It’s easier than ever before to mistakenly buy a counterfeit or knockoff product online. Here’s what to do when it happens to you. --- 1. Stop using the thing 2. Write to the seller 3. File an 'A-to-z Guarantee' claim 4. Contact your credit card company 5. Write to the brand 6. Leave feedback for the seller 7. Replace what you have by finding an authorized seller See also: https://thewirecutter.com/blog/myths-about-counterfeit-products-debunked/ https://thewirecutter.com/blog/amazon-counterfeit-fake-products/

Welcome to the most lovingly curated selection of Amazon and Prime alternatives anywhere. We aim to make giving up Amazon easy and to encourage more people While Amazon's monopolistic stranglehold on our economy has made it increasingly difficult to completely avoid supporting them, we've discovered that—contrary to conventional wisdom—it’s often possible to find lower prices, sometimes substantially, by shopping elsewhere. You just have to know where to look...

Copying a successful business plan is safe, and tons of companies are copying Groupon. The differentiating strategies of the more successful copycats are interesting, as is the arms-race and recursion of deal aggregators. I find it fascinating that people sign up for this stuff, because I find it wasteful. This is insane: “In just over two years, Groupon has accumulated 60 million subscribers, more than $1 billion in venture capital and $760 million in annual revenue to become the fastest-growing Web company ever. In December, it declined a $6 billion buyout offer from Google.”

"Ponoko is the world's first personal manufacturing platform. It's the online space for a community of creators and consumers to use a global network of digital manufacturing hardware to co-create, make and trade individualized product ideas on demand."