Amazon and every major business in the USA don't want you to purchase anything from them

[GON]

The title is a bit misleading- sorry but was posted to bring attention that Amazon's long term business plan is not to sell you a product. Amazon wants you to license products from them and pay Amazon monthly fees to use the product.

"We want to make money when people use our devices, not when they buy our devices."

AMZN is struggling with Alexa generating revenue. This article is what triggered me to post what I see as the future in American business- sell nothing, license fees and pay every month to the corporation, regardless if one uses the product/ service that month. As the old saying" Wow- what a country".
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/202...failure-on-pace-to-lose-10-billion-this-year/

 

[Quattro Pete]

The subscription model is really attractive to businesses. BMW is now offering heated seats on a subscription basis.

 

[tyman]

Lmao licensing fees

 

[skyactiv]

Heard in the news a few days ago Mercedes will sell you a 1 second quicker 0-60 for $1200 annually.

 

[b_b]

while businesses moving to subscription models sucks, the worst part is that we have done it to ourselves. the only reason companies are moving to these pay as you go models is because that we consumers have told them they want it. look at spending habits of the last few decades, people buy the cheaper product to save a few dollars, that inevitably goes out in a few years. so the company producing the more expensive built to last model has had to adapt or go out of business. people change phones, and vehicles every few years now. what's the benefit for a company to build something that last 10 years. the customer doesn't care and will have already bought a new one once the current model develops problems. just my 2 cents.

 

[dippschtick]

We are well on our way to "owning nothing and being absolutely giddy."

 

[FowVay]

Amazon is huge. You can expect to see them split up and divided into numerous separate entities in the not-too-distant future.

 

[SubieRubyRoo]

The title is a bit misleading- sorry but was posted to bring attention that Amazon's long term business plan is not to sell you a product. Amazon wants you to license products from them and pay Amazon monthly fees to use the product.

"We want to make money when people use our devices, not when they buy our devices."

AMZN is struggling with Alexa generating revenue. This article is what triggered me to post what I see as the future in American business- sell nothing, license fees and pay every month to the corporation, regardless if one uses the product/ service that month. As the old saying" Wow- what a country".
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/202...failure-on-pace-to-lose-10-billion-this-year/

“You’ll own nothing, and you’ll be happy.”

 

[Pew]

Saw this coming a mile away. Almost all of our program licenses at work are now on a subscription basis or the "you own it" price is so high, it makes no economic sense to buy over "rent".

 

[doitmyself]

A similar, but different case: Costco makes the majority of it's profit from membership fees, not selling merchandise. In this case though, the consumer benefits with lower prices (not everything) while the company of course makes a profit. The memberships encourage loyalty and the circle of success continues.

 

[Cujet]

We are well on our way to "owning nothing and being absolutely giddy."

Maybe so, but BITOG contains a sharp group of folks. Many here could provide power to the non functional heated seat, and know enough to not purchase hobbled performance cars. I don't see that happening with this group.

 

[Rmay635703]

Amazon has never made money from “selling”

A large chunk of their revenues come from the US government renting their back end infrastructure
lesser source is third parties paying to access the platform.

Inevitably when Amazon decides to monetize god help us.

Amazon uses quadruple the energy and quadruple the packaging for each product compared to Walmart.

Amazon has less efficient infrastructure as compared to Walmarts very lean in store model, what they do has never made much sense, let’s see if they wise up as business and ad revenues shrink

 

[KrisZ]

Maybe so, but BITOG contains a sharp group of folks. Many here could provide power to the non functional heated seat, and know enough to not purchase hobbled performance cars. I don't see that happening with this group.

It’s a slow process targeted at the young generations. BITOG dinosaurs and the like will be politely asked to just die. They may even be so generous as to offer us a “humane” way out, so that we don’t pollute the society with our old and crazy ideas.

 

[GSCJR]

I'm liking my 10 and 12 years old cars, more and more everyday.

 

[Slow Car Sport Mode]

I use Amazon and Walmart for almost everything.

There are many like me.

 

[RaymondP]

Yes...my Microsoft Office suite is up for renewal. Another $150 gone south. I would discourage you from adding up all of you monthly/annual subscription charges. May give you a life ending heart attack, but after cashing in your life insurance at least you would be saving on your health insurance.

To state the obvious, all these business models are based on regular income streams to survive, rather than a single onetime fee. Sadly, same with manufacturing. In built obsolescence vs. quality and longevity at a higher price.

 

[Owen Lucas]

Yes...my Microsoft Office suite is up for renewal. Another $150 gone south.

To me the only thing that makes the Office suite worthwhile is the 6TB of storage, which is actually a deal for $150. Most people don't use that much cloud storage but I do, otherwise I'd be using Google docs.

I do miss the days of buying software once and just using it for years.

 

[chrlsful]

merica is now a service econ (20, 30 yrs now?). All "middle men" banking, insurance. We make movies & music (more service) and not many products (the financial industry for the world, along w/Britain). Even TV is now a subscription, telecom, and so forth. Trouble is? just switch 'providers'. "o0OP, there goes the usa economy, they switched offa us to..."

 

[SC Maintenance]

Every company wants this model. Its high margin, easy to scale. Making and delivering tangible goods is hard (reference to current manufacturing thread).

They charge more for a digital book to download now than they do to ship you a real book. I still buy real books, but I buy mine used from Abe books. I am too cheap to buy a new book.

Realize none of these companies have been through a recession with these service models. When your choice is to eat or have Alexa, I am guessing even the millennials will choose eating. Maybe I am overly optimistic.

 

[Pablo]

Yeah too big of chunk from our small margins, didn't work. Costs us $70, w/o OH for a product we sell for $85.

BUT if you have a product that costs 0.10$ total and you sell for $5.00...............well no need to type more, you see the picture I'm painting. I hope.

20-25% fee.