Re: [Marxism] About Amazon

[Lüko Willms via Marxism]

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 on Samstag, 9. Januar 2016 at 02:14, Philip Ferguson via Marxism wrote:

> Amazon - the global digital East India Company of the 21st Century?:
> https://rdln.wordpress.com/2014/10/18/amazon-the-global-digital-east-india-company-of-the-21st-century/

  as usual, P. Ferguson is adorning himself with foreign feathers. Others link 
to the actual place of the article, he simply grabs it and presents it as if it 
was his own. 

  Only a small note at the end: 
> The above is from a worker in Germany; we have taken it form the Irish 
> left-wing site, The Cedar Lounge Revolution, here. 

   "Here" is 
http://cedarlounge.wordpress.com/2014/10/17/amazon-the-global-digital-east-india-company/
 

  Ferguson is a little Amazon  exploiting other people's work. 
 


Cheers, 
Lüko Willms
Frankfurt/Main, Germany
http://www.mlwerke.de
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Re: [Marxism] About Amazon, and how to fight them

[Lüko Willms via Marxism]

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 on Samstag, 9. Januar 2016 at 04:08, Andrew Pollack via Marxism wrote:

>  workers' struggles, especially by Amazon workers, 

  Einde O'Callahan mentioned the ongoing struggles of the Amazon workers in 
Germany, led by he trade union "Verdi". Verdi stands for "VEReinigte 
DIenstleistungsgewerkschaft", or united service union. Sometimes written as 
"Gewerkschaft Ver.di", with a dot in it. 
 
  Verdi wants Amazon to pay their workers at the rates of retail commerces, but 
Amazon insists that they are a logistics company, and therefore are entitled to 
pay the lower wages of that branch. 

   Verdi  conducts the struggle in a self-defeating way. They organise strikes 
in only one or at most two of the at least four Amazon distributing centers in 
Germany, and only for one or at most two days, and only demanding that Amazon 
sits down to negotiate. But Amazon is only laughing at them. Their distribution 
logistic allows them to direct delivery commands to any other warehouse, and so 
the workers there have to to the picking in the long alleys of the warehouse. 

  By continuing this ineffective way, Verdi is destroying their own 
credibility. 

  The only way is to organize a strike in ALL distribution centers, and keep it 
going until Amazon signs the framework contract of the Retail industry. And 
coordinating this with the unions in neighbouring countries organizing Amazon 
workers there, in order  to boycott all deliveries to Germany from those 
centers. 

  Coupled with a wide public campaign for solidarity, and linking this workers 
struggle with the campaign against TTIP, the secret "Transatlantic Trade and 
Investment Partnership". 
  
 
Cheers, 
Lüko Willms
Frankfurt/Main, Germany
http://www.mlwerke.de
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Re: [Marxism] About Amazon

[Andrew Pollack via Marxism]

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thanks Clay Phil and Louis for your comments
Bellamy is essential! However top-down and non-class his ideology, his
depiction of the potential for reorganizing society was a HUGE influence on
reds a century ago
re ongoing struggles at Amazon, they will certainly help shape the
transition - for instance Amazon workers saying "not only do they work me
like a slave, but the crap we're handling hardly makes for a fulfilling,
healthy life for me and the fam... Hmmm..."

On Sat, Jan 9, 2016 at 6:33 PM, Louis Proyect via Marxism <
marxism@lists.csbs.utah.edu> wrote:

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> On 1/9/16 6:23 PM, Philip Ferguson via Marxism wrote:
>
>> It's a great example of how capitalism creates these developments that
>> could be amazing, but completely distorts them because of the profit
>> motive.
>>
>> Phil
>>
>
> Edward Bellamy, "Looking Backward":
>
> The conversation took another turn then, the point of ladies' fashions in
> the nineteenth century being raised, if I remember rightly, by Mrs. Leete,
> and it was not till after breakfast, when the doctor had invited me up to
> the house-top, which appeared to be a favorite resort of his, that he
> recurred to the subject.
>
> "You were surprised," he said, "at my saying that we got along without
> money or trade, but a moment's reflection will show that trade existed and
> money was needed in your day simply because the business of production was
> left in private hands, and that, consequently, they are superfluous now."
>
> "I do not at once see how that follows," I replied.
>
> "It is very simple," said Dr. Leete. "When innumerable different and
> independent persons produced the various things needful to life and
> comfort, endless exchanges between individuals were requisite in order that
> they might supply themselves with what they desired. These exchanges
> constituted trade, and money was essential as their medium. But as soon as
> the nation became the sole producer of all sorts of commodities, there was
> no need of exchanges between individuals that they might get what they
> required. Everything was procurable from one source, and nothing could be
> procured anywhere else. A system of direct distribution from the national
> storehouses took the place of trade, and for this money was unnecessary."
>
> "How is this distribution managed?" I asked.
>
> "On the simplest possible plan," replied Dr. Leete. "A credit
> corresponding to his share of the annual product of the nation is given to
> every citizen on the public books at the beginning of each year, and a
> credit card issued him with which he procures at the public storehouses,
> found in every community, whatever he desires whenever he desires it. This
> arrangement, you will see, totally obviates the necessity for business
> transactions of any sort between individuals and consumers. Perhaps you
> would like to see what our credit cards are like.
>
> http://www.gutenberg.org/files/624/624-h/624-h.htm
>
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Re: [Marxism] About Amazon

[Clay Claiborne via Marxism]

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It looks like I am heading into the eye of this storm.

