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Has Amazon become a monopoly?

Denis from BE

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Unfortunately everything is made by Amazon to keep customers buying via their plateform whatever you need to buy. As a customer point of view it's a very nice service, but on the hiden side...

Making business based on system like Amazon or Uber shouldn't be a good idea in long term. Their policy are too unrealiable and with big impact. (especially if main income stream come from it)

I'm very curious to see it how will go in the next years when Zozos will get more & more power on every industries. How this guy can sleep ?
 
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Caroleen M

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IMO, the company is getting too big, too powerful, and too disruptive to whatever industry it enters. At this point, we don't even know what industry Amazon is within anymore as their interests are all over the place.

Just to give you an example, Audible (Amazon owned) recently changed their payment policy for their audiobook bounties. The cleverly worded the change in an email that actually made the change sound GOOD. But when you examined it closer, it was absolutely terrible and a total MONEY GRAB. This one simple change will cost me thousands of dollars per month -- and my say in the matter is NIL. Amazon has the exclusive on all my audiobooks. (Commandment of Control anyone?!?).

Anyhow, if Amazon's ruthlessness continues unchecked, there might come a day when 90% of your consumer goods, from food to healthcare to clothing to shoes -- is all bought at Amazon. And at prices that are punitive.

It's some scary sh*t and the chatter is starting to get louder. (I started sounding the "monopoly" alarm a few years ago)

Amazon 'terrifies me as a company,' says a valuation professor

View attachment 20372
What are you thoughts?
MJ,
They have done the same when it comes to Amazon Prime. Which means that my title's 'watch time', thus earnings will be lower than what it used to be. Same here with making a rotten deal sound like they're offering you fresh honey on a silver baby spoon: apparently the "upside with international sales will wind up being much more lucrative for content producers" stated the email.

Problem is, if this is even true, we might be looking at years before we see any of those returns as Amazon is only just starting to make a dent in the international marketplace (think Europe, excluding the UK where they are reasonably-well established). {Sigh.}
 

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IMO, the company is getting too big, too powerful, and too disruptive to whatever industry it enters. At this point, we don't even know what industry Amazon is within anymore as their interests are all over the place.

Just to give you an example, Audible (Amazon owned) recently changed their payment policy for their audiobook bounties. The cleverly worded the change in an email that actually made the change sound GOOD. But when you examined it closer, it was absolutely terrible and a total MONEY GRAB. This one simple change will cost me thousands of dollars per month -- and my say in the matter is NIL. Amazon has the exclusive on all my audiobooks. (Commandment of Control anyone?!?).

Anyhow, if Amazon's ruthlessness continues unchecked, there might come a day when 90% of your consumer goods, from food to healthcare to clothing to shoes -- is all bought at Amazon. And at prices that are punitive.

It's some scary sh*t and the chatter is starting to get louder. (I started sounding the "monopoly" alarm a few years ago)

Amazon 'terrifies me as a company,' says a valuation professor

View attachment 20372
What are you thoughts?

People said the same thing about Walmart. I say laissez faire.

Walmart has been a net gain for America, and for consumers. Has there been a toll? Absolutely. However, as a pure Capitalist, what benefit would it serve to stifle Amazon? They provide what people want, and how they want it. If they didn't, someone else would.

Let the market decide, and let Darwinism win.

@Kak where you at? Take a break from your empire building monopoly to comment.
 

GoGetter24

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I'll always buy from a local supplier if I know one that probably has the thing I need, and is within 30 minutes drive. Amazon's primary power has always been as a "thing search engine".

If someone could provide a service to easily unify stock record keeping and description info, with a geographic search engine, and get local physical retailers to take it up in any serious kind of numbers, it would deliver a hefty whack to Amazon & co.

When people have the option between "wait X days for it to be delivered" and "walk a couple of blocks over and get it right now", they'll choose the latter. Unless we're going to pretend the skies will be roaring with the sound of swarms of Amazon delivery drones: which isn't going to happen.

the last man standing is free to charge whatever he wants!
Until they actually do that. Then competitors come back.

My favourite story about monopolies was Dow Chemical. The big German chemical companies tried to drive him out of business in Europe by selling chemicals below cost. He simply responded by switching from selling them to buying them :D
 
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Kak

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People said the same thing about Walmart. I say laissez faire.

Walmart has been a net gain for America, and for consumers. Has there been a toll? Absolutely. However, as a pure Capitalist, what benefit would it serve to stifle Amazon? They provide what people want, and how they want it. If they didn't, someone else would.

Let the market decide, and let Darwinism win.

@Kak where you at? Take a break from your empire building monopoly to comment.

