[akerl_]

The IPv4 space almost certainly did not cost them $4.6 billion to acquire. They acquired it much cheaper, and they can’t reasonably sell it because they need it for users. So charging for it when they previously did not nets them revenue they were leaving on the floor before.

[crazygringo]

The exact price doesn't matter. The point is, it's wrong to conflate profits with income. You need to subtract costs before you can declare that Amazon "makes" a particular amount of money.

You are of course correct that this gives them revenue, my point is that the article is falsely framing this entirely as profit.

[akerl_]

The costs were already paid. AWS bought that IP space over the past decade. On their financials for 2024, the cost of the IP space they already held is zero.