Elizabeth Warren is right about Amazon. It's not as simple as avoiding their main website.

[kcr]

Last edited Sat Mar 9, 2019, 02:10 PM - Edit history (1)

If someone wants to avoid doing business with Amazon for whatever reason, it isn't as simple as merely deciding to shop somewhere else. AWS, or Amazon Web Services hosts a giant chunk of the web. To give you an idea of how significant they are, here is an article about what happened when they had an outage:

https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2017/03/02/aws-outage-that-broke-the-internet-caused-by-mistyped-command

This past Tuesday morning Pacific Time an Amazon Web Services engineer was debugging an issue with the billing system for the company’s popular cloud storage service S3 and accidentally mistyped a command. What followed was a several hours’ long cloud outage that wreaked havoc across the internet and resulted in hundreds of millions of dollars in losses for AWS customers and others who rely on third-party services hosted by AWS.

The long list of popular web services that either suffered full blackouts or degraded performance because of the AWS outage includes the likes of Coursera, Medium, Quora, Slack, Docker (which delayed a major news announcement by two days because of the issue), Expedia, and AWS’s own cloud health status dashboard, which as it turned out relied on S3 infrastructure hosted in a single region.

Want to thoroughly boycott Amazon?

https://www.fastcompany.com/90281892/bezos-boycott-how-to-live-an-amazon-free-life

Another extreme measure you can take is not visit AWS-powered sites. This is actually possible, as it turns out: One enterprising person built a helpful script–it’s a bit technical, but you can find the instructions here. When implemented, it makes it impossible to visit any AWS site, although a word to the wise, doing this will significantly handicap your web viewing experience. Indeed, services and apps including Netflix, Spotify, Reddit, and even this article here are hosted on Amazon’s servers.[div class="excerpt"

Hat tip to DURHAM D. A great interview with Warren on MSNBC on this topic

[LongtimeAZDem]

1. I doubt this tactic is going to produce the results she desires

[Brainstormy]

2. for many small retailers

like my husband, who sells used books, DVDs, etc., through Amazon, this amounts to an end of business. This is the same ethical dilemma we face when boycotting corporations like Walmart. Do I hate the corporate philosophy? Yes. Do I have other jobs for all those who work there and need that income if Walmart disappeared? No.

[kcr]

5. That's the problem with corporations like Amazon.

Silicon Vally companies like Amazon, Google and Facebook were allowed to grow unchecked and under the radar. It's long past time something was done about it. Not only would the tech industry survive, but small businesses would also benefit. They certainly don't thrive in this business climate.

[Blue_true]

33. Amazon launches thousands of small businesses each day.

Some of them grow to become significant companies.

Amazon didn't grow unchecked, they put money into once backwater efforts like e-books and web-hosting for small and medium sized companies. The company also allowed the stocking of rare products that people can't find locally or even via a web search in most cases. In it's efforts, Amazon lost a frightening amount of money. Now that the once backwater areas that it put money into are spinning off gads of profit money, now the company is viewed as some Frankenstine that was allowed to grow without challenge, but reality is something else.

[MH1]

19. Exactly! Reality is complicated; we need candidates who get that.

I'm not sure about the implementation plan Warren has in mind to break up big tech companies. Maybe she does get it, maybe she doesn't. (yes I need to do more homework)

I think the end goal of creating more competitive free markets*, by preventing the creation of "too big to fail" in the first place, and secondly finding appropriate ways to pare down the existing monster corporations, is a good goal. But we have to be careful of the collateral damage strewn along the way. The small retailers like your husband are potentially part of that collateral damage.

* by "free market" I always mean "many buyers and many sellers", like I was taught in Econ 101. That is completely different from "free" as in unregulated. When I hear "free enterprise" it is usually used in the apparent sense of unregulated, or less regulated capitalism. But free markets require regulation to exist. Without regulation, we get this problem that Warren is trying to address.

[mr_lebowski]

26. The fundamental problems are ..

1) Socialization of Costs, and
2) Monopolies

Without regulation,eventually you end w/monopolies, which is turn antithetical to the principle of the free market. And you also end up with every company externalizing as many costs as they possibly can ... which is also not free market.

The principles underpinning the system WILL BREAK ... without regulation.

However, that breakage ... doesn't actually HARM the corporations who successfully break the system. It helps them.

[MineralMan]

3. Amazon makes an easy target, for sure.

Everyone knows Amazon. It's huge and is dominating online retailing. However, not everybody hates that. And there's the dilemma for someone running for President. A lot of people who will be voting love Amazon, for various reasons. Some even depend on it, especially people who have difficulties that keep them from shopping elsewhere.

There are plenty of voting Democrats who like Amazon and who consider it to be the new way to shop for things.

Yes, it's a huge corporation. Yes, it causes problems by out-competing other businesses. But, that doesn't mean people don't like and use Amazon extensively. Those people vote, too.

