[ajross]

I guess, but Amazon gets me stuff tomorrow or the next day, reliably, week in and week out. Yeah, I could find this stuff elsewhere on the internet. But not for Tuesday delivery. And not without opening another account. Also, right now, often only by paying a tariff-adjacent fee to cover the import costs of the vendors that didn't have the foresight to pre-stock imports like Amazon did.

People who want to write stuff like this really need to reckon with the fact that Amazon is and remains the superior product, and by a very significant degree.

They're not winning because they "hate democracy" or are "full-stop evil" or whatever. They're winning because they're the best.

[ezst]

And that's kind of an issue. Amazon effectively has a monopoly in this space, and competing at a similar level just is not possible anymore. And Amazon is so big that, even when you have a better product and service, it can buy you off¹.

¹: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Souq_(company)

[no_wizard]

This is the reality.

I have moved anything I don’t need quickly off Amazon as much as reasonably possible, and I do avoid some things from Amazon as well, but for too many things they’re the cheapest and fastest option, or the 2nd cheapest and fastest option.

Also if I think there is a reasonably high chance I’ll return an item, I also go through Amazon, because they haven’t once in 20 years I’ve been using them giving me an issue, charged a restocking fee etc.

Other online shops simply don’t match enough of these Amazon value prop to sway me over

[PaulHoule]

My take is that Walmart.com comes pretty close. When I was driving through Pennsylvania two weeks back I saw a huge Walmart.com warehouse right next to an Amazon warehouse. The last mile delivery service of the two seems close to identical (though Walmart+ disingenuously offers "free" delivery from my local store that expect you to tip the driver. [1])

Amazon often costs 5 cents less and you might find that all the issues of Bocci the Rock are at Amazon and one is missing from Walmart, but Walmart is taking the fight to them.

For photography stuff in particular, I buy from B&H, Adorama or direct from vendors such as Red River Paper. Often the prices are better than Amazon and the service is much better (e.g. the owner of the later has schooled me on details of papers and printing that most people couldn't imagine)

[1] Not against giving the tip, just against saying I don't like the comparison against free shipping from other vendors.

[no_wizard]

If the idea is to avoid Amazon on any sort of ethical basis (including monopolistic practices and squeezing suppliers etc) Walmart is no different. You could change any issue you have with Amazon and replace it with Walmart and they all still apply, sans the peeing in bottles of delivery drivers

[PaulHoule]

At least as a shopper my feelings about Walmart are pretty mixed.

That time I needed a game camera immediately and AMZN said 5 days I got it at 7am the next day at Walmart. Most of the bread at the bakery is that awful stuff people accuse of being “ultra-processed food” but they have something like the Vollkornbrot you see in German Bäckerei that is 100% honest and delicious to my taste. The pharmacist there is a real eager beaver who never fails to tell me something I didn’t know about a medicine I take and that’s not easy. On the other hand I ride the bus with someone who used to work there who says it was a shit place to work.

Walmart didn’t have a representative sitting behind Trump at his inauguration and even if it’s evil it’s better to have two evil competitors than one evil monopoly.

[ajross]

FWIW, my suspicion is that people motivated by "Amazon is full-stop evil and an enemy of Civil Rights, Human Rights, Workers, Small Businesses, and Democracy"[1] would be even less motivated to shop at the temple of Sam Walton.

But even so, I just checked and of the last 12 items in my Amazon purchase history, Walmart.com loses on every one of them before shipping is included. They're not really in the game absent externalities like location or specific product.

[1] Not hyperbole: those are the sections in the linked article!

[PaulHoule]

I have my own grievances with Amazon, not least that 2 day shipping became 5 day shipping without warning during the pandemic although I know they had infrastructure in my area because for years I saw their delivery van going around on Sunday. I felt it was really unfair because if I have to wait 5 days for something to arrive I am inclined to go get it at Target or another store in town if I can.

Since then I’ve taken them up on offers of a free month of Prime or a week for $2 which is attractive if it gets me free shipping on a purchase. Now I get the same service as everyone else but if they wanted to be a loyal customer hey should have treated me as if they wanted to impress me as an earlier.

Notably Walmart has a + service which is a little cheaper than Prime but doesn’t have the video and other benefits that I’m indifferent too. I agree with the direction of that guy’s critiques of Amazon but not the magnitude but I’m a strange case in that I’m an amateur political scientist who works as a software dev with real political scientists that I have to be deferential to.

[jeffbax]

Walmart+ has the basic Paramount+ included fwiw

[fred_is_fred]

Canceling my Prime account mainly meant I bought less stuff overall. A win for my wallet and the planet in the end. I need zero friction in my life for healthy eating and exercise, not for buying crap from a Chinese brand of the week (Glorf, Qerdu, Plund or whatever).

[ajross]

> Canceling my Prime account mainly meant I bought less stuff overall.

Which sounds like an agreement with my point, no? Buying stuff without Amazon was in aggregate "more expensive" for you in the broader sense of value that includes effort/experience/whatever. So you didn't.

And, bravo? I'm all for efficiency and reasonable asceticism, and likely agree with you about the general consumerist bent of our society.

All I'm saying is that constitutes an argument in FAVOR of Amazon as a retailer product, and not an indictment.

[agnishom]

"They're winning because they're the best."

They are also actively preventing other marketplaces from being better. For example, for exclusive audiobooks on audible, the producers are paid 40% but only 25% for non-exclusive ones.

[viraptor]

Amazon enables us to buy lots of things we just wouldn't if there was just a little bit more of friction. I'm not sure it's an overall positive that they have next day delivery. We'd definitely be better overall if Amazon didn't undermine smaller shops using discounts only they can afford long term.

[SlowTao]

This statement is not an attack on your character or being just a broad generalization.

The biggest addiction of the modern era is convenience. Once people have it, it is very difficult to give up. We are all addicted to this, we aren't running this site via the letters column in a newspaper, because of convenience. But it also means we tend to ignore the negatives of said services.

Your point of them winning because they're the best, that can also be true. But because of that and the convenience addiction they provide, we let them get away with all the other stuff.

I'm not saying this is an excuse to use Amazon, I have never used it. I am just saying it is a hard hurdle for some to overcome.

[tenuousemphasis]

Humans survived up until about 20 years ago without free 2-day shipping. You'll be fine.

Or you could compromise your morals for convenience, I guess.

[kevin_thibedeau]

It's not free. It's baked into the price.

[BenjiWiebe]

It's baked into the price, but I can buy a free shipping item cheaper from Amazon than what the shipping alone would cost, if I just went to FedEx/UPS myself.