Tech Monopolies: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO) 

Last fight ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-MS53oK26SOU.html

I remember being at the Senate hearings about tracking cookies, Mark Zuckerberg, some dude from Apple teuing to explain why it was okay to get different results on your mobile than your laptop, and the woman from Google who was selling people on why Google was advertising you things you got in your emails. That was 2008. This is exactly what they told the Senate they were going to do. It's just that for some reason no one thought this woukd be nefarious.

This has to do with corruption, not age. Those senators might not understand what the internet is, but they do know what a monopoly and money is. The corrut politicians are more than willing to allow monopolies to continue with bribes and being given insider info to trade off of. These corrupting influences aren't age exclusive, although many in Congress are admittedly quite old and corrupt.

"It's a series of tubes!"

@@asherujudo7383 you don’t know what a monopoly is.

I've been avoiding purchasing through Amazon entirely and have used Google (lol) to find local stores where I can buy what I need. Gets me to explore new areas of my city and meet new people, and feels good to be directly supporting people in my area.

@@geoshi8378 That's the thing, we were expecting Covid to be the thing that killed the shop, but so many people in the community flocked to the shop to support the community. It feels weird to be in a sort of ethics-based economy.

I wish this was an option for me but every game store in central Texas (Austin area) price their stock way over what it should be. Wii remotes are 50 bucks, a nintendo DS is 70 bucks, Gamecube games are all at least 20 bucks over what they are on Ebay, and it goes on. There are no reasonably priced game stores around me at all. On top of that, they try to rip you off big time with trade-in values. edit: just realised you were talking about a board game shop lol.

I just... Hate stores. So much. I hate them. I live in a busy city, in a busy area, I don't have a car so I can't go to other places, and I have trouble just tolerating my grocery store. This isn't new to the Internet - my parents always hated shopping too. I think we have some combination of sensory issues + ADD that can make stores really overwhelming. I buy things in person sometimes, but I almost always researched the item online first. I just can't make those decisions with someone staring at me asking me questions. I guess if I was born in a pre-Internet time, I would shop in person a little more, and simply own less shit. My pocketbook would probably thank me.

Also, just the fact that if I go to a store I can physically see the item is enough for me to prefer that. Even if it is Walmart sometimes. I will always try to purchase things in person when I can, obviously there are times I have to use amazon because at least it’s a somewhat reliable marketplace with a customer service.

Lol. I've said, "Duckduckgo that!" 😊

​@@willashriver1356DDG is literally all I've ever used for 10+ years. Whenever it was that Screwgle finally went down, the very next day I started using DDG.

Of course they are. Government doesn't work for us.

Unfortunately that was to be expected. Thank you for this update

Literally was coming to ask this, since I checked the post date and it's been a while. Thanks for sharing.

Hopefully the EU does something about it then.

Well, fwiw, Oliver's prophecy of Democrats getting slaughtered in the midterms proved false

Did you ever publish your research? I would love to read it.

Welcome to a new feudal system. And since the ruling class profits as much as the tech companies do, don't expect anything to change any time soon. Privacy is dead, independent journalism is nearly dead, the free market is dead, soon democracy will be dead.

@@kelltoran6658 Same.

This was a useful comment

You go girl, get that education. Smart Cookie

yes it will regulate itself, just not in ways that most people want it to - i agree with what you mean, it sucks balls

Oh, it'll regulate itself, just to make everyone at the top richer at everyone else's expense

it never did and never will

It’ll regulate itself. By not regulating itself

Honestly with all the examples I see of people fixing markets to win, the idea was always a fantasy or a lie. It always starts with good intentions, then the biggest players complain, and before you know it anyone starting out is fighting to succeed while the people who tried a bit early on get to ride it out on seniority alone.

The Deep approves this message !

It was powerful stuff

no

that needs to an assignment for theater students to perform

Him not acknowledging Peter the dolphin was a miss opportunity. Unless he's talked about the dolphin acid experiment

they also mentioned ratatoing, so danny too??

NGL I almost choked on a drink when I've heard the Jeremy Renner App being mentioned

I was thinking someone in the writing team enjoys Redlettermedia. Children's guide to the Internet was a gem.

My last name is Renner also. but not related and I don't know much about him. and don't want to.

@@musicauthority674he’s just a normal actor but has very loyal fans

Amazon is evil #BoycottAmazon

No. Your a liar and want attention.

My mother only bought _"sold and send by Amazon"_ products. Because she didn't trust other sellers with her data and money. I always look for the cheapest deal and how the seller is rated. But you tried to build a business with being a seller solely on Amazon? That's not a good business model...

Exactly! These senators/congress who don’t understand and have their family members working for multinational corporations, wealthy individual donors, and special interest groups needs to be VOTED out immediately.

@@yannick245 It was a good business model when Amazon wasn’t interfering and stealing sellers info, but I get what you mean. Multinational corporations are sometimes far WORST than government yet some people think otherwise. We need public market place online as well as public square on social media.

Lolol bro you're a genius

The true winner in all of this... A legend of ever there was one

I did the same thing! Phone switching was a reliable source of extra income for a while there in the 90's.

good for you :)) 👏🏻

I remember that. I did it once and couldn’t believe the check was real!