[kcr]

7. This was a response to those who claim no one has to shop at Amazon

because Amazon isn't a monopoly, therefore Warren was wrong. I decided to make it its own OP. I'd responded to one of those claims explaining just how ubiquitous Amazon actually is and how hard it would be to avoid if one wanted to. How is it not a problem when a corporation grows so large that they dominate the market to the extent that it takes technological expertise the average person doesn't have to avoid it?

[MineralMan]

10. It doesn't really take any technological expertise.

Try this experiment: Go to Google and search for something, say "snowblower." Click the Shopping tab. What you'll find a number of brands and models of snowblowers for sale. Click on any of them, and you'll see several places where you can buy that model. You can compare the offerings and prices from as many places as are listed for that model and brand.

You can do the same for just about anything. Try "diamond necklace." Guess what you won't find? Amazon. To find diamond necklaces on Amazon, you have to go to Amazon and search for them there.

Many people do start on Amazon, because they have learned that it sells just about everything, but you don't have to shop there. Google's shopping tab will let you see many other sources for what you're seeking.

It's a similar story on other search engines. Just search for what you want, click shopping, and go for it.

People choose Amazon as their first shopping location for a reason. They find what they want, at a competitive price and get fast shipping for free most of the time. You can also shop on Walmart.com, Target.com, Etsy.com or even eBay.com. It's still your choice to shop where you wish, or to shop at a wide range of outlets if you search on Google shopping.

Still, a lot of people shop Amazon first. Amazon has successfully trained people to go there if they're looking for something. It's easy to shop at other places, though, if you prefer. Personally, I shop on Google a lot of the time. Often, I find what I'm looking for at a place I can go and buy it locally, then bring it home with me. Others do the same.

Amazon does a very good job of Internet retailing, and has attracted a loyal group of customers. It had better not rest on its laurels too much, though. People do not have to shop there, as I have illustrated above.

[kcr]

12. Really? No tech knowledge needed to avoid AWS hosted websites?

[MineralMan]

14. Who cares who hosts a site? Really.

Most people have no idea who hosts a site they're using. For example, do you know who hosts Democratic Underground? Do you care who hosts it, as long as it shows up when you want it to?

Just fyi, you can find out who hosts DU at: https://hostingchecker.com/

You might get a surprise.

Hosting is hosting. It's just a server farm somewhere that has nothing to do with the sites that are hosted on it. It's a very competitive business, hosting is. Do you have a website? A blog? Who hosts that?

[kcr]

17. It's a very competitive business. Righto. Hence the concern about AWS

When AWS went down, it disrupted a huge chunk of the internet. I bet people cared about who hosted those sites then. So, you have Amazon, the internet retail website that has grown so big it controls a giant chunk of that market, who now controls a large chunk of the internet itself. Very competitive market, you say?

[MineralMan]

21. There is no hosting service that hasn't gone down sometimes.

Reliability is measured in percentages. Most hosting services have over 99% uptime, including AWS.

There are many hosting services out there. A company that needs hosting can choose any of them. Different pricing, different options, different capabilities. It is, indeed, a highly competitive business.

So, did you go to look up where DU is hosted? It's easy to do.

[kcr]

23. Right. But how many of them disrupt whole chunks of the internet when they do?

There are indeed many hosting services out there. How many of them control the share of the market that Amazon does? Just how much of that pie should Amazon get to control, or should they get as much of it as they want? Should they just get the whole shebang?

[MineralMan]

24. There are a few that large.

Not too many, but a few.

Here's a place where you can make a comparison:

https://hostadvice.com/marketshare/

Really, all of this stuff is easy to look up, you know. Google your question.

Here's another link, with even more information for your question:

https://www.hostingadvice.com/how-to/largest-web-hosting-companies/

[mr_lebowski]

27. If Amazon were leveraging AWS to drive customers to it's own websites I would totally get your point

At this point, I don't know of any evidence that they do so, and frankly I think if it did, the shitstorm that would erupt would be like ... not many things we've ever seen.

They absolutely have to be 'neutral' in offering cloud hosting services for websites, if they ever started meddling in other people's traffic to bring themselves actual sales/retail business ... shit would get UGLY.

Companies that choose to use Amazon for hosting choose to do so because they find it makes the most sense economically, and yeah, Amazon has a competitive edge there, as they do elsewhere, due to scale.

But honestly I'm not convinced that's an overall 'bad thing', because there's an efficiency involved with it as well. Do we really 'need' a ton of competition in 'cloud hosting'? I kinda think as long as the cloud host isn't interfering in the natural commerce ... it doesn't matter all that much if there's only a few cloud hosts.

