amazon.

        A monopoly enables this behavior, since there are no other options.

      • @Misconduct
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        41 year ago

        Don’t even get me started on phone chargers. Good fucking luck. The cheap knockoffs are such a fire hazard too I stg

          • @Misconduct
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            31 year ago

            That’s actually my go to a lot of the time now lol

            • ZeroTemp
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              21 year ago

              Same. I use their chargers, cords, ear buds, and speakers and all have worked great with no issues.

        • @[email protected]
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          21 year ago

          As with all electronics, just look for products with UL or ETL certification and you should be OK.

          • @Misconduct
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            11 year ago

            Thanks I’ll keep that in mind for the future