Offer to support the product in some way. You can offer something that Amazon can't... interaction with a person who can help directly.

well, to be blunt, retailers need to do a better job at demonstrating actual value for their prices. i've experienced some dreadful behaviors from retailers giving off the entitled, you should be grateful i'm here for you attitude, while charging higher prices. uhh, no. i'll go to amazon if i don't need that important relationship. if i do need the relationship, then i'll find a competitior who offers value. i'm fine paying the higher price, but not for the entitled attitude.

You forget that if all brick and mortar businesses of a certain product are driven out of business by Amazon, Amazon will then be free to set the price. You can bet your butt that as soon as they happens, Amazon will jack up the price. So don’t think Amazon convenience is free. It ain’t.

Well, you could beat the system by lowering your price then buying up a ton of discounted product to resell after they reset the price

@@nicholase2868 go play some EVE Online, try this strategy in the player run marketplace and let me know how it goes.

You should testify to congress

@@GreenEarth20 we are talking about amazon, not eve. Would they be reported or somethong?

@@fofopads4450 I think they're saying Eve because it has probably the best commerce system that reflects a real world in an mmo. Beyond that, I'm not exactly sure what they believe the result would be, but I'm guessing bad.

If it makes you feel any better, I canceled my Amazon account. And I tell everyone I canceled it. I hate monopolies.

Holy hell, how can an agreement like that be legal?

I'll definitely be more cautious not to buy anything made by amazon for sure. And try my hardest to avoid them completely. Good luck.

Have you spoken to a lawyer about not being able to sue them for mishaps? If you have, they certainly know better than me. I just know often those "signing away your rights" clauses aren't enforceable.

Same, been a seller for 2 yrs and every time I find a good product amazon undercuts me and takes the buy box.

Yep, I saw this in the news a few days back. I get some of the criticisms of the EU regarding national sovereignty and independent monetary policy, but when the EU works, it works very well. Despite all of its flaws, it has tremendous potential to further unite Europe for the benefit of the common citizen. Here’s to hoping the EU will continue on the right path.

not to mention they control all your information and are constantly finding ways to sneak ads to you or capture your email , my dad has had the same email for basically the entire time the internet has been popular, an aol email from the mid 90s, i got 10k deleted, 35k to go. the algorithms also drive political views and were constantly being a/b tested for advertisers, its fucking digital totalitarianism. its amazing how profound an effect this has had on our behavior in such a short time, im 39 and when I was 29 even it was nowhere near as bad as it is now

is it their fault they become successful?

This make a lot of sense, that’s why you always hear startups saying they have no competitors.

Alibaba as a competitor? They must know that people would call out their bullshit.

No it actually just means most people are stupid and lazy. Kind of like this comment

Oh my gosh!!! I never realized!! Now retrospectively when I think about it, that s right! There was never a RU-vid ad in John s videos... I join you in your mad respect

yt can decide to put ads on any video even if the channel doesnt add them. Not entirely up to him

@@chrisprilloisebola Oliver would roast RU-vid for a solid year if that happened.

@@RideAcrossTheRiver they already do that tho

@@chrisprilloisebola Never saw an ad in an Oliver piece.

Honestly John and this show consistenly have me choking on my cup of tea with those! Absolutely nail every single one. I love this show lol discovered it a few months ago, been watching the back catalog.

I mean, I'm not sure what would be preferable.

Or maybe this show is on YT because people outside USA can’t see it elsewhere ?

All I know is that HBO lets John ream their sponsors on air, so some props for that. YT is free, HBO is not, I am glad I get to watch this show and others on YT. Doesn't mean I think YT is awesome, but besides watching some commercials I pay them nothing and give them no info besides my watch history.

@@nerfherder4284 "no info besides your watch history"!? Do you know that YT is owned by Google? It knows everything about you.

TBF I think this is the only show in HBO's (or even Warner Bros Discovery's) entire catalog that uploads it like this.

No Amazon purchases 2 years and counting

I have only bought a shirt off amazon and thats the only time i've used the site. Only reason i even used it then was because my niece had a bday wishlist on it and i got her the shirt. I have been aware for many years that supporting them was bad because it's clear they are just after getting as much power and control as they can and they want to own everything they possibly can.

shop local, support your neighbor, keep the money in the loop :)

Hear, hear! I simply don't buy anything on Amazon, and I survive just fine. There are always ways to get items you need, or maybe you didn't really need them. In the last 15+ years, I've only purchased a handful of things from Amazon, mostly because I ended up with gift cards... and in that case, I make sure to buy things that Amazon take a loss on, like books 😈

@@isajloskidarko Unfortunately Walmart ran most of those local small businesses out long ago.

...and Democrats did get "destroyed" in midterm!!

You raised several valid points which, by the way, are slowly being addressed here in the EU. See for instance the Digital Markets Act.

Good points but this video was already kinda long

@@AndreaLazzarotto So if these companies comply to EU regulations, they'd also affect services (in a good way) provided everywhere else, right?

@@ArcturusOTE not necessarily, but I hope so. Apple and Google might still want to enforce app store restrictions in non-EU/EEA countries.

only thing better about Google Play store vs. Apple iStore (or whatever it's called) is that to develop software for ANY Apple platform (OS, iOS, AppleWatch), you need to pay $99/year PER USER. Google just makes you pay a one-time fee of $99 PER COMAPNY. Also, you can compile and upload your program/app for distribution on any OS (Win, Linux, MacOS) for Google, but you have to compile and deploy on a physical Apple computer in order to get it on the AppStore. Oh yeah, and planned obsolescence means you have to buy a new Apple computer about every 7-10 years, otherwise it won't work with the minimum required compiler version. Fuck Apple so hard. I didn't even get to the "right to repair" shit...

