
Jeff Bezos Owns the Web in More Ways Than You Think - ssclafani
http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/11/ff_bezos/all/1
======
pnathan
Jeff Bezos understands what I want from the vast majority of my merchant
interactions:

> Our version of a perfect customer experience is one in which our customer
> doesn’t want to talk to us. Every time a customer contacts us, we see it as
> a defect. I’ve been saying for many, many years, people should talk to their
> friends, not their merchants. And so we use all of our customer service
> information to find the root cause of any customer contact. What went wrong?
> Why did that person have to call? Why aren’t they spending that time talking
> to their family instead of talking to us?

------
dangero
"Maintain a firm grasp of the obvious at all times."

That's pretty enlightening. This guy is brilliant because he constantly
reminds himself of the fundamentals of business, and is keenly aware that he
easily gets off track from those fundamentals.

It seems as humans, we're very prone to forgetting the most basic of lessons,
and unless we constantly refresh on them, we can easily get off track. It puts
things in perspective like the whole Qwikster/Netflix debacle, or the recent
talk of bloat at Google. At a very basic level, these issues are signs that
the people in charge may have gotten so caught up in the day to day that the
lost their "firm grasp of the obvious". Since in both cases the mistakes are
"obvious" to people on the outside.

~~~
cop359
The Qwikster/Netflix thing is not at all simple

As far as I understand streaming and renting are two unrelated businesses. On
the surface, there is no good reason they should be tied to each other.

It one of the very basics of organizing corporations: If there is no synergy
between different divisions then you should spin the company (at least Russel
Ackoff is behind me on this).

On the other hand, having these two divisions together allows them to hedge
off each other. If rentals get unpopular and everyone starts streaming then
the business as a whole isn't in the red. So there might be good reasons to
keep them together.. but I don't think it's a no-brainer.

~~~
shock-value
On the back-end they are different -- but from the consumer's perspective
renting and streaming are just different means to the same end: watching
content.

If you have a movie you'd like to watch in mind -- regardless of whether it's
available on instant or not -- it's a lot easier to just search on one website
then be forced to go through two (and maintain two accounts). Not to mention
that it makes sense to maintain user ratings for both instant and rented
content in the same pool (for movie recommendations etc). I see a lot of
synergy there.

~~~
burgerbrain
I'm not so sure about them being so different on the backend. Sure, one half
mails a lot of stuff, and the other has lots of servers, but wouldn't there be
a _lot_ of overlap in the "dealing with publishers and licensing" department?

~~~
joshuacc
No. And that's one of the problems. For DVD rentals, no licensing is required.
All Netflix has to do is purchase the consumer DVDs and ship them to people
who want them. Streaming, on the other hand, requires lots of complex
negotiations with the rights-holders.

~~~
hollerith
\--and one reason the company gave for wanting to split in 2 is that content
owners were insisting on counting DVD customers in calculations of royalties
due.

------
yequalsx
I was planning to get an iPad. I thought Apple would update the iPad 2 for the
holidays but they didn't. Then Amazon came out with announcement of the Kindle
Fire. For less than the price of an iPad I can get 2 Kindle Fires and 1 Kindle
Touch.

I pre-ordered a Kindle Fire. The Kindle Fire is the Chromebook Google should
have built. People aren't prepared to have absolutely everything on the cloud.
People read while on the train or in a plane. There needs to be some local
storage.

By utilizing Amazon's cloud infrastructure I'm guessing the Fire doesn't need
a large amount of local storage or a large amount of RAM. Amazon is providing
a top of the line user experience with less than top of the line hardware.
This is my hope.

There is also Amazon's customer service. I bought my first Apple product in
June (a Macbook Pro) and the two times I've had to talk to Apple's repair
people about an issue they acted as if I'm an apostate. I've had nothing but
amazing customer service from Amazon.

I think Bezos has a hit with the Fire. The only tablet that will compete with
the Fire this holiday season is the iPad.

~~~
r00fus
>The Kindle Fire is the Chromebook Google should have built. People aren't
prepared to have absolutely everything on the cloud. People read while on the
train or in a plane. There needs to be some local storage.