Left to its own devices, Amazon will retreat eventually, giving some way to new and more exciting entrants (to both investors and consumers) to emerge.

There will come a day when the price-to-earnings comes down to a healthy 20-30... Amazon can simply can not sustain this. Opportunities for competition will emerge.

Clearly it isn't happening right now, but it will. Good for Bezos honestly. I applaud his success.

In the interim... Let it ride. There is no such thing as too big unless it's the government. The beauty of capitalism is that these things will self regulate.
 
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ChrisV

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Anyhow, if Amazon's ruthlessness continues unchecked, there might come a day when 90% of your consumer goods, from food to healthcare to clothing to shoes -- is all bought at Amazon. And at prices that are punitive.

It's some scary sh*t and the chatter is starting to get louder. (I started sounding the "monopoly" alarm a few years ago)
Good... let ‘em do it. It will just open up a space where one of us can jump in and take it over

Remember what happened when eBay started getting greedy and boosting their fees?

Oh yea that’s right. Amazon took over ;D Amazon used to be in second place until eBay f*cked up.

So let them do whatever they want.

Honestly I think that the ideas of monopolies is kind of BS. In theory it sounds scary, but when a company is so F*cking awesome that everyone goes there.. it’s just because they offer an awesome service or product. Like when people were calling Microsoft a monopoly in the 90’s, were they really a monopoly? Apple still made computers. But Microsoft was the best (AT THE TIME... i dont think so anymore,) and since they were the best, that’s what people bought.

I think we’re trained to believe monopolies are bad and wrong from an early age and look at them as they’re evil, but in reality of course everyone is going to go to the company doing the best job. Google has a monopoly on Search Engines imo. Why? Because everyone else sucks. If anyone wants to beat Google at search, the way to do it is simple: stop sucking so much.

I mean at the end of the day whoever is offering the most value for the best price is gonna be the winner. No one is stopping you or me from creating a company that’s better than Amazon. Yea, it’s a tall order, but that speaks to how great Amazon is as a company. The fact that it’s really really hard to create a company better than Amazon doesn’t speak to their evilness, imo, it just speaks to the fact that they deserve their success. No one holds a gun to our heads and forces us to buy Prime. We do it becasue it used to take us weeks to get our orders. If someone started offering 1-day shipping and all the other benefits, Amazon would go out of business in an hour.

Bottom line is if Amazon starts pissing people off, it’s simply going to create an void in the market. It’s going to create a problem that I’m sure many many companies would be more than happy to fix.
 

ChrisV

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And all beating Amazon is easy. All you would have to do is get really accurate statistics on who are buying what products. Using Data Science and predictive analytics, you predict how many of a certain product every town is likely to buy. You store your products in those places, so that it can be shipped to the most likely location as fast as possible.

In other words, with predictive analytics we can guess with 95% accuracy that 300 people in New York City are going to buy this specific Potato Peeler. So you just store 301 in New York City.

With that 1 day shipping would be possible, and once drone technology is more viable, it will be 1 hour shipping.
 
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Geekour

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Amazon's growth is scary. They made one of the biggest purchases acquiring Souq.com for $580 million. Souq is the eCommerce mogul of the middle east and now it is owned by amazon as a subsidiary. The founder of Souq, Ronaldo Mouchawar, has a story filled with inspiration and tragedy. His parent's were murdered while he was in college or living abroad. You won't read this online as it is personal and only those that grew up in the same town know his story. He was my relative's classmate and they played basketball together long ago in their youth. I can't imagine the strength required to make it to where he is now. All people see is how big amazon is but let's not forget the smaller companies and services amazon acquired to grow to what it is today. Hell, serving amazon would be a business endeavor in its own right. Also Whole Foods is giving discounts to Prime members now, I believe that's recent too not sure about that one or when it started.
 
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ruzara5

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Amazon is a big target. Layers of Big Business and Big GOV have a method. In time. Others in the upper echelons find better strategies and opportunities. Like takeovers from 'activist investors' and major shifts that cannot be ignored even eventually by the fat cats. When they get missed and ignored. It is opportunity. Which at one time. When the 90's were groovin in Seattle. Bez was a another grinding entrepreneur with some quality connections. Market history shows like MaBell and Big Standard Oil, Kodak, etc. Change is inevitable. Chopping up the leftovers means the market will keep feasting.
 
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You guys talking about laissez-faire economics don't know what you are talking about. Nothing about amazon's rise to monopoly power has been "laissez-faire".

If there is one thing amazon has done well, it's use the government for their benefit.