Did you have your account revoked AFTER Amazon started selling some of your items? That would make me think

this is the case with their third party delivery companies. These companies can barely push back or they're at risk for getting kicked out. Which is how Amazon is able to avoid their drivers unionizing. Since most deliveries are done by third party companies, if drivers want to unionize, it's only for that one company. and most likely Amazon will just take away routes from them. And any information, news, or posts on the internet that discuss unions get scrubbed. Plus, as we're all familiar with. The working conditions are deplorable. They've even put cameras inside the vans to micromanage their workers.

And it's pretty crazy really. Like, how much profit is there in Amazon Basics? Is it more than the total profit from all small sellers if they just up and disappeared? Not saying they'd _leave_ Amazon (because they couldn't, generally), but that there should be fewer and fewer of them as time goes on and it becomes natural to avoid Amazon when even planning a small business. Which is to say, Amazon loses their sources for ideas... So why not just leave everyone working and get your cut with no hubbub?

it's not mentioned because it's not an example of self-preferencing. AWS is a perfect example of a monopoly in general, though.

Yeah, AWS is one of those things that the general public doesn't realize how big it is. Amazon's domination of online retail gets all the public attention, but like a third of the internet runs on AWS servers now and AWS is by far the most profitable piece of Amazon's business portfolio, even though it only generates about 15% of their gross revenues.

i work in Belgium, and started only to realise this, when my company with only some 200 workers, in price comparrison came out to AWS too... but they have such a head start that even Google and microsoft have trouble coming to the same scale of economies of scale to offer as good services for as low a price! and they are preppered to suffer some non-profit years to gain some market share! so that's really suprising. it does not need adressing, since it's a service to rent net capacity, it's no way a monopoly, and now that google and microsoft are more foccussed on it, they WIL gain some market share back from AWS as time progresses! like yahoo once was really dominant in internet mail too...

Terrifying.

@@artnerd1000 i really don't see the AWS part as that terrifying ! those systems are decided on by purchase responsees and real ict'er! chances are very little of AWS staying this dominant untill 2030 even! the regular people, don't like having to think to much about different option to just buy somthing pretty cheap... so the amazon web shops almost all dominiance is more worringly !!

unfortunately they did not

@@reis5011 The golden rule; he who has the gold, makes the rule.

Ehi the eu is passing the carbon tax, which is a step toward emission reduction, so at least one good news to make up for the bad one

@@GeorgeWashingtonLaserMusket if you like to check history you'll see if you have enough gold your enemies will sell you their own bullets

Make a segment called and now- now this as an update web exclusive

The Democrats were not annihilated!

I realize this is very nit-picky, but the ratcheting part of the strap wasn’t secure. So the entire visual-parallel of “I know what I’m doing”, quite literally showed he did not know what he was doing.

Facebook’s products are laughable and irrelevant compared to the others anyway.

I used to work in utilities (gas/power) and that was called unbundling: the company that owned the gas pipe/power line had to be seperate from the company selling you the gas/power.

India has added this rule in its e-commerce regulation law. However it does not seems to work the way are thinking

What stops me from opening up another company and separating the business sectors among them? That's the problem with any kind of regulation trying to crack down on that. If you have unlimited money you can just create new legal entities indefinitely and shift the "blame". That's how to legally pay no taxes by the way. Because "on paper" you actually don't make any profit.

And they gotta split instagram and whatsapp from facebook.

Use s t a r t p a g e instead.

But really...Dolphins (as cute and adorable as they are publicized as being, are capable of incredibly abhorrent behaviors). John went there...and it needed to be done! Join my awareness campaign. Dolphins ARE A$$hole Mammals It's True (DAAM IT)!

@@gabor6259 Will RU-vid ban me if I type out "startpage"?

@@SuperFlamethrower No. I've been using it for about 6 months. It's got a couple of bugs (such as if I make too many searches, it thinks I'm a bot, which is why I removed it from my work computer as searching images a lot is part of my job), but overall it's pretty decent. Best feature about it is that it 100% does NOT log or sell your search history.

cool start up line for a sex date, you definetly need to use it when sitting on a couch.

My internet at home is from Texh Savy because it was started to provide a far better, and secure Internet supplier, and better service.

Flash was killed off for a good reason so I don't hold anything against Adobe for that, it was also a vector for all kinds of bad actors

What are you searching for that has to be so specific?

Starting to happen more and more on RU-vid. I can enter the exact, sentence-length title of a niche 12-year-old meme I have a history of watching repeatedly and it'll serve me a page filled with completely unrelated prank vlogs and top 40 music videos that the algorithm already knows I never click on. It's bizarre to feel like the platform knows me LESS well than it did 5 years ago.

