Amazon / Amazon.com / Jeff Bezos

[Estiveo]

I hardly ever see UPS or FedX trucks in my neighborhood anymore. Multiple Amazon vans throughout the day, though.

[raison de arizona]

We get Fedex, UPS, and Amazon vans. Also personal cars delivering hourly Amazons.

[pipistrelle]

Numerous Amazon vans in the neighborhood. All my orders are delivered by USPS. No idea why. Never see an option for same-day delivery anymore.

[AndyinPA]

Maybe here's why:

https://wapo.st/3N4Fr3J Gifted.

Bemidji is not the only place where postal workers say they have been overwhelmed by packages from Amazon, the ubiquitous e-commerce giant. Carriers and local officials say mail service has been disrupted in rural communities from Portland, Maine, to Washington state’s San Juan Islands.

The situation stems from a crisis at the Postal Service, which has lost $6.5 billion in the past year. The post office has had a contract with Amazon since 2013, when it started delivering packages on Sundays. But in recent years, that business has exploded as Amazon has increasingly come to rely on postal carriers to make “last-mile” deliveries in harder-to-reach rural locations.

The Postal Service considers the contract proprietary and has declined to disclose its terms. But U.S. Postmaster General Louis DeJoy has said publicly that “increasing package volume” — not just from Amazon, but from FedEx and UPS as well — is key to the mail service’s financial future. In a Nov. 14 speech to the Postal Service Board of Governors, DeJoy said he wants the post office to become the “preferred delivery provider in the nation.” And in recent years, the agency has reconfigured its nationwide network of mail-sorting plants, purchased an armada of eco-friendly delivery trucks and pressed a marketing campaign in service of that goal.

In bigger cities, Amazon has its own distribution network, which takes some of the pressure off the post office. But in rural areas, where carriers drive miles of lonely routes in their personal vehicles, the arrangement has caused problems.

[Frater I*I]

Maybe here's why:

https://wapo.st/3N4Fr3J Gifted.

DeJoy said he wants the post office to become the “preferred delivery provider in the nation.”

Well, maybe he should of thought of that when he was trying to cripple the Post Office before the 2020 election...

[AndyinPA]

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/ ... shes-peccy

Amazon is asking workers experiencing hardship to write a letter to its company mascot, Peccy, this holiday season so “some of their holiday wishes can come true”.

A flyer from the Amazon warehouse SWF1 in Rock Tavern, New York, states: “Are you or someone you know facing financial hardship this holiday season? Peccy wants to help! Write a letter to Peccy. If the Peccy team selects you, some of your holiday wishes could come true!”

Peccy – a Minion-like orange blob – is Amazon’s mascot and “cultural ambassador”. In an interview with Fast Company, an Amazon HR director said: “He’s called Peccy because he represents our peculiar ways. We call ourselves at Amazon very peculiar.”

Keith Williams, a worker at the Amazon SWF1 warehouse, criticized the contest given Amazon’s immense profits, its sky-high executive pay and the astronomic wealth of the Amazon founder and chair, Jeff Bezos, who has a net worth of about $172bn.

Said Williams: “They basically say, ‘Tell us about your hardships, how hard this holiday season is for you,’ [and] if we feel it’s sad enough [then we’ll’] give your family some help.”

In Amazon’s most recent quarter, the company tripled its profits to $9.9bn, and revenues for the three months ending 30 September topped $143bn.

[Volkonski]

Amazon Prime Video Ad Tier Sparks Class Action Lawsuit From Subscribers

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/busin ... 235822779/

Amazon is facing a lawsuit accusing it of misleading Prime subscribers by charging them an additional fee to stream movies and TV shows without ads.

A proposed class action lawsuit, filed Friday in California federal court, claims breach of contract and violations of state consumer protection laws on behalf of users who saw the terms of their subscriptions with Amazon change when it pivoted to making its ad tier the default for its over 100 million subscribers.

In 2023, Amazon, which declined to comment, announced plans to turn on ads for all Prime Video viewers. The platform last month rolled out the change, instantly turning the service into a streaming-ad juggernaut and the largest ad-supported subscription streamer. Users must pay an additional $2.99 per month to watch without ads.

[AndyinPA]

Good!

[Lani]

Tonight I paid for shoes from Zappos.com. Now I'm getting slips from Amazon. This will be interest.

[neonzx]

Tonight I paid for shoes from Zappos.com. Now I'm getting slips from Amazon. This will be interest.

Amazon acquired Zappos 100% in 2009.

[raison de arizona]

I'm a victim of this. It's bullshit. I paid a lot of money to "buy" a movie series I liked, only to have it later disappear from my library. SO I DIDN'T REALLY BUY IT, NOW DID I?!? Bastids. If I had realized I wouldn't have it forever, or for at least as long as Amazon was around, I wouldn't have bought it! I would have saved mucho dinero and just rented. Bastids.

