The FTC’s legal action versus Amazon.com declaring anti-competitive strategies is actually mainly loaded with points our experts currently understood in an overall feeling: cost trips, tension to make use of Amazon.com satisfaction, and more. Yet at that point our experts come to an ocean of redactions as well as the unexplainable “Job Nessie.” What is it, as well as could it potentially be actually as startling as the unredacted areas produce it seem?
The task, item, or even method is actually described greater than a number of attend the problem submitted due to the FTC. And also it’s one of those scenarios where the redactions possibly produce it audio scarier than it in fact is actually.
Probably.
The 1st referral begins webpage 6:
Amazon has also [redacted] through a [redacted] operation called “Project Nessie.” [redacted] Amazon.com’s Project Nessie possesses already extracted over [redacted] from American households.
What is it extracting? Money? Data? Something quantifiable, or else the document would not say “over.” Though I wouldn’t put it past Amazon, the context does not suggest anything physical or private, like video or biometrics.
An Amazon blog post from 2018 spotted by GeekWire describes Nessie as “a system used to monitor spikes or trends on Amazon.com.” Much of the timeline in the lawsuit takes place since then, however, so this definition (such as it is) may no longer be accurate, if it ever was.
Then, on page 11, among discussions of “anti-discounting” tactics, we have:
Amazon has deemed Project Nessie [redacted]: it has generated more than [redacted] in excess profit for Amazon.
In addition to overcharging its customers…
So Nessie does result in profit, but not necessarily directly, even though the last sentence implies it.
A bit of redaction sleuthing: An earlier sentence describes Nessie as a “[redacted] algorithm,” with the blackout text composed of no more than 5 or 6 characters (and note, “a” not “an”). Price? Profit? Sales? “Search” would just about fit too.
Last in Nessie references in the lawsuit is the whole section 7, which is 4 pages dedicated purely to Project Nessie.
Project Nessie is an algorithm [redacted]. Aware that this scheme belies its public claim that it “seek[s] to be Earth’s most customer-centric company,” [redacted].
How distressing. It later refers to “Part VI.A.3, above” in the middle of a redacted paragraph; the section is about how “Amazon maintains its monopolies by suppressing price competition with its first-party anti-discounting algorithm.”
Amazon recognizes the importance of maintaining the perception that it has lower prices than competitors. Behind closed doors, however, Amazon executives actively [redacted].
Instead, [redacted] “prices will go up.”
Unfortunately, the rest is almost entirely gone, as you can see:
So what are we to make of this mysterious Project Nessie? It’s a highly secret internal algorithm and associated operation that makes them a lot of money, likely by manipulating price or search.
Are those small, seemingly arbitrary changes to price we see on items — up by a few cents today, down by a few tomorrow — Project Nessie in action, increasing or decreasing the price as needed based on the immense amount of sales data they have access to? This seems the most likely explanation, and the ability to dictate price based on what a customer is likely to pay would be both highly profitable and fit the description of “belying” the customer-first narrative.
Or could it be that search — which we know Amazon heavily manipulates in favor of certain sellers — is likewise being juiced in some unknown way? It could also be something else entirely, more arcane or technical.
One thing is sure: Amazon doesn’t like talking about it. (I contacted the company for comment and have not heard back yet.)
Will we ever find out what it is? It seems very unlikely that this entire lawsuit and trial will not shed at least a little light on it.
But we may know sooner than that. Of course it is Amazon’s right to ask that confidential information be withheld from a public document. But the company must soon file documents justifying its numerous and extensive redactions, which will be weighed and, if found wanting, removed. So it may be that in a few weeks we will learn more about Job Nessie — whatever it is actually.
