[20yrs_no_equity]

I worked at Amazon, I interacted with Jeff Bezos, the Washington Post doing this does not surprise me. It is effectively his political blog, where he gets to push his agenda while being abstracted away from responsibility. (EG: Amazon PR can continue its campaign of BS propaganda without WashPo articles hurting them or Bezos.)

[benregenspan]

Fred Hiatt has run the Washington Post editorial page since 2000 and this editorial is entirely consistent with his past work. He's always pushed neoconservative positions and taken the word of sources like the House intelligence committee at face value. Amazon might well have financial interests in US intelligence, but it's very easy to imagine this same editorial being written with or without Bezos as the owner of the paper.

[dnautics]

Hasn't Bezos officially come out against government intrusion into online privacy? E.g.:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2016/05/18...

[ReadingInBed]

This is a good point. As far as I remember Amazon had/has a contract with the CIA for 100s of millions. When the rich own the media there is always a risk that they will hire those that push their agenda. Amazon could greatly profit from government contracts. I wouldn't argue one article proves a conspiracy, but it's so incredibly hypocritical that you have to wonder why WaPo would publish it. Especially when it means future leakers might not want to go to them for fear they will work with the govt to imprison them.

[SixSigma]

$600m over 10 years

I bet Bezos isn't too comfortable about the Trump presidency after the way WaPo has behaved

[SixSigma]

No wonder the are anti-Trumping, the gravy train is pulling into the station

[nhebb]

From what I can tell searching relevant dates, I believe the Washington Post published the PRISM piece before Bezos purchased the newspaper.

[nekopa]

I believe that's the point. Before Bezos the paper thought Snowden was great, after Besoz they want him thrown in jail.

[nhebb]

Mea culpa. I did miss the point.

[johansch]

You're kinda missing the point here.

[nitrogen]

What does Amazon gain from an anti-Snowden article? Should we be worried about the privacy of our purchase history and AWS instances even more than we already were?

[my-cowardly-alt]

Not Amazon, but Bezos' startup Blue Origin is a defense contractor, currently bidding to supply the rocket engines for US national security launches (Air Force, NRO). He's one of two finalists (with Aerojet Rocketdyne), with a decision expected in 2016 or 2017.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/boeing-lockheed-venture-developi...

I think it's reasonable to say it's a conflict of interest, trying to be both a newspaper reporting on the intelligence industry, and a major contractor for that industry at the same time.

(I apologize for creating a throwaway to post this; I'd prefer not to annoy AWS).

[wallace_f]

Years ago I reserved this kind of level of paranoia for the tin foil hat types, but to me now, it seems not only reasonable, but prudent.

[jacquesm]

It's a sobering thought that we are still thinking about some as 'tin foil hat types', which makes you wonder what we'll think of them years from now.

[nitrogen]

I realize this is an old thread, but it occurs to me that one of the problems is that implausible conspiracies are lumped together with plausible, likely operations and dismissed as a group with a single label.

[wallace_f]

I agree wholeheartedly.

Apparently the CIA popularized the term 'conspiracy theory,' in the 60s, though I don't have knowledge on the veracity of that claim. It's clear that at least a non-pejorative term would be useful.

[tomc1985]

Snowden's revelations did a lot of damage to trust in American servers and internet services internationally. (Bezos/Amazon probably stands to lose much in this way.) Many other parts of the world actually care for their privacy; Germany for example is still wary of excess data collection because of the Stasi and the problems they created.

News of PRISM et al is probably one of a few root causes behind underpinning this newfound federation of internet authority

[lolc]

> Snowden's revelations did a lot of damage to trust in American servers and internet services internationally. (Bezos/Amazon probably stands to lose much in this way.)

By attacking the messenger they show how little they care about their users.

[rodgerd]

Bezos kicked Wikileaks from Amazon's infrastructure with nothing more than a few senators expressing displeasure at WL's actions.

Whether Bezos is a True Believer in the American empire, or whether he just wants to curry favour with the government to make money is beside the point: Amazon is definitely a partisan in these things. It will be interesting how that fact will play out in Europe and Asia over time.

[dalke]

I think it's more about the political influence Bezos might get by showing that he supports the established political system.

[jackmott]

I would wager it is just that this is what Bezos believes is right.

[20yrs_no_equity]

What Jeff believes is right is what accrues to Jeff more power. The founders of Google, Bill Gates and Steve Balmer, Jobs and Wozniak, the early Sun people, they all made mistakes and might have done bad things. Generally I think people running businesses are doing so because they want to make a dent in the universe. I don't buy the idea that CEOs are sociopaths (which seems to be a common perception). But if you told me you believed Bezos was a sociopath I would suspect you were right.

I only worked there a couple years but I had more interaction with him than I would like (though he never chewed me out) and usually, I'm eager to get close to the CEO and learn what I can.

[wallace_f]

>Bezos was a sociopath

Can you elaborate, please, on why you feel this way?

[jacquesm]

You've quoted that so out of context it now has a different meaning.

[dforrestwilson1]

I can't believe this was down-voted when it is so obviously true. Thank you for posting.