@@alansandoval1705 have you literally never looked on google for the answer to a problem you're having? i mean c'mon, if you've had even the slightest computer issue that you've had to google you'd have seen this shit happen. you have a problem, you look up the problem on google, some of the solutions say to do x y and z thing, that doesn't work. now what? now you have an uber specific problem that the most common solutions don't work for. so you try to find the right solution, except google thinks it knows better than you so it's showing you results that are only tangentially related. ever looked up a movie clip on _this fucking website_ just to find out it wasn't uploaded? then you've probably seen this issue happening on youtube as well, where instead of trying to show you search results, it's showing you tangentially related (or sometimes not even related at all) results to your search. "People also watched", "For you", etc. what fucking meteor are you living on that you've not had problems finding things on google? even the highest level google-fu'ers i know have hopped to DDG because google is unusable. the go-to trick to make google work is to attach "reddit" to your search to get results that might actually help (and also because reddit's search feature is so bad it could be a monster in an ARG) but even then it's pretty hit or miss whether or not google wants to show you the proper results

Same I thought I was crazy. Simple questions asked 10 years ago will give you a decent result vs today where is results full of ads or things not even remotely related to the question asked

Drives me nuts that you can’t just quotation marks anymore to just get results including that specific term. The amount of times I’ve just had to give up is ridiculous.

The inverse Cramer index and the Pelosi ETF are next level indicators used by real pros

He's either wrong about everything, or maliciously deceiving his audience. The inverse Cramer ETF is a fairly successful one

Bullshit artist.

I'm always amazed that he manages to keep a show and to not get kicked...off. 🤔

Flashback to the "And Now This" compilation of his love for Chipotle lmao

Exactly: in the 'olden days' of the internet, younger users went to sites like Club Penguin, Disney, Cartoon Network/Nickelodeon and flash game sites that offered a safe, secure and age-appropriate environment whilst the rest of the internet was for adults. Now however, the destruction of those sites has seen the migration of young users onto social media and other sites with a mass of inappropriate content and interactions with unscrupulous and indeed *dangerous* people, and a whole host of issues around child safety online in the digital age.

11:56

Heck sometimes you even find it cheaper that way!

This is how i'm trying to use Amazon going forward... i've always hated their business practices, but they lure of buying a bunch of random crap in one fell swoop would win out occasionally. I unlinked my credit card and will make a conscious effort to buy directly from merchants, or local places.

Better yet call them, you may get a very good discount if it's an expensive item.

I try really hard to do this. Sometimes it works. Unfortunately, sometimes it doesn’t. One time I tried to buy a product direct from the sellers website and the item just sat in a PayPal cart without doing anything. Finally I said f**k it and bought it off Amazon.

Yeah, I try to do this as much as possible as well. Often with add-ons like Honey I can get a better deal on the merchant's website and get free shipping with similar delivery times. And I actually do scroll down and look for the better prices or used-like new condition items.

🤩😂🤩😂🤩

That is a sad state for your life to be in, also u all now know the regret of breaking -us- AT&T up.

Same here

Not for long they're owned by Warner Bros now xD

If only this MOFO would stop saying, "okay, Google"

Theyre also a lot of times 5-10x the expected shipping time that amazon can

Amazon has one thing going for it, it's called an economy of scale. Amazon has massive warehouses, its own delivery services, and possibly other tricks up its sleeve to cut product and shipping costs.

Last fight ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-mhmaSIRHTYw.html

That's because he doesn't have " Clickbait" Thumbnails. It's literally him talking

no shit. the screen space is 100% him and a clip bubble. hes sitting at a desk that covers half his body. theres like one of four distinct movements he can make. what internet based university did you attend?

I smoke weed too.

It's the hands, isn't it?

Last fight ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-mhmaSIRHTYw.html

Now that I think about it never seen a Dolphin up close . Is this the yearning in my heart ?

Horses are scary when they're in heat, and so with dolphins. Actually Dolphins are WAY scarier than horses when in heat. Actually Dolphins ARE ALWAYS in heat. They're the second horniest animals in existence...

And Adam Driver

lol Dolphins are scary to everyone but humans because we bribe them with fish. They kill sharks for fun and murder porpoise because they look similar but aren't Dolphins, yes Dolphins murder because of racism. As for intelligence, studies into their brains definitively say they aren't anymore intelligent then the dumbest dog.

I thought it was my dog (she makes a lot of sniffing noises and strange noises), and was delighted to learn it was a person in the video

or white

Oh, man, the product placement it that show was PAINFUL.

Don't even SAY Bing

@@RideAcrossTheRiver And the subway sandwhiches!!

@@paulbonaventura4969 They smell like a log with tomato farts!

i'm a software engineer, i always tell people at work to "bing it" when they have a question guaranteed to get a laugh every time

That's exactly right. They use financial power to create more political power to create more financial power.

I have similar arguments with my conservative friends who all rant about labor unions like trained drones while complaining that they are getting screwed over by their job and are unfairly paid and have shit benefits. Yeah dip shit, unions are the only negotiating tool regular people have versus business owning oligarchs. Fox News brainwashing and the like have set back our country 30 years in terms of progress.

People aren't blind to it; they want to become part of it. They want to be the ones looking down and laughing at others.

Exactly, that's just human nature. The more powerful, consolidated and unregulated corporations get, the more they squeeze competition out, and engage in predatory practices.

@@chichi3701 A lot of people don't actually want to enslave others, but even a selfish minority can make a decent life much harder for the rest, tempting them to break their good principles. The decent need to get better at banding together.

