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Comment by adetrest | Hacker News Reader

Cancelling my prime was one of the best thing I did for my future self. I really didn't need half of the crap I ordered from Amazon. It's mostly overpriced, poorly refurbished or low quality junk that I could get for half the price directly from aliexpress.

But more importantly, without 1 day delivery on tap it makes you think harder whether you really need to waste your money on yet more junk or if you can live without it. Unsurprisingly, you don't really need it most of the time.

And if you're not buying from Amazon, you're not complicit in the company abysmal treatment of its employees, or total disregard for intellectual property laws (fake items are everywhere on amazon)

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Promoting Aliexpress as an alternative in the first paragraph is a bit inconsistent with the j’accuse on disregard for intellectual property laws on Amazon.

The Aliexpress deals are likely over, since they were being subsidized by the US postal service who have pulled out of the treaty that encouraged it.

https://hackaday.com/2018/10/17/us-announces-withdraw-from-p...

In my opinion, it's not as underhanded on aliexpress as it is on amazon: when I buy the brand name on amazon I never know whether I'm getting the real deal, a hastily repackaged used item sold as new, or a knock off. Aliexpress is only knockoffs, and they are marked as such so I know what I'm getting: I'm paying the price of a knockoff, not retail for the genuine item. If I want the real deal, then I'm getting it from a physical store that doesn't have a tainted supply chain.

To add to the above, most big box stores carry the same brands for a price very close to Amazon (you'd be surprised how often that's the case of you checked before buying on Amazon)

At a big box, I don't have to wait for the delivery company to fail me, I'm not lining amazon's pockets, and if it's cheaper on Amazon most stores will price match anyway.

Its hard when the 3 bookstores you used to go to close down over the course of 5 years

How about ebooks? The public library? Or other retailers? Amazon isn't the only option for buying books online, whether you live in a city or not.

You might be well served by a local library.

That was good advice when public libraries were less used. But these days (at least in the American cities I frequent), they are massively popular.

Which means if you reserve a new release, be prepared to wait. Even with 17 copies of a particular newish book, the wait for it from my local library system is in excess of eight months.

Wait eight months, or drop $11.95 at Amazon? Easy choice.

>> Which means if you reserve a new release, be prepared to wait.

Except we wait 2 or 3 years for the damn thing to be written; a little delayed gratification until your hold comes up is such a minor, first-world problem.

Popular public libraries are most definitely better than the alternative. They can justify better funding and bigger budgets, improve physical facilities and move into new service areas.

Better World Books

I go there for my used books now and rarely can't find what I need.

Yep. 95% of the world doesn't live in the imaginary retail utopia the Amazon-haters do. For the vast majority of people, Amazon opens up new retail possibilities.

Yes, Amazon has ethical/moral/UX/etc... issues. Be critical of its actual sins, not imagined ones.

> Amazon opens up new retail possibilities.

By not being required to pay taxes for a very long time, causing all of your local retail possibilities without that state benefit to close.

You're assuming that every location has equal retail possibilities.

I'm not talking about places where bookstores, electronics stores, etc... closed because of Amazon. I'm talking about the vast majority of places that never had bookstores, electronics stores, etc... in the first place.

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