Data QuineFirst I thought I'd found the Loch Ness Monster...turns out to be Nessie instead. 🦕
Project Nessie: Transactional Catalog for Data Lakes with Git-like semantics
"Nessie is to Data Lakes what Git is to source code repositories..."
Cory DoctorowThen, under a program called #ProjectNessie, Amazon jacked up the prices of those products, knowing that as soon as they raised the prices on Amazon, the prices would go up everywhere else, so Amazon wouldn't lose customers to cheaper alternatives. That scam made Amazon at least a billion dollars:
https://gizmodo.com/ftc-alleges-amazon-used-price-gouging-algorithm-1850986303
This is a great example of how enshittification - rent-seeking on digital platforms - is different from analog rent-seeking.
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When a corporation can hide evidence and testimony from the public and the press, it gains broad latitude to dispute critics, including government enforcers, based on evidence that no one is allowed to see, or, in many cases, even *describe*. Take #ProjectNessie, the program that the #FTC claims Amazon used to compel third-party sellers to hike prices across many categories of goods:
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Hey look at this
* A Murder Story: Whatever Happened to #Interoperability? https://www.theamericanconservative.com/a-murder-story-whatever-happened-to-interoperability/
* #PredictivePolicing Software Terrible at Predicting Crimes https://www.wired.com/story/plainfield-geolitica-crime-predictions/ (h/t Slashdot)
* Amazon Used Secret ‘#ProjectNessie’ Algorithm to Raise Prices https://www.wsj.com/business/retail/amazon-used-secret-project-nessie-algorithm-to-raise-prices-6c593706
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Rich Stein (he/him)"The #FTC complaint redacted this information, but sources told the WSJ that #Amazon made 'more than $1 billion in revenue' by using #ProjectNessie, while competitors learned that 'price cuts do not result in greater market share or scale, only lower margins,'...
'As a result, Amazon has successfully taught its rivals that lower prices are unlikely to result in increased sales—the opposite of what should happen in a well-functioning market,'..." https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2023/10/report-amazon-made-1b-with-secret-algorithm-for-spiking-prices-internet-wide/ v @arstechnica #monopoly
TechBitesThe US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has alleged that Amazon used an algorithm called "Project Nessie" to test how high it could raise prices before being undercut by competitors. When competitors didn't match Amazon's price hikes, the company would automatically return prices to their previous lower level, the FTC claimed. Nessie was also used to discount goods, with Amazon offering discounts if competitors reduced prices. The FTC's suit alleges that Project Nessie extracted an excess of $1 billion from American households in "excess profit."
#Amazon #AntiTrust #FTC #ProjectNessie #USA #US #Business #Tech #TechBites
rmoff 🏃🏻 🍺 🥓🔧🔨 How to Implement Write-Audit-Publish (WAP) - an exploration of how WAP can be done on @apacheicebergdevs, #apacheHudi, @deltalakeoss, @lakeFS , or #projectNessie
🙋🏻 What is WAP?
👉🏻 Check out yesterday's blog: https://lakefs.io/blog/data-engineering-patterns-write-audit-publish/?utm_campaign=Social%20media%20activity&utm_source=Mastodon&utm_medium=social&utm_content=blog_rm-wap1
