Hi folks! I'm here with another idea. Let's make an amazon alternative. I know! I know! That was asked for a couple times already but lets discuss some details.

Amazon is basically glorified dropshipping by now. What if we just made federated (not sure if over activitypub would work) ads and sales, powered by fediseer (the "trust" network of the fediverse).

Example 1: So you buy at toms groceries, you trust them. they have experience with tina's hardware store and they trust them. so you can buy both toms and tinas wares on both sites.

Example 2: So for example, I run a small business that sells computers. You run a small business that sells mice and keyboards. I have worked with you before so I mark you as trusted in my local website, which federates with yours, showing your products in my shop. If a customer buys my computer and buys your keyboard on top, my site sends you a buy order with customer address and payment. I get a small fee for my electricity of say 1%.

Can someone try and poke holes in this idea? It feels like this could work!

Have a nice weekend.

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[–] ThePantser@lemmy.world 7 points 2 days ago (2 children)

So online farmers/flea market?

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[–] TurboHarbinger@feddit.cl 3 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (5 children)

ITT: OP has an "idea" and no money. Please do all the work.

We are not your thinktank bro

[–] PhilipTheBucket@ponder.cat 3 points 2 days ago

Why do you hate fun

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[–] blue_berry@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

Could this be an app realized based on the mycelial web - amazon uses huge AI models to predict their customer's behaviour and do the logistics ... (not sure myself, but it probably won't work solely on ActivityPub)

[–] haui_lemmy@lemmy.giftedmc.com 2 points 2 days ago (3 children)

The goal is not to ensnare the user but to free them. AI is absolutely not part of this idea. I havent read of the mycelial web yet though. Is it a thing or just an AI pipedream?

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[–] NaibofTabr@infosec.pub 3 points 2 days ago (15 children)

I think there's some misunderstanding here. Amazon is a massive logistics system. The retail storefront is a tiny part of what Amazon is today.

AWS exists because Amazon needed to solve an internal data handling problem in order to solve their logistics problems so that they could scale up. After building that system, they started selling it as a product to other businesses. The point being, Amazon's real success is based on providing business-to-business services. The retail website is the tiny public-facing bit, but it depends on the rest of the organization structure in order to operate properly.

What you're proposing is more like an eBay alternative, where the system is basically just the storefront, and the sellers listing products are responsible for their own logistics. eBay still provides dispute resolution for buyers though, and that's hard to achieve without some centralized control.

There's also the legal problems. At some point someone will use such a system as a silk road - probably sooner rather than later. Whoever is administrating and hosting it will be liable for criminal activity in the countries where the crime occurs. It will not end well.

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[–] MyOpinion@lemm.ee 3 points 2 days ago (4 children)

Or you can just buy from other online retailers.

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[–] lambalicious@lemmy.sdf.org 3 points 2 days ago (4 children)

Example 1: So you buy at toms groceries, you trust them.

[citation needed]

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