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Cancel Amazon Prime [2021] (archive.ph)

submitted 11 months ago by trashhalo@beehaw.org to c/technology@beehaw.org

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Amazon Prime is a remarkable success but also dystopian. It has made convenience and speed the norm, habituating consumers to buy more products. Prime's flywheel effect - where more customers lead to more data and scale which attracts more customers - has fueled Amazon's dominance. Prime subscribers spend twice as much and Amazon's value has multiplied 97 times since 2005. While canceling Prime may not hurt Amazon, it can benefit local businesses by gaining a new customer. However, Prime has rewired how people think about what is possible to obtain and how fast, making a Prime-free life unimaginable for many.

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[-] snowbell@beehaw.org 18 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

You can order from somewhere else online. Most of Amazon is cheap crap from aliexpress now anyway. They don't even have the best prices most of the time anymore.

[-] RickRussell_CA@beehaw.org 2 points 11 months ago

Sure, if I can wait 2-5 weeks I'll check AliExpress.

[-] snowbell@beehaw.org 3 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

My point was not to buy things that are just shitty crap from aliexpress. Or that cheap crap from aliexpress is unappealing junk that nobody would want to buy, the equivalent of email spam. In fact, the complaint I tend to hear people make the most often about Amazon is how hard it is to find anything on there that isn't cheap chinese junk from AliExpress.

[-] RickRussell_CA@beehaw.org 1 points 11 months ago

Perhaps people use Amazon differently than I do. I mostly buy niche items that you simply can't buy at stores, or if you do find them at stores they are astronomically expensive.

Which is not to say I don't switch things up. I order from Best Buy, Walmart, a whole bunch of different places. But on balance, I'm happy with the Prime subscription and use it frequently.