If you "buy" a digital movie on Amazon, but Amazon removes the movie from its library when Amazon's license expires, did you really buy it?

Amazon faces a false advertising class action about this issue, and today, it lost its motion to dismiss the case.

[Slim Cognito]

Oh man!!!! I should’ve hung onto more of my DVDs.

[RTH10260]

‘They are breaking the law’: inside Amazon’s bid to stall a union drive
Retailer doing ‘whatever it takes’ to halt organizing at warehouse in Moreno Valley, California, workers say, as Amazon faces unfair labor practice charges

Michael Sainato
Wed 3 Apr 2024 12.00 CEST

Facing an insurgent campaign which threatened to unleash a wave of unionization across its vast workforce, Amazon stands accused of reaching for dirty tricks.

Workers who tried to organize inside its warehouses claim the technology giant orchestrated an illegal counteroffensive, using scare tactics and spreading misconceptions.

Nearly two years have passed since workers in Staten Island, New York, voted to form its first US warehouse union. As the Amazon Labor Union took its battle nationwide, the company scrambled to ensure it did not suffer the same crushing blows.

The world’s largest retailer is “going to do whatever it takes”, Nannette Plascencia, who has worked for nine years at its ONT8 fulfillment center in Moreno Valley, California, said in an interview, “even knowing they are breaking the law”.

Photographs shared with the Guardian reveal how Amazon pushed back against an organizing drive inside ONT8 with anti-union messaging. “Unions run their business with your money,” and deduct dues “regularly” from paychecks, employees were warned on TV screens installed in the warehouse.

These tactics are at the heart of an operation by Amazon which is the subject of unfair labor practice charges, leaving battles to unionize across Amazon in limbo while both sides wait for months on actions and rulings by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), a federal agency.

Amazon workers in Moreno Valley filed for a union vote in October 2022, only to pull the election petition after significant opposition from the company. Those who led the campaign allege managers violated labor laws to halt it in its tracks.

They cried foul to the NLRB, which last March consolidated their cases into a formal complaint seen by the Guardian. Managers at ONT8 “directed employees not to discuss the union on the work floor during work time”, but permitted discussion of other, non-work subjects, according to the complaint, which also alleges the company held “‘captive audience’ meetings with workers.

The charges will be heard before an administrative law judge in August. Amazon denies all allegations of labor law violations at ONT8.




https://www.theguardian.com/technology/ ... california

[RTH10260]

Amazon increased US plastic packaging despite global phase-out, report says
The same year, 2022, company replaced plastic sleeves in EU with paper and cardboard, and cut plastic packaging globally by 11.6%

Oliver Milman
Thu 4 Apr 2024 10.01 CEST

The amount of plastic packaging waste created by Amazon has increased in the US even as the online retail giant sought to phase out plastics elsewhere in the world, a report claims, amid growing pressure for a global treaty to end plastic pollution.

Amazon created 208m pounds (94m kg) of plastic packaging in the US in 2022, equal to the weight of nearly 14,000 large African elephants, which is a 9.8% increase in the amount of packaging it produced in 2021, according to Oceana, an US marine conservation group that used industry data and Amazon’s market announcements to form its analysis.

The increase in 2022 occurred even as Amazon made headway in reducing its plastic use elsewhere in the world, cutting its plastic packaging globally by 11.6% compared with a year previously. In Europe, the company has replaced its plastic delivery sleeves with paper and cardboard, amid new rules from the European Union aimed at stamping out single-use plastics.

Oceana said that the persistent reliance on plastics in the US is “troubling”, pointing to evidence that much of this waste will end up ingested by marine animals or strewn along coastal areas. According to the group, up to 22m pounds (9.9m kg) of Amazon’s global plastic packaging from 2022 will have ended up in the world’s waterways and seas. Oceana’s analysis cites a 2020 scientific study published in Science that found 11% of plastic waste globally ended up in aquatic ecosystems in 2016.

“This sort of plastic film is a big problem for the oceans and a lot of it can’t be recycled,” said Matt Littlejohn, senior vice-president of strategic initiatives at Oceana.

“Amazon is one of the most innovative companies on the planet. It has eliminated plastic packaging in Europe and they can clearly do so across the US, too, even without regulatory pressure. This is a completely solvable problem. They have just got to get on with solving it. They know what to do.”

Amazon has disputed Oceana’s analysis, calling it “misleading” and highlighting its global reduction in plastic use, although the company did not disclose US-specific figures on plastic packaging that counter the report’s findings.



https://www.theguardian.com/technology/ ... ckaging-us

[raison de arizona]

Bezos and Lauren Sanchez arriving to the White House at the state dinner for Japan.

[Suranis]

Is she carrying two of his spare heads?

[Foggy]

There's a balcony you could do Shakespeare off of ...

► Show Spoiler

Those who remember know that I'm a fan of small breasts. That's not what I call an attractive woman. And she has those megalips that look clownish.

[pipistrelle]

Is she carrying two of his spare heads?

Kidneys.