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Amazon made $35b profit last year. They're celebrating by laying off 14,000 workers (a number they say will rise to 30k). This is the kind of thing that Wall Street *loves*, and this layoff comes after a string of pronouncements from Amazon CEO about how AI is going to let them fire *tons* of workers.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2025/10/29/worker-frightening-machines/#robots-stole-your-jerb-kinda

https://pluralistic.net

Pluralistic: When AI prophecy fails (29 Oct 2025)

A black and white image of an armed overseer supervising several chain-gang prisoners in stripes doing forced labor. The overseer's head has been replaced with the glaring red eye of HAL 9000 from Stanley Kubrick's '2001: A Space Odyssey.' The prisoners' heads have been replaced with hackers' hoodies.

Image:
Cryteria (modified)
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en — A black and white image of an armed overseer supervising several chain-gang prisoners in stripes doing forced labor. The overseer's head has been replaced with the glaring red eye of HAL 9000 from Stanley Kubrick's '2001: A Space Odyssey.' The prisoners' heads have been replaced with hackers' hoodies. Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

Greg Johnston

@GPJohnston@mastodon.social replied · 3 weeks ago

@pluralistic I do, and encourage others to, #BoycottAmazon. Don’t buy a goddamned thing from it.

@knutson_brain@sfba.social replied · 3 weeks ago

@pluralistic
bubble up > trickle down

Kevin Russell

@kevinrns@mstdn.social replied · 3 weeks ago

@pluralistic

Have not used Amazon for many many months. Not a problem. Start boycotting tech Bros. Step at a time.

T2R

@T2R@infosec.exchange replied · 3 weeks ago

@pluralistic Wait until they have to eat crow and have to rehire a bunch of people because "a.i." can't do the job they were promised it could do.

tanavit

@tanavit@toot.aquilenet.fr replied · 3 weeks ago

@T2R @pluralistic

I guess Amazon will ask the customers to do the job the AI can not do...

Marquis de Geek

@marquisdegeek@ohai.social replied · 3 weeks ago

@T2R @pluralistic As someone that has all the qualifications for said roles, but been unable to find work "because AI", I look forward to that day with relish and a side order of schadenfreude :)

Alexa Devreux-Swift

@alexadeswift@lgbtqia.space replied · 3 weeks ago

@pluralistic

Capitalists and their Wall Street lackeys won't be happy until companies can be run without any employees at all, by which time every worker will be unemployed and unable to afford what they produce.

To say this entire economic system is myopic is an understatement in extremis!

EndicottRoad59

@EndicottAuthor@mastodon.social replied · 3 weeks ago

@pluralistic Amazon, and other companies, are actually hurting themselves. The fewer people working means the fewer have money to spend, which means Amazon and other companies will see their sales decline. If your customer is broke, it doesn't matter how much money you saved on A.I.

Bernd Paysan R.I.P Natenom 🕯️

@forthy42@mastodon.net2o.de replied · 3 weeks ago

@pluralistic They apparently already replaced their DNS expert by AI. Expect more outages soon.

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