> By utilizing Amazon's cloud infrastructure I'm guessing the Fire doesn't
> need a large amount of local storage or a large amount of RAM. Amazon is
> providing a top of the line user experience with less than top of the line
> hardware. This is my hope.

These two statements are at odds with each other. 8GB is paltry for any amount
of video or music (on my iPhone, a full 13GB is music/audio - I listen a LOT
of books on tape and podcasts).

The cloud for personal media is unreliable for a big chunk of time as many
mobile providers either don't provide coverage, bandwidth or quota to fulfill
my needs... it's not clear that 8GB+CloudDrive will do this (it would be great
if CloudDrive 2.0 would just treat your local available store as a giant
cache).

Proof will be in the pudding. However, given that Amazon has yet to tell us
how many Kindles it's sold or how much money they have made on them, it's
unclear how we'll be able to gauge it's success.

~~~
yequalsx
The statements are not contradictory at all. Some local storage is needed for
people who will out of range of wi-fi. Like airplane travelers. But they don't
need a lot of local storage. People just need enough local storage to bridge
the gaps in wi-fi coverage. Internet access is ubiquitous but it isn't
universal.

While on the internet Fire users will stream their content. They don't need a
high powered device to do this as Amazon's cloud infrastructure will be doing
some of the work. While off the internet the device just needs enough power to
play videos, read books, and play songs and games. This doesn't require a
heavy duty processor.

~~~
smhinsey
You can get an idea of this with their MP3 Cloud Player for Android. I keep a
minimum of music on it for gaps in coverage and things I listen to very
frequently, but it easily shifts to "cloud mode" and streams well on 4g/wifi.

------
xianshou
I wish the authors of adapted metaphors were forced to map their altered
versions to the original.

Example: The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse are Conquest, War, Famine, and
Death. The Four Horsemen of Technology include Apple, Google, Facebook, and
Amazon. Which goes with which? I vote Amazon for Conquest (of the Internet),
Google for Famine (of attention span, and possibly design sense), Facebook for
War (over friends, likes and popularity), and Apple for Death (of freedom).

N.B. The preceding intended for humor only. Any attempt to interpret seriously
will meet with swift rebuttal.

~~~
etha
Conquest? Isn't it Pestilence?

------
thesteamboat
The quote that spoke to me in the article

> When you pay $199 for Fire, you’re not buying a gadget you’re filing citizen
> papers for the digital duchy of Amazonia.

I know many people don't mind living in walled garden, especially if it's very
pretty, but it seems unhealthy to me. Has this stopped being a scary thing to
people?

~~~
patio11
It was never a scary thing for people. The entire walled-garden-curated-
experience versus open-standards-loose-confederation-of-providers generates
heated discussion only among a small, small sliver of geeks. For most of the
population, this is an irrelevant technical detail like what flavor the CMOS
on the device is. Users lack the insight and vocabulary to even identify which
world a particular device or ecosystem belongs to. (So do geeks, because this
is primarily a matter of tribal affiliation rather than technical reality, but
that's another matter entirely.)

The underlying philosophy of your device matters not a whit to a 14 year old
girl. She wants to listen to the same music, read the same books, and watch
the same movies that her friends do. These are her core requirements for your
device. The rest is boring geekery.

~~~
ryanwaggoner
Off-topic: Patrick, you strike me as a geek's geek. And that's a compliment.
So why is it that so many of your HN comments have you shrewdly observing the
world as seen from the vantage point of non-geeks? About 80% of the time, I
can tell I'm reading one of your comments because of this penchant you have
for telling geeks that the things they're arguing about don't matter to normal
people or to businesses. How did you develop your understanding of non-geeks?

Bonus question: what do you think about QR codes :)

~~~
patio11
_So why is it that so many of your HN comments have you shrewdly observing the
world as seen from the vantage point of non-geeks?_

A combination of bloody-minded contrarianism and having my monthly food budget
be acutely dependent on my ability to successfully model the thought processes
of 48 year old non-technical women.