Companies: we love capitalism! We can pay lobyists to create law that prohibits competition. Capitalism: working slavey yay!

EX-actly. Very well-put!

@Nicholas Time capitalism never ends up in monopolies. You are thinking of socialism

If only we could move to China. Those commies really understand capitalism.

@@robertshort9487 tell me you don't know a thing about socialism, without telling me you don't know a thing about socialism

What irks me the most is that people know this, yet still go there. People know Amazon is shady, but damn it if they don’t love it. Customers grew these monsters.

What kind of kid knows modern phrasing like "fair trade and ethical standards"?

@@hiimjustin8826 Easy. I asked questions as a kid and I was closer to my teens when the one near my house opened.

I always hated walmart destroying all of those small businesses. Now its Amazon or Walmart.

My mothers hometown has a walmart, not a supercenter, specifically because of this. The local community constantly rallies against it when they start talking about expanding. They know it would kill any local stores.

That also bleeds into renters' bills. You have to use THIS cable service because no one else is allowed to run their service on our properties. You have to use THIS utility company and you pay them through us. It's bullshit.

same with power companies too, John covered it a few weeks ago. 😏

That is why internet provider and other utilities needs to have a massive public option, if it isn't already nationalized. Not just because it will create competition, but also because the nature of fly-over regions simply cannot support more then 1 private company, there's simply not enough market to do so. The monopolies don't even have to suppress competition, there isn't a market worth doing so. You need an alternative that would guarantee service that you will never get from private monopolies.

They will tell you there are alternatives. AT&T offers me "high speed" internet - DSL at around 1% of my cable internet speed. Yay competition? That'll force the cable companies to compete on price, speed, and service. 😜

Yes, that is an example of a monopoly, unlike what John’s team is conflating.

To wake them up is to suggest they ever went to sleep. They don't sleep. They're always listening.

@@ScottMurrayBestFamilyCars Yes, obviously. I'm refering to it making the devices listen for something to respond to. So they'll start interrupting what you're trying to watch.

Worked with my phone😅

I thought I was the only one who noticed. It was driving me crazy 😂

There wasn't time for it in the video, but Google's purchase of Doubleclick was a blatant violation of Clayton, but antitrust regulations haven't been enforced in years. They'll force a promise for something shiny that has basically no enforcement mechanism and call it good.

In so, so many ways, Google *is* the competition small businesses have to fight. The biggest part of any online business is getting into those top results. Google's algorithm determines who gets top results. But people can also just pay Google to get top results on specific searches. People can also set up their entire sites according to Google's "guidelines" to improve their rankings. They can embed Google's tags, use Google's tools, and advertise in Google's ad network. The reality is that two small businesses competing with each other are more likely to spend their time and energy competing with Google.

I never made that connection with Google (pun intended). If your advertisers are yourself you're not worried about losing sponsors.

Also, on RU-vid, small content providers are constantly under threat of "demonitization" for issues real or imaginary. Does RU-vid take the videos down? Only in the most egregious cases. They usually just keep the videos up with ads and keep all of the money for themselves.

It activated on the phone that I am using to watch this video lol

Seems like a reasonable reply to any "yes or no" question when one person has to speak for many. Which might not be the case with a soccer coach.

@@Gillsing Does it? Because if the question is "have you ever used third party data?" And your answer is "We have a policy but I can't say that policy hasn't been violated." Then your answer is actually "Yes, we have" Because even as someone who hasn't worked for a major international company, I'm more than aware of the difference between policies [that we enforce] and "policies" [that exist on paper and everyone is told to ignore]

@Clyde2 why is this spam now?

That’s a perfect way to recontextualize an answer, I’m going to use this in the future

ha _oh, im imagining my daughter's soccer coach is doin a _*_whole lot_*_ more than that if ya feel me.!_

Yep, and they even manage to convince people that giving up their data is good for them. That shows the control they have. Imagine being able to know all market demand, for things that don’t even exist. Having algorithms that can accurately predict any market is basically game over for competition. Remember all those trillions they pile up are basically coming from the customer’s pockets so their products/services must have an extremely large profit margin that could be way less with proper competition

Human online behaviour

Yes and they provide us with a service for free that is very useful.

@@Dunkeyhote its not free they made trillions

Lol

Last fight ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-mhmaSIRHTYw.html

It's the only way I can because I don't want to pay for HBO, which would come via Amazon Prime. I may not get the full episode, but at least I get the bulk of it. An even bigger problem is that I pay for RU-vid Red so I can watch things without 10 ads every 5 minutes or so. I'm likely to fall asleep during the second ad, then completely forget what I was watching by ad 8, and by ad 10 have stopped caring. However the view count goes up whether I enjoyed it or not. It then tells the algorithm to suggest that more often. There's a lot of crap videos that I stop or tune out. However there are some people who will be interested just because they saw it and think it's a popular must have. Also I'm guilty of leaving the TV on Amazon Prime for my cat. You know the company is bad when someone in another country that is looking for a job in the US would take any other job than Amazon.

@@jenniferstine8567HBO quit Amazon Prime last October, my guy. You have to get it directly from the horse's mouth now

@@jenniferstine8567 You can usually watch the full episode from some random RU-vid uploader on Sunday evening after (or sometimes while) the show was (is) being broadcast. Do a search on RU-vid using the show name and you'll probably find it if you scroll down a bit. It really is worth watching the full show most of the time.

