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Comment by coldpie | Hacker News Reader

Honestly I've mostly stopped shopping online entirely. B&M stores have limited space, which means they have to choose what to stock, so they do the work of selecting decent products for me. When I do shop online, I don't use any of the flea markets (Amazon, Newegg, Walmart, etc).

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I have shopped online almost exclusively for over 20 years and have started doing the same thing. If I buy a fan at Home Depot, I can be reasonably assured it won't go on fire. They have product buyers that assess the quality and prices of products. Amazon purposely does not have this as it would open them to liability. So "Independent reseller" GOODAIR fan is not at all assessed, and they only provide a platform for users to judge the quality of items and post reviews.

But the GOODAIR fan says it's UL certified and can produce 12047492037 CFM of air!

It has 3,000 5 star reviews, surely it's high quality

Legally speaking, B&M retailers specifically buy things such as UL rated products just because they would incur legal liability for not doing due diligence before stocking and selling goods.

Amazon avoids all of that liability by claiming they are essentially, a flea market.

Hence why Amazon begrudgingly reacted to the FTC demanding the takedown of completely fake smoke alarm listings.

There's also the opposite effect. B&M stores have limited space, and most people prioritize price over everything else, thus most B&M stores thus stock mostly cheap junk that works just enough to keep them out of the court system and keep enough customers happy to keep them in business.

Sadly, if I want a quality item, or a specialty item, and I'm out of luck.

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