mrzaius🚸Jan 20, 2023
Ex-Amazon employees on the almost impressively cynical way Amazon smile started:
Show threadaresJan 20, 2023

@mrzaius

so amazon smile supposedly started as a way to avoid paying google for search traffic

which sounds exactly like the kind of cold, soulless, mercenary thing amazon would do

except that google doesn't get paid for regular search results, they only get paid for ad clicks

and if amazon doesn't want to pay for ad clicks, then amazon could just stop running ads

and amazon is ending the program, but google still exists, so if avoiding google was the reason, then why stop the program?

sorry, this story doesn't add up

@anildash

Show threadTom Bellin Jan 20, 2023

@ares @mrzaius @anildash Yeah, there's a bit of 2 + 2 = 5 happening in this story. The stuff about paying Google is weird, but the basic outline is right.

If you're amazon, the problem is being reliant on Google for your traffic. What happens if tomorrow Google decides to house your results?

A lot of online vendors have this problem, but Amazon is big enough to do something about it. Encouraging more users to start their shopping at amazon.com is a win all by itself.

Show threadChristopher Masto

@tob @ares @mrzaius @anildash Ironically, I don't remember coming to Amazon via Google until relatively recently, when Amazon's search started to get so bad that I'd fail to find something there, then do a web search and discover that they actually do sell it.

Fixing that seems like it would be a better way to ensure people come in through the front door.

Jan 20, 2023 at 1:22pmWeb
Show threadTom Bellin Jan 20, 2023
@masto @ares @mrzaius @anildash To be fair, out-performing Google on search seems very unlikely.