 _QR codes_

The US will learn what Japan has learned: QR codes are an inferior way to get
people to visit a page compared to an interaction like "Google for 'Old Spice
guy'", where 'Old Spice guy' is a keyword purposely chosen to uniquely refer
to a page under your control.

~~~
tomjen3
But wouldn't that only work if you were certain you could win the seo battle
for that particular keyword?

On the other hand, you own and control that qr code.

~~~
patio11
Yes, but given that the keyword isn't a real word but a purpose-created
microphrase, you're going to ROFLstomp over everyone else on SEO for it. e.g.
This post will win for [ROFLstomp SEO], probably within a day.

~~~
dean
Just googled ROFLstomp SEO. This post is number one. Only took 6 hours.

------
assistantpilot
_Bezos: For better or worse, it is really not a part of our culture to look at
things defensively. We rarely say, “Oh my God, we’ve got to do something about
that existential threat.” Maybe one day we’ll become extinct because of that
deficiency in our nature. I don’t know. We look at things through a different
lens. We say, “Oh, here’s this incredible phenomenon called social networking.
How can we be inspired by that to make our business better?” I hope we find
something._

This is precisely the reason that I think Google will not succeed in their
Google Plus approach to social networking.

~~~
sahaj
I won't elaborate too much on this point because it's been made many times
here in the past, but I'm pretty sure you don't understand G+ if you think G+
is a short sighted move to combat just Facebook.

------
ableal
Notable observation by Levy: _"Replacing the hardware is no more complicated
or emotionally involved than changing a flashlight battery."_

This is followed, in the next paragraph, by the _"you’re filing citizen papers
for the digital duchy of Amazonia"_ observation already remarked on in another
comment.

Not enough attention is being given to this aspect - the device is mostly
irrelevant, the 'appstore' account is key. In time, the user accounts will
eventually accumulate a significant amount of value. However, these accounts
are designed as personal and non-transferable.

A couple of years into the wide use of the appstores, in practice, they work
as if the "used" content is of no value. But perhaps soon we will have divorce
lawyers settling who keeps the house, the car and the Amazon (or iTunes)
account ...

------
gfodor
The big question for me is if all these startups bootstrapping on EC2 are
going to wake up one day and decide they need their own servers. The smart
money is on "No" being the answer to this question: the switching costs are so
unbelievably high, and each day that goes by AWS manages to release features
that reduce the surface area of reasons you'd need to do so.

So, it basically looks like the current generation of startups are going to
grow up on AWS. You can imagine the implications of this for Amazon's profits.

~~~
regularfry
The flip side is that EC2 is _expensive_ for what it provides in terms of
server power per dollar, and switching costs are considerably lower if you're
doing the smart thing and already taking advantage of provider redundancy.
Amazon may be ahead now, but they can't stop swimming.

------
gabaix
I always remember Jeff Bezos' 3 lessons: obsess over customers, invent, think
long term. <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-hxX_Q5CnaA> I love the way he
unfolds his ideas simply and disrupts markets, one at a time.

------
Volpe
I'm not sure highlighting Amazon's Kindle Fire's reliance on 'streaming' over
'local storage' is a clear "positive vs negative".

You can't stream without a (reasonable) internet connection... Seems more of a
trade-off than an improvement.

~~~
johnthedebs
_Seems more of a trade-off than an improvement._

That's exactly the point. Instead of trying to compete directly with the iPad,
Amazon is serving a different part of the market.

------
spullara
I just cancelled my Kindle Fire order (which I made the day of the
announcement, perhaps too hasty) based on the review by David Pogue:

[http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/14/technology/personaltech/th...](http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/14/technology/personaltech/the-
fire-aside-amazons-lower-priced-kindles-also-shine.html)

My take away is that if they can't get the included apps to perform well, it
is likely not a device I will enjoy using. I'd rather pay another $300 for
something that is a joy to use. Probably be better off using the Kindle app on
an iPod Touch.

~~~
notatoad
if you can afford to spend an extra $300 like that, and like to read, you owe
it to yourself to get an e-ink kindle.

