the unstoppable local-biz-swallowing pseudo-monopoly that is AMAZON

of course it could just be a negotiating tactic/ruse

fine by everyone i know in queens.

GOOD

Northern Virginia makes much more sense anyway, they just wanted to go to New York for the glamor

God, is this gonna fuck it up even worse for those of us in the DC orbit? Thanks a lot, Nerd York.

smells like victory

I would maybe consider letting amazon move in if the surrounding co-op boards in LIC and Astoria interviewed them first.

they really ought to move to toledo or buffalo or something.

AMAZON CANCELS PLAN TO COME TO NEW YORK

"After much thought and deliberation, we’ve decided not to move forward with our plans to build a headquarters for Amazon in Long Island City, Queens" - Amazon spokeswoman Jodi Seth

— J. David Goodman (@jdavidgoodman) February 14, 2019

almost certainly the best thing for the city

Union leaders castigate Amazon for its workplace practices and resistance to unionization, but have said they would be more open to supporting the deal if the company made changes.
“I think that what they need to do is have a dialogue with us,” said Stuart Appelbaum, an outspoken opponent and the president of the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union. “If they’re receiving $3 billion in money, including from union members and workers, they shouldn’t then take that money and use it to fight their workers.”
George L. Miranda, the head of the Teamsters Local 210, said his union could get behind the deal if Amazon agreed to not actively resist unionization at its offices and warehouses in New York.
“Remain neutral. That’s all we’re asking,” said Mr. Miranda, whose union has rallied with opponents. “It would say that they want to be good, responsible corporate leaders here in New York City.”

For Amazon, the commitment to build a new headquarters requires positive, collaborative relationships with state and local elected officials who will be supportive over the long-term. While polls show that 70% of New Yorkers support our plans and investment, a number of state and local politicians have made it clear that they oppose our presence and will not work with us to build the type of relationships that are required to go forward with the project we and many others envisioned in Long Island City.

As someone who owns land in Arlington, Virginia, I, um, approve?

Amazon is not a hip new york company at all anyway, they are far more suited to being a stodgy Northern Virginia company

and yeah should make my childhood home more valuable, as if my parents weren't already completely comfortable in their retirement

well acc to that statement they're not committing to building anything in N Va or anywhere else beyond what they already announced

Amazon is not a hip new york company at all anyway, they are far more suited to being a stodgy Northern Virginia company

― Norm’s Superego (silby), Thursday, February 14, 2019 2:28 PM (forty-four minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

they sure are: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jan/31/amazon-defense-cloud-computing-pentagon-jeff-bezos

indeed

Amazon will pay $0 in federal income taxes on $11.2 billion in profit. https://t.co/Kmfv6TMzJV

— FORTUNE (@FortuneMagazine) February 14, 2019

He should be taxed for dick picks.

Didn't a bunch of Amazon people buy real estate on HQ2 insider info?

One factor that concerned Amazon executives was how activists in New York City broadened their attacks from the specifics of the deal to the company’s practices far beyond the five boroughs, on unions and working with ICE, per two people familiar with Amazon's decision.

— J. David Goodman (@jdavidgoodman) February 14, 2019

NJ's Gov Murphy and Newark officials heavily romancing Amazon for HQ2

Welp, there goes Newark's Ironbound if these jerks move in. Goodbye blue collar, hello blue agave turmeric smoothies!

Never mind just the Ironbound; the whole area's so densely populated, rents are gonna spike across three counties.

"Worst day for nyc since 9-11, except this time the terrorists were elected." David Lichtenstein of @LightstoneGroup on #AmazonHQ2

— Amir Korangy (@mrkorangy) February 15, 2019

Little Orphan Andy and fellow bootlickers are beggin' to be adopted

https://www.theverge.com/2019/2/28/18245302/amazon-hq2-new-york-long-island-city-letter-politicians-ceos

gross.

last June, Seattle city council passed a head tax on businesses to fund solutions for the homeless crisis (caused in large part by economic imbalance from the city's third extended tech boom) [nb: WA has no income tax]

the newly-elected corporate-boosting mayor reacted to pressure from Amazon threatening to dump a downtown office space lease, by illegally colluding with councillors to cancel the tax days later

today: Amazon dumped that lease without ever moving in

https://www.amazon.jobs/en/jobs/836421/managing-editor-news

"The Managing Editor, News will work on an exciting new opportunity within Ring to manage a team of news editors who deliver breaking crime news alerts to our neighbors."

in my ongoing effort to disentangle myself from Big Data i have resolved not to buy anything from Amazon and it's.... really easy? this is how i do it:

- look it up on amazon, skim the reviews, follow the algorithm, everything
- when it comes time to buy it go to the actual manufacturer/source whatever

it is often cheaper! for instance Winstanley, the 1975 film about the proto-communist Digger. available new on Amazon for £14.97. i ordered it direct from BFI for £9.99. thanks for the tech, Jeff!