Not sure why you think that's funny. RU-vid is amazing and free. you were just able to share a thought with anyone in the world that comes to this channel and wants to read it and you have a problem with that?

same when big business says, "unions will lower wages''

As someone that has worked for two of these companies (Amazon and Apple) we need to step in as a people and hold them accountable.

As someone who spent four years at Amazon, and who was initially very into being a small part of big tech, it doesn't take long to see the truth, if you're looking. From within, it's always "more, more, more" which is why they must be held accountable from without. Since I've left, I've found many alternatives to Amazon that are higher-quality and feel better to buy because I know what the people making or selling it stand for. It makes a difference.

You only have to be really good for a little while to get people hooked. Those quick answers from Google are awesome. And more than a little bit destructive to the sources that provide them, basically for free. The Amazon Basics stuff is great -- everyone buys them and loves that relatively decent stuff can be had so cheap .... for now. Until (what's left of) the competition gives up, and quality plummets and prices rise because, what else are you gonna buy, and where are you gonna buy it? This is the reason you can't even search for something obvious and explicit on Amazon without scrolling through dozens of items that are "sponsored" and not at all what you were asking for. This is the reason why, when you buy a new washing machine or refrigerator or TV, to replace the one you've had for 20 years, you figure you're doing well if it lasts _five_ years, and might well have to have it serviced within that span. But, as long as you can buy AA batteries in 50 packs for 2/3 the price of name brands, or ask your phone for something and get a spoken answer in less than 5 seconds, or have RU-vid playing on your refrigerator door ... nobody cares. Convenience and cost will trump any concerns about suffocating competition, or environmental or labor concerns. But, we'll also sit back and rah rah when someone says something snarky like "hey Bezos, why don't you stay up there in space? " Hypocrites. All of us.

well, as a mobility impaired person in the middle of boston, i can tell you that retail prices for food and other things are more expensive here from national chains than Amazon - except for Trader Joe's - and they won't deliver or give me the rest of what comes with a prime subscription. it might not be like that in cheaper parts of the country, but it is here.

I'm the same. I knew there were problems with the big companies but they're practical so I felt guilty but kept using Amazon for instance. But like you, the AT&T precedent opened my eyes on the fact that the big companies aren't just crushing the small ones, which in itself is bad already, but in doing so they're preventing us from discovering so many things we can't even imagine. They're practical now, like it was practical to be able to make a phone call rather than write a letter, but smartphones and the Internet are so much more and we shouldn't miss something as big just because we like next-day shipping.

Your insight is appreciated, though 👍

honestly, you probably could write that book. and then watch as it gets sold on Amazon :)

@@asdfhklljfztvvw3686 oh boy do I have stories…but TBH it doesn’t really matter because Amazon owns too many Congresscritters of both parties, there is no way this passes at all and even if it it somehow miraculously did pass, it would have no teeth. I’ll give another fun freebie about dealing with Amazon as a seller. You have extremely strict metrics to meet so far as ship time, orders absolutely must leave your warehouse within something like 24 hours (subject to some slight wiggle room on weekends, depending on how you structure your shipping). All well and good right? I mean we all hate getting stuff late…however AMAZON itself doesn’t hold itself nor it’s FBA fulfillment to the same standard. Noticed your Prime orders coming more and more laughably late? That’s because Amazon may or may not get the order out the door in time…but wow betide the seller who does the same thing. This is probably another way of pushing sellers into FBA, where Amazon gets a bigger piece of the revenue. One more. Amazon’s bots constantly crawl the web looking for your other listings not on Amazon. You are not allowed to sell the product elsewhere, say on your own website, for les then what Amazon thinks is a “comparable price” to your amazon listing. However that price is ALSO something amazon looks at, and if the algorithm decides you are selling it for too much on Amazon itself…the listing is taken down. There is no appeal. Selling on your website for less (since no amazon fees)? Amazons bots find out and your whole account could get nuked. Sometimes you have to sell an item at a loss on amazon and try to slowly raise the price over time until you are actually making a profit since raising it more than ~15 percent or so tends to trigger the algorithm.

This is without a doubt one of the most disturbing rays of light this topic has been shed on me. It’s clear as day now that Amazon tactually & intentionally junk punches the other [the sellers] businesses by knowingly tying them up in litigious and (undoubtedly) expensive legal, contractual tittle tattle that in turn delivers a very real, very damaging blow to these 3rd party companies. If anyone has any insight or suggestions on how a difference can be made or how to help enter this bill into the conversation - I’m all ears. & I’m fine with having to old bags on the hill as long as they’re contributing to the future of this economy. Are they willing to come to the table and talk about it..or are they not? That is the question.