Amazon's shipping costs are subsidized by taxpayers. That's right, you and I are paying our taxes so that amazon can undercut competitors and sell for such a low cost.

If you believe in laissez-faire and the free market (as I do), then you should be very concerned with what amazon is doing, because it is the farthest thing from the free market.
 

Nik@16

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I found this article very depressing: Survival of the Richest – Future Human – Medium

Seems like some people just have a mindset of ruthlessness and survival, even to survive in an environment not really worth living in.
Dude , All these articles are written by novices. Especially on Medium. It doesn't mean a thing and pitying and compassion is a bullshit idea the author is promoting. All I learned is that only the paranoid survives.
 

Nik@16

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I'll always buy from a local supplier if I know one that probably has the thing I need, and is within 30 minutes drive. Amazon's primary power has always been as a "thing search engine".

If someone could provide a service to easily unify stock record keeping and description info, with a geographic search engine, and get local physical retailers to take it up in any serious kind of numbers, it would deliver a hefty whack to Amazon & co.

When people have the option between "wait X days for it to be delivered" and "walk a couple of blocks over and get it right now", they'll choose the latter. Unless we're going to pretend the skies will be roaring with the sound of swarms of Amazon delivery drones: which isn't going to happen.


Until they actually do that. Then competitors come back.

My favourite story about monopolies was Dow Chemical. The big German chemical companies tried to drive him out of business in Europe by selling chemicals below cost. He simply responded by switching from selling them to buying them :D
 
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MJ DeMarco

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EU begins investingation into Amazon w/respect to small merchants...

EU Starts Preliminary Probe into Amazon's Treatment of Merchants

I think someone here mentioned this... how Amazon will use internal data from their smaller merchants to eventually enter new spaces and eventually compete on... @Vigilante was that you?

So if Amazon sees small merchant XYZ KILLING IT on something, Amazon will use that data to determine if they want to enter the space, and hence, eventually SQUASH small merchant.

Predatory and monopolistic? Nawwwwwwww...

Screen Shot 2018-09-19 at 8.21.58 AM.png
 
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Vigilante

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EU begins investingation into Amazon w/respect to small merchants...

EU Starts Preliminary Probe into Amazon's Treatment of Merchants

I think someone here mentioned this... how Amazon will use internal data from their smaller merchants to eventually enter new spaces and eventually compete on... @Vigilante was that you?

So if Amazon sees small merchant XYZ KILLING IT on something, Amazon will use that data to determine if they want to enter the space, and hence, eventually SQUASH small merchant.

Predatory and monopolistic? Nawwwwwwww...

View attachment 21684

There was an expose article done a few years ago on this topic. Amazon waits in the weeds, and when they see someone develop something successfully Amazon would go directly to the source. It was a well written and highly publicized article... that went nowhere.

The solution for a while was private branding, but when the flood gates opened to China that kind of changed the easy ability to differentiate products/brands.

This might have been the article, and if so you can see this is nothing new to Amazon. Competing With Amazon on Amazon
 

Bryan James

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I'm not invested in Amazon and I don't encourage any of my clients to invest in Amazon; overpriced valuation and shaky foundation in my opinion. No dividend on a $2k/share stock quote and a 3% profit margin (they only became a profitable company over last 1 or 2 years!), $45 BILLION in debt with $27 BIL cash, plus all of the negative governmental/political interest coming in? Hell no. It had an impressive run but don't see much long-term potential. 5 years ago, oh hell ya, but I would've sold out (as an investor) by now. That's where I stand.
 

Fabio1

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Hello,

It's a way for them to slowly investigate how to increase their market share in European countries.

A Dutch financial article said that their effort is still limited however, because their main focus is increasing market share in India.

I'm curious about how they will compete with the two biggest eshops in The Netherlands, who have a 3 and 4 times higher revenue than Amazon, free shipping for quite small priced products already and deliver in 24 hours and for an increased number of product even same day delivery; a service that you have to pay at Amazon. The most obvious scenario will be a complete takeover. Time will tell.

Kind regards,

Fabio
 
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Walter Hay

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Hello,

It's a way for them to slowly investigate how to increase their market share in European countries.

A Dutch financial article said that their effort is still limited however, because their main focus is increasing market share in India.

I'm curious about how they will compete with the two biggest eshops in The Netherlands, who have a 3 and 4 times higher revenue than Amazon, free shipping for quite small priced products already and deliver in 24 hours and for an increased number of product even same day delivery; a service that you have to pay at Amazon. The most obvious scenario will be a complete takeover. Time will tell.