F Amazon

I canceled prime finally; my reason for avoiding buying from Amazon at this point is less out of civic duty and more because the noise about counterfeit goods and fraudulent sellers got to be loud enough that I decided I would cease rolling the dice. Books I've been buying almost exclusively from my local bookstore for years, it turns out I get paid enough I don't need a discount on books.

Prime is such a scam. “Pay to shop!”

The counterfeit goods problem is getting real. I bought my kid some jeans on Amazon and supposedly the same jeans earlier on Jet. The ones from Amazon we’re shoddily constructed and seemed awfully likely to be fake.

i got fake dry shampoo from there a year and change ago and it was the worst

I never, ever complain in restaurants or stores or write bad reviews etc. but I make amazon refund or reimburse me for every mistake they make.

me too

I do the same thing - the other day I got an email saying a delivery was attempted and I know the driver didn't even ring the doorbell because I was sitting directly overhead, with the window open, and heard nothing. I called customer service instantly. It was delivered the next day plus I got a $10 credit.

Yeah they always mess up their delivery promises. I've had them reimburse me fully for stuff that came days late (that they said to just keep).

What's pissing me off lately is if I order something delivered to my house, it comes 2-3 days earlier than if I ask them to send it to my PO box, even using Prime. Why the fuck do they think I have a PO box? So shit won't come to my house where someone can steal it!

i'm guessing it takes longer because it has to be routed through the post office (or wherever your po box is).

I wish I could think of a better thread for this as this isn't just about Amazon by any means, but this article about people who drive around the country buying stuff from big-box stores to sell for profit on Amazon is incredible: https://www.theverge.com/2019/7/10/20687434/amazon-sellers-nomad-merchants-products-malls-walmart

Anderson is an Amazon nomad, part of a small group of merchants who travel the backroads of America searching clearance aisles and dying chains for goods to sell on Amazon. Some live out of RVs and vans, moving from town to town, only stopping long enough to pick the stores clean and ship their wares to Amazon’s fulfillment centers.

When you spend weeks on end traveling the strip malls and big-box stores of America, you start to appreciate small differences in what can seem like archipelagos of sameness: the way the Targets get cleaner as you approach corporate headquarters in Minneapolis; the novelty of an unusually small Walmart in Indiana; the McDonald’s in Pomeroy, Ohio, that served pizza, the remainder of an abandoned experiment in the ‘80s.

How was the McPizza?

“Bad!” Anderson says exuberantly. “But that’s not the point.”

Discontinued nail polish, Pop-Tarts, hair curling products: Anderson has chased them all when the scanner has shown them fetching multiples of their normal price. He once hunted a particular brand of discontinued dental floss across the Big Lots of America, buying six-packs for 99 cents and selling them on Amazon for over $100 apiece.

He has no idea why someone would pay so much for such things, but the scanner tells him people do. His best guesses are melancholy ones. Discontinued cat food is a big seller, which he didn’t understand until his mom’s cat grew old and senile and refused to eat any of the new flavors. He once saw a post from a parent whose son was autistic and drank from the same plastic cup every day for 20 years. The cup eventually disintegrated, and he didn’t want to drink from any other vessel.

“I’ve always wondered if it’s something like that,” Anderson says. “But it can’t be that common. Plus, I don’t see how you get that attached to it. I can see a cup, but I don’t get a dryer bar.” In any case, demand exists. Someone bought a $300 dryer bar last month.

this is my shit.

great article

I think one reason this hit me so hard is that I just finished reading Anna Tsing's The Mushroom at the End of the World the other day, and this struck me as a weird, grimmer companion piece to that book.

Great article!

Also,

Often, sellers will invent destinations to give their travels a direction. Anderson likes to follow bands. He recently followed The Mountain Goats across four states and is planning to do the same this summer when Tool goes on tour.

Maybe he's an ILXor?

I want a 70’s-era Wim Wenders movie of this article.

Kings of the Resell.

Anderson In The Closing Toys R Us.