@@melissaburbury8256 since I’m on a roll and heavily caffeinated, let’s talk about another way Amazon screws over it’s sellers, this time domestic (Canada included). Everyone who uses Amazon in any capacity knows how a listing works, there is a single listing for a specific product and then all sellers list under that listing. Selling a copy of “Starfighters of Adumar”? You don’t create a new listing, you simply list under the existing one, alongside everyone else selling that book. But for nonbooks things can get a little murkier, the same OEM widget might be sold under multiple listings as each importer slaps their own label on the widget and sells it on its own listing. Okay fair enough, that’s hardly a new thing, lots of companies sell the same product. In computers, Clevo makes laptops that multiple companies sell as their own. But where Amazon’s special brand of bullcrap comes in is with custom designed widgets that you yourself designed and had made overseas for your own exclusive use. Amazon heavily markets FBA to China, has special events to entice Chinese sellers to list on Amazon, and tries to make it as easy as possible for them to sell in America. Nothing wrong with this right? More products means more choices and better prices? Not necessarily. What many times happens is that your widget will be cheaply ripped off and then the seller will start listing under your own listing, stealing sales from you. Customers receive a poor imitation of the product they ordered, and they leave bad feedback. This then drives the listing’s rank down until it’s totally destroyed and then the seller moves on to the next listing to copy and destroy. Look up the sad tale of a product called Brush Hero for more sordid details. Also, when returns happen (because people return the crappy knockoff), Amazon mingles their return with the actual product returns, and if they decide it’s “new condition” they will return it to your FBA inventory. So now someone orders from you on the listing, not your knockoff competitor…and they still get the crappy knockoff product. Amazon does almost nothing to prevent this. “Private label” and “brand registry” is fractionally better than nothing, but Amazon does a very poor job of actually enforcing it. Sellers are ruined and driven out of business entirely thanks to Amazon enabling behavior like this. Also lots of Chinese sellers buy confidential data (internal Amazon data, the same data Amazon uses to decide which product to rip off for a new Amazon basics knockoff) about whatever listing they are going to target…directly from corrupt Amazon mid level execs in China, giving them an even bigger advantage in targeting your successful listing. Amazon basically does nothing about this. And this again only scratches the surface of how Amazon screws domestic third party sellers.

I was an MCI customer! My brother-in-law worked for them when MCI was switching to fiber

As a former college student, I don't believe you should let students cite google as it is not a source; it's an algorithm that takes from other sources like Wikipedia and never tells anyone. If wikipedia articles can be barred from being a fair source in academia for unreliability (despite being far better monitored), I think google should too.

I have gotten completely false information from those google answers. It just goes by whatever is most popular and doesn't take into account if the article is factual or an opinion piece.

Thank you for teaching media literacy. This country needs it SO BAD.

@@AzizidarkReborn that was my general point of this comment. I DON’T let them use google as a source. I tell them it’s like saying your source is “the library” or “the internet.” It doesn’t tell you anything.

@@michellebennett4015 We really do! It’s a key thing in teaching now!

Look at Nike or any other big Company all of them pay the absolut Minimum it's not only big tech

Last fight ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-mhmaSIRHTYw.html

@@herbttryhard7353 That doesn't make it more okay

@@OGimouse1 i agree 100%

Because they are monopolies and control the policy that is made. Would you write policy that taxed you? Ofcourse not, you would be the only one with an exception lol.

It’s not up to conservatives this time, it’s up to Chuck Schumer and he’s just as bad as the republicans. He will let this bill sit there until after august and then it’ll be forgotten with the midterms coming right up

It's pretty amazing to see conservative voters talk about how Republicans are going to take down the corrupt "Big Biz" any day now. Ok buddy, I'm sure the party that constantly cuts taxes for business and the rich will take on monopolies to help the little guy.

But the rest of her policies are so contradictory to conservatism that it is really tough to support her.

Besides the fact that she’s a bold faced liar? One good deed doesn’t undo an entire lifetime of gaming the system and lying to the public.

Sure you do, but from whom?

Wait this show has actual audiences?

sssissssisiissiissi

THIS ONLY HAPPENED AFTER THEY BANNED RACIST, PE- DOS AND BOTS ACCOUNTS AND WEBSITES......... DONT FALL FOR THEYRE WHINNING..... THE TECH RACE WITH CHINA IS TOO CLOSE FOR THEM TO BE GETTING IN WAY OF STUFF THEY DONT UNDERSTAND. THESE COMPANIES PROTECT YOU FROM VIRUSES, SPYWARE, MALWARE AND RANSOMWARE!!!! DONT ATTACK OUR ONLY PPL IN OUR CORNER. WHAT ABOUT BIG OIL, BIG MARKETS, BIG MEAT

oh really

@@MakeSomeNoiseAgencyPlaylists Yeah really. Pay attention to what's going on around you

I don't. Last thing I want is politicians gutting the internet. So then the people that bribe them get to call the shots like everything else? Meh, no thanks.

But if these companies don't have monopolies how will liberals be able to suppress news stories that impact elections? How will they be able to silence speech they don't agree with? Ugh....poor dems..you don't realize you're going to give away all your evil power by breaking up evil corps.

You are absolutely correct. Greece is a beautiful country!

@@rogwheel Yeah its all fun and games in Greece til the Gov. steals all your money in your bank account.

I get 1.5gbit fiber internet with TV in Thailand for $30/mo. 1gbit in a non fiber market (most of them) is around $120/mo in the US.

I just paid my web/cable/phone bill 15 min ago and it was $298, $129 of which is Internet (300MB). Insane.

Greek income is also a third probably

He does his job quite well and fits my niche for infotainment.