[kcr]

28. Given how little anyone seems to care as it is

I'm not sure why you'd think there'd be much of a shit storm over anything Amazon did. At any rate, the point is Amazon is a monopolist in e-commerce. AWS either is or is very close to being a monopoly in the cloud space, which means that Amazon could leverage its power in the cloud hosting monopoly to protect its monopoly as an e-commerce platform by making it more difficult or expensive to run an e-commerce platform in the cloud.

[MineralMan]

32. It has no monopoly in cloud services or hosting.

See my other post on this. It's far from being number one in site hosting, and has huge competition in cloud services. Go look it up...

https://www.democraticunderground.com/100211904593

https://www.zdnet.com/article/top-cloud-providers-2019-aws-microsoft-azure-google-cloud-ibm-makes-hybrid-move-salesforce-dominates-saas/

It's important to have facts, not guesses...

[DURHAM D]

4. It might be helpful if you find Senator Warren's interview

with Ari Melber from last night and add it to your OP.

[kcr]

6. I didn't see it. I will go look for it.

[Renew Deal]

8. A Democrat can't win by making enemies of the tech industry

[kcr]

13. No? So, what industries can they tackle?

Is there an accepted list? Are all industries to be capitulated to, or only some? At what point do we put people first? Or is that just not done.

[Renew Deal]

15. We can "tackle" all of them

You can’t make enemies of most of them. Industry is run by people and many of those people vote. People will accept appropriate regulation, not being targeted.

[kcr]

20. Anti-trust laws are nothing new.

Industry has never viewed them as anything but an attack, and yet these are laws that have remained on the books for over a century. So, I think it's safe to define them as established and appropriate regulation. Certainly nothing radical.

[Irishxs]

9. Bezos began selling used books from garage.

Why is he being blamed for just growing his business? I am a life long denocrat, but I don’t think the gov has a right to just come in and chop up a private company. I shop at Amazon because I don’t have to drive all over looking for something. Won’t vote for Warren if she keeps talking like this. Best thing she could do is pass better privacy laws, like Europe did.

[kcr]

11. What is the difference between anti-trust laws and privacy laws?

Why are you for one but not the other? Both are government regulation.

[Irishxs]

16. Answer, sort of.

One allows company to operate but with conscience for consumers. The other changes actual ownership of someone’s company. It may not make sense but if I had nurtured a company from the beginning, I would not want to see it divided up by the government.

[kcr]

18. The government has to divide them up when they get too big

Or no one else gets to have companies and there's no competition. I'm sorry that would hurt your feelings as a business owner, but think of it this way. If you value privacy, it's in your best interests. We'd lose privacy laws eventually when these gigantic companies get rid of them. And they would with their outsized power.

[Irishxs]

22. You are correct..

about companies getting so large and wielding power to change laws. We absolutely need stronger privacy laws, though, to protect data. Enjoyed the discussion!

[Blue_true]

35. Exactly how is Amazon violating anti Trust laws?

Taking risk and out fighting your compitition is not being a Trust that is crushing competitors unfairly.

[Blue_true]

34. Bezos also nurtured along e-books when the format was a money loser.

He likely saw that lots of small companies like his once was didn't have low cost cloud based web hosting. I think that we can't go around tearing down companies that take a chance on longshot ideas and see that risk pay off big. E-books could have never taken off, I admit that I was very cold to the format when Kindle was being pushed. Providing cloud services to small companies could have not taken off.

I don't like what Amazon did with their HQ2 effort, but I view Bezos as a modern business visionary, he takes chances when others are running away. Bezos now is moving into groceries with his efforts to launch a lower cost version of Whole Foods that will serve customers that don't fit well in the WF format. The effort could fail miserably, but it also could have people screaming about Bezos controlling 60% of grocery shopping in a few years. Capitalism is about taking risks and working one's ass off to make those risks pay off.

[lostnfound]

25. Maybe Ari should read "Surveillance Capitalism"

The video someone posted between Naomi Klein and the author of Surveillance Capitalism, Harvard professor Soshana Zuboff, makes me think that Elizabeth Warren is onto something. Interesting

The monopoly of the sales and the platform is part of it, but the sucking of personal data into massive data clouds is another issue.

[crazytown]

31. I am reading it now.

Very important. And yes I bought it through Smazon.

[brooklynite]

29. Based on my teaching experience...

I’m willing to bet that a lot of the millennials attracted to Warren and Sanders have Amazon Prime accounts.

[kcr]

30. Yep, I bet they do. I have one, too.

People have been owning things for a long time, and yet consumerism still manages to be a thing. I'm sure the people who broke up AT&T all had phones.

[Blue_true]

36. Was breaking up AT&T effective?

I think not. We have only three phone companies and massive prices to consumers. And service in rural areas is getting worse and worse by the year. AT&T took phone service into places where it was not profitable, for a reasonable cost to people that needed that service.

[Awsi Dooger]

37. Warren is apparently determined to damage our nominee though it won't be her

Incomparably awful instincts. She couldn't see the big picture if you wrapped it around her house