Can we please make a viable (federated!) amazon alternative? I have an idea!
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Exactly, you probably want a 3rd party to handle the money exchange part. Doesn't mean a Fedi app can't facilitate everything else.
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To me at least, this contribution makes you seem like an even worse asshole than them. Just some anecdotal feedback.
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Sellers need to sell there to survive
Amazon is a service provider. Sellers sell there because Amazon provides product advertising (every product page is essentially an ad), order processing, payment processing, warehousing, order fulfillment (via the warehouse staff), shipping, dispute resolution, return processing (which is its own logistics nightmare), and even resale of returned/refurbished products in some cases, and all of it is coordinated through their data systems.
It is extremely convenient to sell a product on Amazon because they handle all of the customer-facing parts of selling, all you have to do is describe what you're selling, and arrange for Amazon to get the product somehow. It's the convenience that keeps sellers on their platform. It's the convenience that makes it worth the cost of doing business with Amazon.
Now yes, each individual service could be replaced, but splitting them out is going to cause coordination problems. It's going to slow down the order fulfillment, and it's basically shunting the operation cost (both time and money) back onto the seller. That's going to mean fewer sellers interested in using the alternative, because now they have to do for themselves what they could simply pay Amazon a percentage of their sale price to do. And because this alternative is slower and can't provide the same kind of return guarantees that Amazon can, fewer customers are going to want to use it.
The thing keeping people locked in amazon is amazon, nothing else.
So yes, you're right, but I don't think you're giving enough weight to what Amazon is as an organization. Amazon is a lot more than just the retail website. Having all of those services under one roof makes the operating costs lower, which is a big part of why the prices are so competitive. If the seller has to take on those costs then they have to raise the price of their products.
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Your point - in general - is valid but what does it have to do with the idea of federated dropshipping?
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nothing outside of what the other person said. it would be more akin to federated ebay rather than federated amazon and still will lack some of ebays benefits. Don't get me wrong I think its a good idea viewed in that way. I mean better than craigslist which is not even federated.
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I believe its valid to point these things out from a technical standpoint. What is the point you're trying to make though?
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All these services are centralized. Thats the entire point. I'm trying to figure out how to do this in a social, open and transparent way. Maybe check out techno feudalism to see why i think the needs to happen pretty soon.
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There is no real point. You did not seem to get what the other person said and so I added it to make it a bit more clear on why its not an amazon replacement because amazon does so much more. Its just sorta how conversations involving a few people work. Im not just talking about the last thing you said but about the whole read down the line.
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@haui_lemmy I had a mostly similar idea a few weeks ago but I'm a mess ( sleep issues ) so no coding for me.
But yes, as I mentioned somewhere extending activitypub could be a start. -
You are completely misunderstanding what Amazon actually does, and why it's successful, despite being a shitty company. It's first and foremost a logistics company. People can order "stuff" in many places, but if they order it on Amazon, they'll get it by tomorrow if they order it before midnight. They got warehouse everywhere. They do (some) of their own final deliveries for anyone close to those, use the big logistics players for the rest (ups, DHL, ...) while having massive volume and the power to dictate price that comes with that. The number of workers in the warehouses is actually minuscule for their size, it's all automated. Huge up front cost, very low cost once it's actually running.
Consumers go there because they can get literally anything. Again: warehouses. It's also a market place but that only works (these days) because it's THE place the people go. The reviews are also a massive point, and would be inherently untrustworthy in a federated version.
How would you ever get anyone to go to your federated version for shopping that sells like "some" things? Even if you manage to combine all those shops, you'd need a way to agree on what an item is called (or how to assign id numbers) so the same item from multiple sellers is grouped in the same offer, and many similar small things you take for granted it didn't even ever see/notice on Amazon.
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With Amazon you pay that service if you consider that its prices are often higher than standard ecommerce sites.
You can say it's a very comfortable service, but try to think how many times you returned products that you considered really necessary... -
It's much more than that. Amazon's strength is also in its proximity warehouses and contacts with delivery companies.
Otherwise you just have a federated Ebay.
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So in simple terms, you propose to build a mom-and-pop shop and have it act like a global player like Amazon?
Congrats, it does not happen very often I sit in a chair and stare at the screen in disbelief!
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Could this be an app realized based on the mycelial web - amazon uses huge AI models to predict their customer's behaviour and do the logistics ... (not sure myself, but it probably won't work solely on ActivityPub)
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I order stuff from ebay. Got a phone on the way from china right now. Ebay work-alike might not be a bad place to start.
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The goal is not to ensnare the user but to free them. AI is absolutely not part of this idea. I havent read of the mycelial web yet though. Is it a thing or just an AI pipedream?
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Whatever your idea of a mom and pop shop and acting like a global player is, I'm not thinking of anything like this. As I mentioned. This already exists. The idea is to automate and streamline some parts, basically.
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Exactly. The idea is to not make a perfect copy but a viable alternative without the constant breaks in design and trust when scouring the web for items. All those funny labels on websites for example like trustedshops are just for this. If one could make a web of trust, that would eliminate fakes and take power from for profit companies who make these labels and control trust.
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Amazon has a lot of different aspects, same as facebook and xitter. I aim to think of alternatives, not perfect copies. My only hard target is that it is free from single entity control. Thats why not ebay or one of the others. Flohmarkt is kind of promising but i'll check it out deeper and host an instance. That way I can judge its potential.
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I'd really appreciate your points, were they not shrouded in condescension. I understand very well what amazon does.
If you feel like helping, think of constructive things to say. Otherwise dont waste your energy.