When started my job with Rackspace a little over a year ago it represented
a return to the ranks of the industrial proletariat which I left more than
30 years ago when I worked as a Motor Inspector (electrician) at Bethlehem
Steel and an experimental machine electrician at Honeywell. Working as a
Linux Sysadm in San the Antonio HQ for 3 months was an eye opener, 4000
workers in a half-million sq. ft. of converted mall space in a depressed
area of town and aptly named "the Castle."  I hadn't worked at a place this
big since Bethlehem's Vernon works in the late 1870's. This experience was
very different, yet strangely, the same.

Now I'm a work-from-home racker, but still part of the team of several
thousand sysadms, dcops, netsec, dbas and infrastructure techs collectively
called "the engine room" in the company. All this stuff we do on the
Internet requires an engine room to maintain it and I work in it 40hrs. a
week - today is an ETO day.

So what does this have to do with Amazon, by now you are probably
wondering? I'm getting there, but first on background:

Rackspace grew up as an open source software company in San Antonio, has
contributed to the OSS community, particularly in supporting the open stack
OSS cloud software and Linux. I has also been influenced by Linux community
values, which is why it located in a depressed community, partnered with
local schools to build the cloud academy, has long been on Forbes' best
places to work list, and would hire someone like me. So how it had grown up
to a 6K employee company with facilities from London to Hong Kong and still
maintain the kind of work environment I've generally only seen at small
shops.

But even as I started, the winds of change were blowing, and not a good
wind. As I was coming in the door, the founding ceo was headed out and the
new ceo was away fighting takeover bids from some of the bigger players in
cloud. Wolves were beaten back but management said Rackspace would have to
become more productive to survive. Capitalist pressures will Trump the best
of intentions.

Rackspace is the leader in managed cloud. Amazon in biggest player in cloud.

Already there was an article from the NYT or WSJ about working for Amazon
in the tech area that was making the rounds in the engine room as a
cautionary tale emphasizing what we'd already heard from the Amazon
refugees in our ranks, when management announced a new partnership with
Amazon. It seems we are going to be managing part of their cloud for them.

So that's where things stand now going into 2016. We are to be trained on
the Amazon cloud, and with it, the Amazon methods? grumble-grumble. Already
last year they introduced this new thing they call "metrics." This year
looks to be a "clash of civilizations." Everybody welcomes the Amazon
business but nobody wants to find themselves working for Amazon or like
Amazonians.

I got this job so I could continue my political work but for a Marxist,
this is a situation that is pregnant with possibilities.


Organize!

Clay


Clay Claiborne, Director
Vietnam: American Holocaust 
Linux Beach Productions
Venice, CA 90291
(310) 581-1536

Read my blogs at the Linux Beach 


On Fri, Jan 8, 2016 at 7:08 PM, Andrew Pollack via Marxism <
marxism@lists.csbs.utah.edu> wrote:

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>
> Excellent piece. More proof that Amazon is objective socialization on
> steroids - and therefore ripe for the plucking once workers' struggles,
> especially by Amazon workers, pose the question of putting its technical
> and organizational advances in our hands.
>
> On Fri, Jan 8, 2016 at 8:14 PM, Philip Ferguson via Marxism <
> marxism@lists.csbs.utah.edu> wrote:
>
> >   POSTING RULES & NOTES  
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> >
> > Amazon - the global digital East India Company of the 21st Century?:
> >
> >
> https://rdln.wordpress.com/2014/10/18/amazon-the-global-digital-east-india-company-of-the-21st-century/
> > 

Re: [Marxism] About Amazon

[Philip Ferguson via Marxism]

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It's a great example of how capitalism creates these developments that
could be amazing, but completely distorts them because of the profit motive.

Phil


On Sat, Jan 9, 2016 at 4:08 PM, Andrew Pollack  wrote:

> Excellent piece. More proof that Amazon is objective socialization on
> steroids - and therefore ripe for the plucking once workers' struggles,
> especially by Amazon workers, pose the question of putting its technical
> and organizational advances in our hands.
>
> On Fri, Jan 8, 2016 at 8:14 PM, Philip Ferguson via Marxism <
> marxism@lists.csbs.utah.edu> wrote:
>
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>>
>> Amazon - the global digital East India Company of the 21st Century?:
>>
>> https://rdln.wordpress.com/2014/10/18/amazon-the-global-digital-east-india-company-of-the-21st-century/
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[Marxism] About Amazon

[Philip Ferguson via Marxism]

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Amazon - the global digital East India Company of the 21st Century?:
https://rdln.wordpress.com/2014/10/18/amazon-the-global-digital-east-india-company-of-the-21st-century/
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Re: [Marxism] About Amazon

[Andrew Pollack via Marxism]

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Excellent piece. More proof that Amazon is objective socialization on
steroids - and therefore ripe for the plucking once workers' struggles,
especially by Amazon workers, pose the question of putting its technical
and organizational advances in our hands.

On Fri, Jan 8, 2016 at 8:14 PM, Philip Ferguson via Marxism <
marxism@lists.csbs.utah.edu> wrote:

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>
> Amazon - the global digital East India Company of the 21st Century?:
>
> https://rdln.wordpress.com/2014/10/18/amazon-the-global-digital-east-india-company-of-the-21st-century/
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