- cross-posted to:
- globalnews@lemmy.zip
- cross-posted to:
- globalnews@lemmy.zip
FTC files “the big one,” a lawsuit alleging Amazon illegally maintains monopoly::FTC: Amazon “extracts enormous monopoly rents from everyone within its reach.”
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I can’t help but notice Amazon is facing a big lawsuit over hurting other corporations.
Selling an infinite catalogue of shoddy, fraudulent, and outright dangerous goods like leaden toys, phone-melting power-equipment, house-destroying incendiary batteries, and data-erasing empty data storage? No, that’s fine, that’s not Amazon’s fault, that was XZBBK’s fault. We kicked them off the store. No, I don’t think they’re related to that new company XBZZK, why would you say that? They sell legitimate USB cables that according to the listing used to be cutting board, a drying rack, a canopy for a kids bed, and an espresso machine.
It’s worse than that.
They DON’T kick bad actors off the store most of the time because they don’t know who they are.
Amazon keeps all of product X in one place in each distribution center, regardless of the supplier. So they can’t know which of the 35 sellers of the product is supplying the counterfeits.
I don’t buy batteries from them anymore. I’m pretty sure 90+% of 18650 cells they have are counterfeit.
The gall to question their listing with an average customer rating of 4.9/5 stars. Sure I only gave them that rating so I could qualify for the warranty on the 3 TB flash drive I bought from them for $8.99, but I’m sure it’ll work fine once I use it for the first time.
Amazon isn’t sued for not kicking bad actors, it is sued for being bad actor
Amazon and Walmart are in great need of some good ol’ trust busting. Well, they aren’t in need of it, this society is in need of it.
Amazon and Walmart have just outright won the game. Everyone else in those spaces, and adjacent spaces, just can’t compete anymore. You either do business with them or die/live on the leftover scraps.
It’s really not good, there should be more opportunities for others.
I just want a trust buster
Pff…. Now do the banks, cable companies, health care, etc.
If they did the banks, you’d say Pff, now do Amazon. Let’s value what we have and hope to build on it, rather than dismiss it as not enough.
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Thse are just government employees. They dont have an unlimited staff count to deal with everything at once. Its unrealistic.
banks
Not a monopoly though?
cable companies
Agreed on this one! In theory, there are lots of cable companies.
In practice, you actually only have one cable provider that provides service in your area.
health care
Also not a monopoly in my area.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mean to defend any of the abusive practices of any of these industries. It’s just that they’re not monopolies.
Monopoly as used by professional economists doesn’t refer to a literal 100% marketshare. It refers to distortion.
FCC burns ISP’s butts
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The Federal Trade Commission and 17 state attorneys general today sued Amazon, claiming the online retail giant illegally maintains monopoly power.
“Our complaint lays out how Amazon has used a set of punitive and coercive tactics to unlawfully maintain its monopolies,” FTC Chair Lina Khan said.
Today’s lawsuit seeks to hold Amazon to account for these monopolistic practices and restore the lost promise of free and fair competition."
Joining the FTC in the lawsuit are Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Nevada, New York, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Wisconsin.
The FTC claimed that “Amazon’s illegal, exclusionary conduct makes it impossible for competitors to gain a foothold,” and that the company “extracts enormous monopoly rents from everyone within its reach.”
If the FTC gets its way, the result would be fewer products to choose from, higher prices, slower deliveries for consumers, and reduced options for small businesses—the opposite of what antitrust law is designed to do," Amazon Global Public Policy & General Counsel David Zapolsky wrote.
The original article contains 613 words, the summary contains 174 words. Saved 72%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
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Lol are you high? Amazon isn’t even the cheapest option in many cases and hasn’t been for a long time. They’re a terrible company that literally extorts merchants, authors, and businesses. Just look at the cut Amazon takes from books, for example: 65%!
You’ll see in that editorial just how much Amazon fucks over authors (many major authors have begun refusing to sell books and audiobooks on their platform). And that’s just a tiny fraction of all the fuckery Amazon is involved in.
You’re also being completely short sighted if you believe Amazon isn’t going to begin price gouging the shit out of everything once their market dominance is utterly complete. Monopolies are illegal for a reason. Just read up on the Robber Baron Era of the US to see how bad it gets when monopolies go completely unchecked. Sadly, we’re pretty much reliving it already, as Amazon isn’t the only company doing this type of bullshit, which you rightly pointed out in regards to other rackets.
That still comes at a cost, short term gain sounds nice until the next generation(what you were) are even more screwed than before. It’s not the win that it feels like, but they know it feels good and that’s why they try so hard to get you to focus on that instead of other things.
I also understand that it’s fucking rough out there and no one has the energy or money to the right thing every time. Keep buying the cheap deodorant if that’s what you need to do but understand that it comes from a system where the entire goal is to wear you down and pay you so little that you have no choice. These businesses charge so little because they know that no one can compete with them at scale and everyone suffers in the longterm.
Enjoy your counterfeit deodorant that’ll likely give you cancer, I guess? Most of what they get people these days is fake garbage that’s the same shit on Wish and Temu, but somehow being on Amazon makes it seem more trustworthy to anyone not paying attention.
👞👅
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That feel when your Etsy purchase comes with an Amazon receipt in the package :(
I had this happen to me on eBay as well. I paid a few extra bucks to avoid buying from Amazon and instead got the item mailed to me directly from Amazon. This is against eBay’s policies (you need to have the described item on hand) and may be against Etsy’s policies too
That’s if Etsy shit wasn’t expensive as hell. It’s not practical to ship at
No thanks, I don’t feel like going back to waiting a week for my package, 4 hour to next day delivery is just too nice
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Will not go anywhere because Amazon and other gigacirporations basically own the US govt at this point.
Well it’s a shame a company can’t keep benefitting the customers. Seems the capitalist business plan always has to go through a morph of fucking over everyone.
I’m all for Amazon getting sued but… the big one? Wasn’t there another “big one” a week or two ago? And who called it that? Feels like the reporters just made that part up.
Lina is the best
I want this to actually do something but I don’t have any hope anything will happen. Sigh.