Kind regards,

Fabio
I think Amazon might have an uphill battle in India. Flipcart is solidly entrenched in the marketplace, and during the Walmart takeover the Indian board got Walmart to agree to a great share buyback deal that should help maintain the strong loyalty that Flipcart have earned from their employees.

There is always the risk to Amazon that Walmart's experience in India together with now having a lot of brilliant and experienced Indian experts now on their staff, Walmart might do better in the USA after settling down in India.

Walter
 

MTEE1985

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Amazon to Raise Its Minimum U.S. Wage to $15 an Hour

Cliff notes: All U.S. workers will get a $15/hour minimum wage, top 25% in starting pay for general warehouse jobs AND it will be effective in a month. They aren’t waiting 2-3 years like other retailers.

Love them or hate them, you have to admit, they/Bezos are exceptionally good at appealing to the “99%”
 

theresgot2bemore

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Amazon to Raise Its Minimum U.S. Wage to $15 an Hour

Cliff notes: All U.S. workers will get a $15/hour minimum wage, top 25% in starting pay for general warehouse jobs AND it will be effective in a month. They aren’t waiting 2-3 years like other retailers.

Love them or hate them, you have to admit, they/Bezos are exceptionally good at appealing to the “99%”

This was a clever strategic move and, as usual, will have predictable outcomes.
 
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Robert Williams

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IMO, the company is getting too big, too powerful, and too disruptive to whatever industry it enters. At this point, we don't even know what industry Amazon is within anymore as their interests are all over the place.

Just to give you an example, Audible (Amazon owned) recently changed their payment policy for their audiobook bounties. The cleverly worded the change in an email that actually made the change sound GOOD. But when you examined it closer, it was absolutely terrible and a total MONEY GRAB. This one simple change will cost me thousands of dollars per month -- and my say in the matter is NIL. Amazon has the exclusive on all my audiobooks. (Commandment of Control anyone?!?).

Anyhow, if Amazon's ruthlessness continues unchecked, there might come a day when 90% of your consumer goods, from food to healthcare to clothing to shoes -- is all bought at Amazon. And at prices that are punitive.

It's some scary sh*t and the chatter is starting to get louder. (I started sounding the "monopoly" alarm a few years ago)
Amazon 'terrifies me as a company,' says a valuation professor

View attachment 20372
What are you thoughts?
In my thoughts YES, you are right. Nowadays Amazon becomes a disrupted machine as it will sooner ruin the life line of retail marketers as all the youth and upcoming generation are shifting towards it. This all because of the best marketing strategies it provide, but in my knowledge it will prove a big problem for the retailers.
 

Vigilante

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Xeon

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Those article links above are highly worrying. On track to capture 50% of the US ecommerce market?! Jesus. Imagine a world where Amazon controls 100% of the eCommerce market.

It's really a bit of a grey area : being a platform provider and then coming up with your own brands based on the information you got from your 3rd-party sellers and customers are just.....

While this may sound very "loser-ish" and whiny, and perhaps highly naive and stupid, but...

I hope the US government will break up Amazon into smaller companies.
Bezos is getting far too powerful for his own good.

Is it time to break up Amazon.com? Here’s how it gets done
Amazon will be broken up by antitrust regulation, expert warns
 
Last edited:

tammymorton313

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IMO, the company is getting too big, too powerful, and too disruptive to whatever industry it enters. At this point, we don't even know what industry Amazon is within anymore as their interests are all over the place.

Just to give you an example, Audible (Amazon owned) recently changed their payment policy for their audiobook bounties. The cleverly worded the change in an email that actually made the change sound GOOD. But when you examined it closer, it was absolutely terrible and a total MONEY GRAB. This one simple change will cost me thousands of dollars per month -- and my say in the matter is NIL. Amazon has the exclusive on all my audiobooks. (Commandment of Control anyone?!?).

Anyhow, if Amazon's ruthlessness continues unchecked, there might come a day when 90% of your consumer goods, from food to healthcare to clothing to shoes -- is all bought at Amazon. And at prices that are punitive.

It's some scary sh*t and the chatter is starting to get louder. (I started sounding the "monopoly" alarm a few years ago)

Amazon 'terrifies me as a company,' says a valuation professor

View attachment 20372
What are you thoughts?
Its always said that "what goes up must come down". Amazon is the Walmart online. Amazon is into every industry because of "What goes up must come down". So, when one industry is down the others are up which keeps the money flowing in no matter what happens; they got it covered. That's Amazon!
 
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D

Deleted50669

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Someone should start "Antizon" to compete with a similar business structure, only you get presented random products and swipe left or right on them.

Just kidding.
 

MJ DeMarco

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