The culture war between "the left" and "the right" in the US is largely driven by tech monopolies who want everyone focusing on anything but them. It's definitely about time they get the attention.

same was said about net neutrality years ago, and right to repair recently in california, we the public can yell, but it wont matter. these tech companies spend lots of money to buy lawmakers. i say that knowing full well i know the ironey of typing this out into a google owned website.

THIS ONLY HAPPENED AFTER THEY BANNED RACIST, PE- DOS AND BOTS ACCOUNTS AND WEBSITES......... DONT FALL FOR THEYRE WHINNING..... THE TECH RACE WITH CHINA IS TOO CLOSE FOR THEM TO BE GETTING IN WAY OF STUFF THEY DONT UNDERSTAND. THESE COMPANIES PROTECT YOU FROM VIRUSES, SPYWARE, MALWARE AND RANSOMWARE!!!! DONT ATTACK OUR ONLY PPL IN OUR CORNER. WHAT ABOUT BIG OIL, BIG MARKETS, BIG MEAT

Possibly. On the other hand, it could be that you're only permitted to see the comments of people who agree with you.

Yeah this is what bipartisanship is... We all want the same things... and no one is getting what they need let alone what they want...

🤣

The dolphin and Peter have a torrid romance going.... :D Why do you think Peter was busy looking for the best surf spots when he wasn't looking for, you know, that other thing? Or looking for dolphins. (awkward, isn't it?)

@America Project Yes, and while we do that, it would really help things along if US citizens take action

Just to point out for anyone who doesn't know, this is an HBO series, which is a part of Warner Media, which was completely (or largely) owned by AT&T. Warner Media is now owned by Discovery, but if I'm not wrong AT&T still has some shares in the company.

@@sandaromo Even prior to this, John has been very critical with AT&T.

I agree with you but I think John Oliver is here on an entertainers Visa he's still a citizen of the UK

@@jonbrand5068 He became a US Citizen in December 2019

@@jonbrand5068 He may have a dual citizenship, if the U.S. still allows it. He did a guest spot with Stephen Colbert when he became a citizen and talked about the process and taking the citizenship test.

Last fight ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-mhmaSIRHTYw.html

I argued for months with Amazon about why I couldn't find a "Note 2020 Ultra Otter Case" throufh 4 pages of APPLE IPHONE X CASES. The only way I could find a link to it was Googling it--and then it would take me to APPLE IPHONE XI CASES 🤬

Same with ebay “sponsored”

It's the same on Facebook. I regret starting a business page there. I'm a photographer just starting out and if I don't pay Zuckerberg a sliding scale of money for every post, nobody sees it. And recently they've gone a step futher, if a friend or follower shares that post FB will still surpress it from the feed unless I've paid them for it to be seen. Because I lean towards art and am not often advertising a product or service, this makes it impossible to grow my fledgling little business that is frankly my only feasible way out of poverty at this point... Thanks big tech! 👍

Amazon has brand tags you can click now, but 99% of the time their brand store don't have the product you are searching for inside Amazon. In other words they have 1000 loopholes to screw laws and make them win any battle. Verified original products need a platform on Amazon by law!

Not really. They have to abide by the laws of the local country they are doing business in. Just look up Belgium/Netherlands and computer games (loot box gambling mechanics). The problem is, EU moves even slower than US does.

@@lubossoltes321 the thing is: the US does push its legislation onto other countries through trade treaties making local laws more and more difficult to enact. The EU is strong enough to stand its ground, and it's even guilty of the same. But many smaller countries don't have that luxury. Now, I don't think that the push off the EU and US for similar rules world wide is a bad thing without any merit. Many countries have used local laws to enable bribery and corruption in the past. But OP still has a point. He doesn't get to vote on those laws, yet is affected by them one way or the other. Whether, and how, this can, or even should, be fixed is a whole other topic ...

@@lubossoltes321That's not true. The EU is literally at the forefront of tech regulation.

@@vill007b3 Buddy, I live in Germany, trust me we’re not😂 almost spat out my coffee. We’re still mauling over which charger to use. FROM 2010! The day the US/UK pass stringent legislation, will be the day these major tech companies fall in line, until then, they just laugh in our faces and hush up our politicians by writing them checks. Let’s not kid ourselves to feel better man

It’s like people don’t realize the benefits that come with being a “superpower” sometimes💀The ability to make an impact worldwide by enacting local decisions made from within said country. For example: Here in Bavaria, Germany we could pass a legislation keeping these major tech companies in check, but that wouldn’t move the needle *one-bit* internationally. Same legislation is passed somewhere in LA, San Francisco, Dallas, or NY, and it would create drastic world-wide change, since most of the major tech companies reside/HQd within the US. It sucks sometimes, but that’s the leisure of producing products that consumers (in both private/public sector) want in high demand, and having the most powerful military, economy in the world to back it up. This goes for nearly every sector too, not just tech, hence why most of John’s videos are about America.

They just wait a generation, for everyone to forget.

@@andybaldman issue is that those elected congress ppl have no clue bc they have been in the office way before Microsoft and haven’t caught up yet

Can you be more specific or time stamp the argument they are making

AT & T said the same before that, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Standard Oil didn’t argue in the same vein. Power does what power do.

It's the same basic idear that the riaa used against amberol cylinders Controll of content

Because they are lying and totally do the thing.

Sounds like Vassily Nebenzia when he speaks at the UN.