Hacker News Reader

Comment by FireBeyond | Hacker News Reader

Yeah, don't do that. Instagram ads are no different to the WURGLBIXY and HUYTVING and XORMLINAP and other smashed up syllable "brands" on Amazon, except they'll mostly deliver something to you, even if it is shit.

Take any of the images from an Instagram ad. Someone, somewhere, did (probably) build or design the product being sold (a lot come from Kickstarter and may have never launched), but if you search you'll find hundreds or more scams riding on that coattails who will hope to collect and fuck off with your money before IG shuts them down (if they ever do).

View on HN

I took an IEC power cable that came with a no-name broken printer my folks bought off Amazon. It was rated for the usual North American 120V/15A, but the conductors on the inside were hardly suitable. Measuring with cheap calipers, I reckoned they were good for about 1/10th of that. Similarly dangerous products with any of the generic electronics currently selling on Amazon/Temu/eBay/et al. Poor isolation, poor grounding, underrated wires, incorrect fuses, knock-off ICs, lord knows what kind of chemical treatments and/or lead content; It's as if regulations no longer exist, since there's no longer any fixed target that can be sued to enforce them. Something will need to be done directly to Amazon that will cause them to put a check on these products, but that seems laughably naive in the current political contexts.

Yeah, Amazon literally could not give less of a fuck. Leave a review on the seller, deleted. Leave one on the product, deleted. They say it's because of co-mingling but sorry, that's your hole you dug yourself, Amazon.

And why did you remove the option on returns to say "I think this is counterfeit"? etc. etc.

Full willful head in the sand.

Anything electric/electronic like that, now, I only order from places like Adorama or B&H or the manufacturer. And then actual "higher" end ones like Anker, etc.

"We're just a marketplace". I really need to revisit leaving Amazon as a resolution.

Amazon has sold fraudulent fuses that will kill people for years and they don't care. Big Youtubers did videos to try to get Amazon to care. Amazon just does not care if people die because caring would impact their business model. They are straight evil at this point.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com