<story><title>Apple now valued at more than Amazon, Alphabet and Meta combined</title><url>https://www.marketwatch.com/story/apple-now-valued-at-more-than-amazon-alphabet-and-meta-combined-11667430617</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>KerrAvon</author><text>Google and Facebook are not really in the same businesses as Amazon and Apple.&lt;p&gt;That Amazon isn&amp;#x27;t worth more is puzzling. I know I&amp;#x27;ve stopped buying from them unless I absolutely have to because I can&amp;#x27;t trust that the product I get is non-counterfeit and previously unused -- seriously, who sells used shavers as new, totally f&amp;#x27;in gross -- but has everyone else stopped buying too?&lt;p&gt;update: grammar</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>potatolicious</author><text>Yes, for a lot of classes of products I simply do not buy from Amazon any more. The counterfeiting and inventory co-mingling (such that you can&amp;#x27;t even filter for trustworthy sellers) has destroyed a lot of Amazon&amp;#x27;s usefulness.&lt;p&gt;IMO Amazon&amp;#x27;s foray into 3P market-making will ultimately be seen as an attempt to grow the product that ends up killing the product.&lt;p&gt;Even besides the counterfeiting, there&amp;#x27;s just &lt;i&gt;so much crappy junk&lt;/i&gt;. Want lightbulbs? Wade through page after page of crappy no-name brands who all have fake&amp;#x2F;gamed reviews, so you can&amp;#x27;t tell the good from the bad. Want a name-brand lightbulb? Well, then we&amp;#x27;re back to the counterfeiting problem.&lt;p&gt;Even when I do buy from Amazon there&amp;#x27;s at least a 50% chance what I buy will be some cheap bullshit with faked reviews that will fall apart in under a month of use. Amazon is &lt;i&gt;worse&lt;/i&gt; than the Walmart discount bin.&lt;p&gt;Amazon has weirdly given me a newfound appreciation for traditional retailers. There is &lt;i&gt;value&lt;/i&gt; in the curation - in filtering bad products so that as a customer I can shop with confidence, and that even if I don&amp;#x27;t do too much research the product I buy will be &lt;i&gt;good enough&lt;/i&gt; - or at least authentic and safe.&lt;p&gt;The complete laissez-faire free-for-all model just results in me Googling for product reviews for the most mundane things I buy. It is a massive time-sink.</text></comment>
<story><title>Apple now valued at more than Amazon, Alphabet and Meta combined</title><url>https://www.marketwatch.com/story/apple-now-valued-at-more-than-amazon-alphabet-and-meta-combined-11667430617</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>KerrAvon</author><text>Google and Facebook are not really in the same businesses as Amazon and Apple.&lt;p&gt;That Amazon isn&amp;#x27;t worth more is puzzling. I know I&amp;#x27;ve stopped buying from them unless I absolutely have to because I can&amp;#x27;t trust that the product I get is non-counterfeit and previously unused -- seriously, who sells used shavers as new, totally f&amp;#x27;in gross -- but has everyone else stopped buying too?&lt;p&gt;update: grammar</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>randycupertino</author><text>Stopped buying from Amazon for any household products after getting a fake  hummingbird feeder and fake castor oil (was opened and repackaged canola oil).  Just can&amp;#x27;t trust them to send you the real name-brand product and not something knockoff or fake.</text></comment>