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Amazon.com Nears 10-Year Anniversary

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the stuff-to-read dept.

mopslik writes "Amazon.com is nearing its 10-year anniversary. "Soon after Amazon.com Inc. debuted 10 years ago, Jeff Bezos and his handful of employees spent late summer nights packing books in a tiny warehouse, scrambling to ship a growing gush of orders. Today, the man who has grown accustomed to being hailed the king of Internet commerce runs a global powerhouse that did nearly $7 billion in sales last year, dealing in everything from banjo cases to wild boar baby back ribs." Although Bezos has drawn some ire from his collection of patents, there's no arguing that his company is one of the most successful online sites today."

5 of 181 comments (clear)

  1. Will be interesting to see outcome of his patents by team99parody · · Score: 4, Interesting
    It's interesting to see how Amazon's playing the patent game. In some ways it looks like they recgonise it's an absurd game and are taking out all these borderline patents that wouldd be a great case study as to why patent reform is needed.

    If he does take that approch, he could be seen as a great hero to your average /. guy, with quite a bit of positive PR. Wonder if this segment of the market matters enough for him to do this.

  2. Amazon and patents by daniil · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Actually, the one-click patent cited in the GNU link was really not so obvious after all. Even Tim O'Reilly, the man that offered $10,000 rewards for finding prior art to this, has later admitted this.

    --
    Man is a slave because freedom is difficult, whereas slavery is easy.
  3. Amazon versus Yahoo board posters by FunWithHeadlines · · Score: 5, Interesting
    In the late 90s, I was one of those investing in Amazon stock. I used to read the Yahoo investment message board for Amazon, and I remember all those posters who were absolutely sure Amazon was going down. They used to post detailed diatribes about profit and loss estimates, and how Amazon was fooling everyone with their accounting, and that their end was going to be soon and hard.

    Yeah, yeah, I know, you get those types on every Yahoo stock board, and some of them are just shorts trying to scare people away. But the meme on the Amazon board was that they were losing money on every sale...but making it up in volume! Hardy har har. These people were absolutely convinced that Amazon would never succeed at their profit margins. And indded, Amazon was losing money every quarter.

    But Jeff Bezos kept saying that the important thing was growth and market share and mind share, and that to go to profitability too soon would be a mistake. The Yahooligans roundly laughed at Bezos for saying stuff like that. But in the end, Bezos pulled it off. Amazon survived the dot-bomb, and is a solid company. But I'll bet anything if I went to the Yahoo board today (I'm no longer an investor in them, so I don't check), they will still be saying that Amazon's end is nigh.

    Shows you the value of ignorning conventional wisdom if you have a new idea and a strong vision of how to implemenent the idea in the long term.

    1. Re:Amazon versus Yahoo board posters by MsWillow · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Jeff has always been one darned smart cookie. Back when I worked with him at Fitel, he told me of how he once wrote a program to convert / translate the tape counter on several different VCRs, so that the American ex-pat community could figure out where on the tape their favorite tv show was located. Clever, and non-obvious.

      I knew darned well he'd make money. He used to talk US Tax law at lunch, and how the IRS gives a company X years before they must show a profit. He used that time to build up his company, to be strong enough to compete.

      He's good, and a decent dude, too, tho Ellie may not agree - Ellie usually lost at the lunch tab games played with Jeff and I :) Heck, Jeff even came to my wedding in 1988 - a Wiccan handfasting, back before Wicca really took off.

      Good guy, Jeff. Hopefully, he learned from Graciella how to attract the best and brightest employees, and how NOT to treat them. Fitel was a bear of a place to work. I could not have survived without Jeff and his then-gf Annette St. Onge.

      --

      Lemon curry?
  4. Spammers. by sadtrev · · Score: 5, Interesting

    One of my staff bought a book from them a year ago from a work account. Since then they've been sending me unsolicited offers for things I have no intention of buying.

    Their e-mail contains no return or unsubscribe link. I believe that here in the UK that is illegal. I have struggled even to find a phone number or postal address on their website to send a cease-and-desist letter.

    Yes, they're big and successful but their behaviour bears all the hallmarks of spammers.