~~~
spullara
When they fix the flicker on page turning, I will.

~~~
bad_user
That's how e-Ink currently works. On the other hand you've got good contrast,
especially in direct sunlight. Also battery life lasts for a whole week with
the Internet connection on and for a month (at least) without that connection
active.

Reading entire novels on my Kindle 3 is an enjoyable experience. Reading long
essays on an iPad has given me nausea - as I could see the reflection of the
light above and my freaking face in the screen glare of that iPad. The
contrast is really poor in a strong light environment. Also the battery died
during a single flight from Europe to the US, when I needed it the most.

Of course, the E-Ink Kindle is only good for reading books or long essays.
It's not an iPad replacement, but the one thing it does well can't be matched
by devices with normal LCD or Amoled screens.

~~~
spullara
I'm not sure why I would be modded down for pointing out how e-ink currently
works and how I don't like it and won't be using it until they fix it. Someone
mentioned that with the Kindle Touch they have pushed the flicker to every 6
page views and have reduced its jarring effect. Presumably there are other
people that also think that e-ink, as it currently works, isn't that great
because of this problem. I've mostly read books on my iPhone 4 using Amazon's
Kindle app and I find it to be much more enjoyable, YMMV. So, when they fix
that problem, that it currently has, I will probably get one -- which is why I
have been buying books on Kindle instead of iBooks in the first place. You are
lucky you can enjoy e-ink, I wish I could.

~~~
gfodor
It'd be nice if you could elaborate on why the flicker is important enough to
you that it outweighs the obvious benefits of e-ink. Up until I read this
thread I never even considered it as a 'thing', it surprises me anyone could
care about the particular way a reading device transitions between pages, as
long as it's fast enough. It seems like the least important aspect of what
makes a reading experience on a device good vs bad.

The portability and convenience of the Kindle DX has basically changed my life
as I now have been plowing through all those technical books I've been meaning
to read over the years.

~~~
gnaffle
I think it's a bit difficult to explain this to someone that isn't
experiencing it as a problem. It's similar to the way some people react to DLP
projectors with color wheels ("rainbow effect") while some don't. People are
sensitive do different things. I find the flicker jarring even though it's
short. I do enjoy the benefits of e-ink, but I'm perfectly fine with staring
at a backlight display for hours, so I'm OK with reading on an iPad as well.

~~~
gbog
Strangely, I had the same reaction as yours in the beginning, each time I
flipped a page on my Kindle I "saw" the dots flicking. Then, around one week
after, I completely forgot, until you reminded me about the issue today.

So, in short, except if we have a very different neural system, which is not
likely, the annoyance should disappear soon enough.

------
dgurney
Thank you for linking to the single page version of that.

------
jluan
Post-PC? Post-Web? Wired, what do those terms actually, practically mean?
Companies and articles that bring up these artificial distinctions promote a
hipster cooler-than-thou that is based only on perception...

~~~
LiveTheDream
Wired defines Post-PC at the same time it introduces the term

> the post-PC era—in which the desktop is replaced by lean, portable, gesture-
> driven tablets

They also define post-web:

> in which our devices are simply a means for us to directly connect with the
> goodies in someone’s data center.

though I'll admit the latter definition is lame, the first one is reasonable.

------
muayguy
So,... I'm in Europe... can I use this thing and have access to the streaming
or not? I read somewhere that because the data you stream would reside in
Amazon's datacenters and Amazon is a US company all the information would
"belong" to them, and thus, making it vulnerable to US law. Is this
definitive?

------
sumukh1
Seems like the full page link is broken. You can use Readability by clicking
on readability view here, or just go straight to the multipage article
<http://rdd.me/rdnylmgg>

------
freemarketteddy
>It is a third gadget, the long-awaited Amazon tablet called the Kindle Fire,
that represents his company’s most ambitious leap into the hearts, minds, and
wallets of millions of consumers.

Blah Blah Blah....A sufficiently ambitious kid could make something like that
in his basement!

~~~
chadgeidel
Didn't "a sufficiently ambitious kid" already try this with the
Crunchpad/JooJoo? <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JooJoo>

~~~
freemarketteddy
Yes and in fact what he did was more ambitious than just forking android.

Since I am getting downvoted let me clarify....There is nothing special in the
Kindle....It just uses ordinary hardware with an open source operating
system...yes any kid could make something like that....But what amazon is
really selling is the services they have built through which people are going
to buy content on the kindle!

