[babypuncher]

I feel like the offloaded liability is just a technicality and is a poor lack of incentive for Amazon to do anything. Sure, the product was sold by a non-Amazon third party, but from the user perspective the defective product was purchased on Amazon. The company can deflect blame to the marketplace sellers all they want, but it's still Amazon's reputation that receives the most lasting damage.

[aidenn0]

I am wondering if Amazon is immune to reputational damage though. People have been complaining about counterfeit and defective products from Amazon for about 5 years now, and it doesn't seem to have had significant effect on market share.

I've been disentangling my purchasing habits from Amazon, but I don't know too many other people who are.

[reportingsjr]

I don't think the majority of people care about quality. I think most focus mainly on price.

See Walmart for an example of this. They force manufacturers of otherwise decent stuff to make lower quality versions of products to sell only at Walmart, just to lower the end price.

Considering that Walmart is one of the largest companies in the world, this seems to be a winning tactic.

[oblio]

People only care about quality for a very few select goods in their lives. Most of them are of hedonistic nature and/or are publicly visible so are a status symbol.

Everything else will be as cheap as can be bought (so probably 90% of purchases).

[justin_oaks]

People are unable to accurately judge quality before they make a purchase, and often well after the purchase the quality is uncertain too. Who knows how long it'll take before you find out that your cheap USB charger was made of shoddy materials and will catch on fire when it fails?

But you can know the exact price before the purchase.

People are optimizing based on the information they have.

[aidenn0]

Amazon doesn't have the best prices though; it's big selling point is, IMO, convenience (this is IMO a bigger factor for Walmart as well; while they heavily advertise a few particularly aggressively priced items, most of Walmart's SKUs are pried middle-of-the-road).

[miej]

i cancelled my prime subscription yesterday after finally getting frustrated enough by so much of what i've bought/wanted to buy on amazon being clearly fraudulent in one way or another. forget free shipping, i want products that work, and which actually are what they are advertised as. i've wasted too much time munging through reviews to try to figure out if a good product was stealthily replaced with a dud, if manufacturing standards dropped significantly, if the seller was paying for positive reviews, not to mention time/effort wasted on returns and discovering that the products i got were in fact blatantly counterfeit/defective.

yall probably know rule 34, but I'm pretty sure there should be another rule of the internet: "if a product exists, it will be counterfeited on amazon". just try taking a look at how many people on the amazon sellers forum have their businesses/brands seriously harmed by the myriad of counterfeiters on amazon.

i also recommend this write-up for more perspective on the extent and nature of fraud on e-commerce platforms: https://www.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/publications/20_0124...

[aidenn0]

My biggest problem so far has been finding alternatives that are not just as fraudulent. So far picking a retail store and only getting things that are "available for pickup" even if I plan to have it shipped seems to work for me, but that greatly reduces the available options. Buying direct from the manufacturer often works, but some mfgrs have switched to a storefront on Amazon :(

[throwawayboise]

I don't buy anything from Amazon anymore, but I agree most people I know haven't gone that far.

[chiefgeek]

Same here. It isn't easy. I dropped Prime a couple years ago. I think I placed five total orders last year, pandemic and all.