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> Like yesterday Amazon kept showing lightbulbs with the wrong physical socket size. This exact thing happened to me. One of the problems, was that the bulb I was looking at, had a specific mini-candelabra socket, and the ones they showed me, had one that was just slightly larger, but looked almost identical (and the name was also “mini candelabra”). This was one of those “recommendations,” in the list at the bottom. I actually ordered the wrong bulbs, based on this, and had to return them. I have also had Amazon direct me to gray market and counterfeit goods, with extreme confidence; often insisting that the dodgy product was being sold by the manufacturer. I now order direct from the manufacturer, for anything over about $50, even if I pay more (happens less frequently, these days. Amazon is no longer the bargain it used to be, and even gray market now sells for full retail). Sometimes, the manufacturers use Amazon for fulfillment, but I don’t mind, as they direct me to the real product. It’s not 100% Amazon’s fault, as the scammers have figured out how to game the system, but Amazon is not trying to fix it. I assume that this is because they make so much money. I have heard, anecdotally, that selling on Amazon has become a nightmare, for legit sellers; especially small ones. The scammers have no problem, putting up with B.S., but real sellers can drown. Here’s something I experienced, a couple of years ago, when I was looking for a stand for my phone: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25582762 (the links in that post no longer do what they did, back then). |
Same thing happened to eBay, any attempt to cut down on the scammers just reduced the number of actual real sellers, until basically there's nothing but scammers left for large swaths of the site.