[Lazare]

Odd story. If you strip out the "Amazon" and "AI" stuff, the core seems to be that there's a tech company offering a service called Buy For Me which crawls various merchants who operate their own storefronts, lists the products they find for Buy For Me's users, and have a button the users can press which...buys the product.

Which is a little odd, and the value is questionable, but fundamentally seems...fine? You're a merchant, you're selling pencils on the internet, people are buying your pencils from you. And historically the way this might have been built would be something like a desktop application that users install, and which then goes and loads websites, displays them, fills in payment info, etc. Which of course is exactly what the web browser does already.

And all of the complaints about how it should be opt-in also feel odd. If you install WooCommerce and put a storefront up on the public internet, you've pretty obviously opted in to "selling your products on the internet". You don't need to tell Firefox that it's okay for people to use it to buy your stuff!

Of course, this isn't a desktop app, it's agentic AI run by Amazon, which certainly makes it feel different, but I'm not entirely sure how different it should make our analysis.

But also, the story raises a bunch of interesting questions and then doesn't answer any of them:

> Chua also received at least several orders for products that were either out of stock or no longer existed on her website.

How exactly did this happen? The story is that the orders are being placed through the normal storefront, right? So how exactly?

Or:

> Gorin sells wholesale through a password-protected section of her website, where retailers must submit resale or exemption certificates so orders are properly exempted from sales tax. She said she was still able to complete a “Buy for Me” purchase of a product pulled from her wholesale site despite never opting into the program — a scenario that could expose her business to tax liability if individual shoppers were able to place tax-exempt orders. Gorin also worries that surfacing wholesale pricing could undermine profit margins, allow competitors to undercut her prices or bypass minimum order requirements designed to keep wholesale sales viable.

That's just begging for an explanation. Is Amazon is somehow using stolen credentials to obtain price information? Or is Goren mistaken and the info isn't password protected at all? (And if not, why not?)

I'd also be interested in unpacking a bit more the legal and contractual implications of agreements like Mochi Kids has signed. The brand apparently doesn't allow its products on Amazon, and doesn't allow partners like Mochi Kids to sell on Amazon, but...Michi Kids isn't? Mechanically someone is buying the products at retail and effectively relisting them. Which...I dunno, feels legal? Is any agreement actually being violated here? Does the brand have a course of action? Does Mochi Kids have an actual legal obligation to opt out? Does Amazon have a legal obligation to let vendors opt out? Is Amazon legally buying anything from Mochi Kids, or is the customer the person using Amazon? Given the payment info being used is the customer's, I'm not sure Amazon has a commercial relationship with the brand or the vendor?

And so on. It feels like too much of the story is being carried by it being about Amazon and AI, which means the author felt fine just glossing over the details.

[saghm]

"Fundamentally fine"? How do you think Amazon would react to someone scraping their marketplace and posting the inventory under their own service? Unless the answer is "they'd be perfectly happy to have to opt out individually in each case", that's a double standard. The only reason they wouldn't actually need to care about this is because they have comparatively inexhaustive resources to be able to shut this sort of thing down with a sledgehammer without having to risk meaningful consequences rather than what they're telling sellers to do, which is to ask nicely to stop being included, and that's a sign of an unhealthy ecosystem where competition is non-existent.

[Lazare]

As someone else noted, Amazon sent a cease and desist letter when someone tried more-or-less the same thing on them (https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/company-news/amazon-perplex...), so it's absolutely a double standard, yes.

But that doesn't answer the question of what rights vendors actually have here (much less what rights they should have).

[kstenerud]

The fact that Amazon even allows vendors to request de-listing (and the fact that Amazon does it promptly) would suggest that Amazon's lawyers have recommended that they do this (and that it's likely for a good reason).

We, as non-lawyers, may never know. But they obviously know something... Enough to spook them.

[lucyjojo]

copyright on pictures, text descriptions, use of their brand names?

[userbinator]

I have bought items from AliExpress which somehow arrived from an Amazon warehouse, unexpectedly quickly. The price was right and I have no other complaints, so I think it does happen.

[jonhohle]

Any fulfilled can use FBA (fulfilled by Amazon) for their own inventory and their own retail front end. Amazon charges storage and shipping fees and the items do not need to be for sale on Amazon.com.

https://sell.amazon.com/fulfillment-by-amazon

[johnnyanmac]

>Which is a little odd, and the value is questionable, but fundamentally seems...fine?

1. Brand management is strict for a reason. You don't want some third party pretending to represent you and suddenly they become malicious or simply get hacked and have their customers (and indirectly, your customers) assosiswte you with frustration and danger. Or even something completely inconsequential in the grand scheme of things but a PR nightmare. Like having Nintendo products in a list next to some Magnum condoms.

2. There's subtle issues with making things "too convenient" to buy. Trackers and affiliates get frustrated, so it might make you less money in the long term. You might have related items to tempt buyers to buy more so spending goes down. Less users accounts (be it an email list, curation algorithms, or following on social media) weaken outreach for future holiday deals.

And those are 2 points when not considering a trillion dollar tech giant and the Ai concerns.

[lenkite]

> Which is a little odd, and the value is questionable, but fundamentally seems...fine? You're a merchant, you're selling pencils on the internet, people are buying your pencils from you.

Why not apply your exact "its fine" standards to Amazon too ? Standards go BOTH ways, after all.

> In November, Amazon sent a cease-and-desist letter to Perplexity over its new Comet browser, which lets users ask an AI agent to find and buy items on Amazon. In a statement, Amazon said third-party shopping agents should “operate openly and respect service provider decisions” on whether or not to participate.

