In a move that shocked nations, Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos announced Monday that he would be shifting the mega-corporation’s focus from consumerism to philanthropy. “We recognized that our practices were changing\u2014and\u00a0often destroying\u2014local businesses and global economies, and it’s time to mend fences,” Bezos said in a Seattle press conference held at the company’s first warehouse, the garage of an early home he owned in that city.
\n“As the year 2020 approaches,” Bezos said, “we have done our own 20\/20 re-visioning, and it’s looking helpy.” He outlined several moves that the company would be making in the coming year, including using its patented drone and AI technologies to deliver\u2014not books and home goods to impatient U.S. city dwellers, but medicine, nutrients, and water to people in\u00a0remote corners across the globe. “It’s an ambitious move,” he continued, “but given last year’s profits measuring in the billions, we realized that there are only so many jets, designer clothes, and expensive haircuts any CEO group could use in a lifetime\u2014and most of us are bald anyway\u2014so why not share some of\u00a0our extraordinary wealth\u00a0to ease needless suffering?”
\nOriginal investors are reeling in the wake of the announcement, but the news comes as a boon to those who\u00a0initially resisted buying in because of concerns\u00a0about the inevitable losses of jobs and tax revenues in\u00a0local communities as a result of the online juggernaut. “Now we can\u00a0give all our money to\u00a0Amazon with a clear conscience,” said an anonymous new investor, “because they’re going to do good things with it.”
\nSome insiders question the decision’s motives, saying that it doesn’t seem in character for the richest man in the world. “Come on,” says one early investor. “It was a tell when\u00a0Jeff originally wanted\u00a0to\u00a0name his company ‘Relentless.com.’ Do you really think he’s backed off his intention to control the world’s economy? This is just another move in the monopoly game.”
\nIt remains to be seen what will come of this shocking April 1 announcement, but the world is waiting with bated breath, and just a little bit of dry mouth.
\n****
\nHappy April Fool’s Day, ShelfTalker readers!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A spring announcement on April 1 that made waves around the world.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29128","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29128","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=29128"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29128\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=29128"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=29128"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=29128"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}