<story><title>Amazon reports its first unprofitable year since 2014</title><url>https://www.npr.org/2023/02/02/1153562994/amazon-reports-its-first-unprofitable-year-since-2014</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>staringback</author><text>Have you ever tried to search for something on Aliexpress? It is the worst experience I have ever had. &amp;quot;Free  Shipping&amp;quot; button (sometimes) shows things with free shipping, or the actual price of the item showing as $0.99 when that is for the optional plastic lid or whatever. Only about half the time I try to use Aliexpress it gives me the results I want.&lt;p&gt;Furthermore, it is stupidly obvious when something is just being dropshipped vs coming from Amazon&amp;#x27;s warehouse, just look for the Prime logo on the items. At least with Amazon I get things relatively quickly even compared to other US based options such as Ebay or even going through the retailer directly</text></item><item><author>kps</author><text>Amazon is now Aliexpress with (sometimes) local shipping.&lt;p&gt;For years we&amp;#x27;ve been told that the worker in Shenzhen is cheaper than the one in Seattle. Now I tell you, Jeff, that the &lt;i&gt;entrepreneur&lt;/i&gt; in Shenzhen is cheaper than the one in Seattle.</text></item><item><author>diceduckmonk</author><text>There was a 5+ year period in my life where I was receiving Amazon deliveries every week.&lt;p&gt;Last year, I purchased a single item on Amazon.&lt;p&gt;In the midst of moving apartments right now, and looking for basics + upgrades. I&amp;#x27;ve noticed what made Amazon so great and dare I say addicting was trustworthy reviews and crowd-wisdom curation of good-enough products. This shopping cycle, that magic felt gone. The audacity of product search to be littered with ads. A few years into that Amazon habit, I started reaching for &amp;quot;fake amazon reviews&amp;quot; on Google to get an estimate of how authentic the reviews are. Even that step has been gamed and noisy now.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Spivak</author><text>The issue isn&amp;#x27;t who&amp;#x27;s doing the shipping. The issue is that Amazon is, for most product categories, 90% a front for Alibaba resellers. Nothing against Alibaba&amp;#x2F;Aliexpress, I get stuff from them all the time, but there are times when I specifically don&amp;#x27;t want those products.&lt;p&gt;If you&amp;#x27;re willing to wait a month Aliexpress is all the same stuff for 1&amp;#x2F;10 the price.</text></comment>
<story><title>Amazon reports its first unprofitable year since 2014</title><url>https://www.npr.org/2023/02/02/1153562994/amazon-reports-its-first-unprofitable-year-since-2014</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>staringback</author><text>Have you ever tried to search for something on Aliexpress? It is the worst experience I have ever had. &amp;quot;Free  Shipping&amp;quot; button (sometimes) shows things with free shipping, or the actual price of the item showing as $0.99 when that is for the optional plastic lid or whatever. Only about half the time I try to use Aliexpress it gives me the results I want.&lt;p&gt;Furthermore, it is stupidly obvious when something is just being dropshipped vs coming from Amazon&amp;#x27;s warehouse, just look for the Prime logo on the items. At least with Amazon I get things relatively quickly even compared to other US based options such as Ebay or even going through the retailer directly</text></item><item><author>kps</author><text>Amazon is now Aliexpress with (sometimes) local shipping.&lt;p&gt;For years we&amp;#x27;ve been told that the worker in Shenzhen is cheaper than the one in Seattle. Now I tell you, Jeff, that the &lt;i&gt;entrepreneur&lt;/i&gt; in Shenzhen is cheaper than the one in Seattle.</text></item><item><author>diceduckmonk</author><text>There was a 5+ year period in my life where I was receiving Amazon deliveries every week.&lt;p&gt;Last year, I purchased a single item on Amazon.&lt;p&gt;In the midst of moving apartments right now, and looking for basics + upgrades. I&amp;#x27;ve noticed what made Amazon so great and dare I say addicting was trustworthy reviews and crowd-wisdom curation of good-enough products. This shopping cycle, that magic felt gone. The audacity of product search to be littered with ads. A few years into that Amazon habit, I started reaching for &amp;quot;fake amazon reviews&amp;quot; on Google to get an estimate of how authentic the reviews are. Even that step has been gamed and noisy now.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>explodingwaffle</author><text>My _favourite_ part of searching on AliExpress is that, when you’re logged in, 90% of any search results have nothing to do with, you know, the search query, and are just (related to) products you’ve previously looked at. Why?!?</text></comment>