These people want Amazon to "respect service provider decisions" - just like Amazon demands of other people.

[Lazare]

I mean, I'm inclined to think Amazon was wrong over the Comet browser thing too, so...

[ericd]

Yeah, seems like there’s a big fight brewing over losing the status quo of having control of how humans interact with stuff, as agents come along and make it so we don’t need to wind our way through the digital ad mazes they’ve constructed to do things.

But the incumbents who don’t want to allow this seem destined to lose, this is a tsunami coming, where this is just obviously how things will be done in the future once performance is good enough, and any group who tries to force customers into the old way is just not going to succeed for one reason or another. This is just how the market is shifting.

[eitally]

What you described in the first bit is essentially what the Shop app does (but in clear partnership with the retailers).

[ajross]

Yeah, this is structurally no different than hiring an assistant to shop for you.

The complaint isn't a moral one. It's fundamentally a trademark dispute. Manufacturers of goods want control about how their products are presented to consumers. Hermès doesn't want their stuff on the shelves at TJ-Max because it "dilutes their brand" or whatever.

Unfortunately trademark law doesn't speak to AI Agents, which is why there's a tech angle here. This is likely going to need to be solved with legislation.

[bastawhiz]

> this is structurally no different than hiring an assistant to shop for you

In my opinion it's fundamentally not, because when you hire an assistant, you're hiring them with the intent to have them buy the product from the merchant.

Here, it would be like if you went to your local Safeway or other supermarket and there was a man standing at one of those sample carts who said "Hey, what you think of these papayas?" They're good, you look at them and decide you want two. "Great, I'll go in the back and get it." They disappear and come back with the papayas.

What's different:

1. You probably don't know where the papaya came from. Your intent in buying papayas didn't start with a clear understanding of the whole transaction.

2. You didn't interact with the merchant. If you want support, you have to go through the supermarket.

3. Whether you can file a credit card dispute is questionable. You likely won't win a dispute saying "I bought these and they're bad." You paid for a personal shopper, not a product. They substantially complied with their end of the transaction. You can't reliably dispute your instacart order saying "The papayas were disgusting." Instacart didn't sell you papayas, they sold you shopping services.

4. The merchant didn't sell to your email, they sold to some Amazon email. Good luck getting tracking details or getting customer support to talk to you directly. Good luck with returns.

5. Either Amazon is giving out your real credit card number (!) or using a virtual card. If it's the former, they've just invented credit card fraud as a service: you really going to trust Amazon's AI to hand out your card details safely? If it's the latter, you're probably going to get billed separately from the merchant charging you, which means Amazon is a middleman for refunds and payment issues.

In November I ordered a nozzle that I needed, which I knew had been discontinued. I ordered from a small seller, thinking they might still have some in stock. Turns out, they never even charged my card (probably because they don't have one and never will). I have been unable to get in touch with them about the order. I suspect this is very common, especially with drop shipping.

If Amazon charged me up front but they were not charged, that's outrageous. They don't even have a way for me to prove I didn't get my item (how could they?). Or will they mysteriously charge me at some point in the future? Who knows!

[EagnaIonat]

To add to this. Having a personal shopper is not new. Net-a-Porter for example do it. But you are paying for the personal shopper and the brands have a closer connection to their customers.

So I agree, it's very different.

[ajross]

> the brands have a closer connection to their customers

That's... not a thing though. No such thing as "brand rights" [1] beyond stuff like trademark, which clearly doesn't apply here. In particular there's no inherent recognition of a manufacturers ability to control what happens to downstream goods. Stuff is stuff, if you sell stuff the people you sell it to can sell it too.

[1] Nor do we really want there to be? I mean, I get that this seems bad because ZOMG AMZN, but in general do we actually want to be handing more market control to manufacturers vs. middlemen and consumers?

[SpicyLemonZest]

As the source article covers, some manufacturers routinely ensure this kind of closer connection through contractual promises from authorized retailers. (Obviously any individual person who buys a product can still resell it, but for things like clothes consumers widely understand this to be a separate "second-hand market".) Amazon invests a lot of effort themselves in the consumer experience, they understand very well that stuff isn't just stuff and it matters how you sell it.

[EagnaIonat]

> No such thing as "brand rights" [1] beyond stuff like trademark, which clearly doesn't apply here.

I don't disagree with you on a personal opinion side, but the more expensive brands have a snobbery about who they sell to. To me it seems less about quality and more about "I'm rich" app style of fashion.

[danaris]

It's not bad because ZOMG AMZN, it's bad because *Amazon is a monopoly*, and thus anything they do to take more control should be treated with extreme suspicion.

[ajross]

Again, no such thing. There's no antitrust regulatory framework that recognizes the ability of "small" brands to constrain their downstream markets in ways "big" ones can't.

People are getting bent out of shape here, again, based on the specific player. But seriously what do you really think the solution is supposed to look like? I just don't see a fix here that won't make things worse, and I absolutely don't see one available under current law.

[hamburglar]

If I were a merchant and I was bothered by this, I’d start figuring out how to exploit it. Ask your developers to code in the ability to detect the AI buyer (email address is a dead giveaway for now) and give them higher prices. Oh, you have an automated buy-bot? I smell opportunity.

[hahahahhaah]

If you strip out the Microsoft and Internet Explorer there was just some rando tech company giving away a free as in beer browser license. No biggie.

[kaonwarb]

Thank you for this careful comment.