The Internet transformed Amazon.com from a small bookstore into a giant that threatens Wal-Mart

Amazon’s revenue is approximately $90 billion, compared to Walmart’s $500 billion – a comparison that no one could have possibly imagined, not only in the beginning of Amazon’s incorporation, but even after few years into its operation. Amazon’s growth has been exponential, thanks to the difference in its nature of what the company is founded on – the Internet.

Amazon was initially created without a particular product to be sold in mind. The creator literally wanted to start any business over the internet, believing that such e-commerce business will be of great success in the future. It will not be an exaggeration to say that Amazon was formed solely due to the existence of the Internet. Amazon’s growth was also depended very much on the Internet. In other words, the Internet has created Amazon.



The Internet's impact on the growth of Amazon is so overwhelming that many my ask a question like, "Would Amazon exist without the Internet?" Professor Coronado from the University of Maryland's Associate Director for the Master in Supply Chain Management at the Robert H. Smith School of business

Having earned a bachelor's degree in business from the Universidad Autonoma and a Master of Professional Studies in Supply Chain Management from the Pennsylvania State University, Professor Coronado's expertise does indeed conclude to think that the Internet's impact on Amazon is massive.

Professor Coronado went further and actually explained to what extent the opposite was true -- how Amazon affected the growth of the Internet.

One could say that the relationship between Amazon and the Internet is one of a mutual relationship where both sides benefit. The Internet is almost solely responsible for Amazon's growth, meanwhile Amazon has also definitely contributed to the growth of the Internet, especially among the people who are dedicated online-shoppers.

Amazon starts off as a small online bookstore in 1994.

The founder of Amazon, Jeff Bezos, wanted to start off his own business. He didn't have a specific business idea in mind, but he was sure of one thing and one thing only. He wanted to launch an online business, so that he wouldn't regret participating sooner in the Internet business boom during the time period later on. 

This idea of starting an online business just came to him after reading a report on how the Internet would project annual Web commerce growth at 2,300% in the future. Yes, unlike most businesses that was created first and then incorporated into the internet world, Amazon was, from the start of the foundation, created to be operated in the Internet world. Literally, Amazon was born to be on the Internet.

Bezos created a list of 20 products that were marketable on the Internet. He narrowed the list down to the most promising items, and settled on books because of the large world-wide demand for literature, low supply cost, and the huge pool of books to be marketed. The business quickly grew, as Amazon was selling books to all 50 states in the United States and over 45 countries within just the first two months of business. During the short two months period of time, Amazon’s sales also went up to $20,000 per week.

First named and incorporated as "Cadabra" on July 5, 1994, Bezos decided to change the name a year later when a lawyer misheard "Cadabra" as "cadaver." Bezos looked at the dictionary, and settled on Amazon, as it was a place that was "exotic and different" and the "biggest" river in the world, both attributes which he wished his new company to become. The company went live with the new name "Amazon.com" in 1995.

Amazon was reincorporated in Delaware in 1996. On May 15, 1997, Amazon issued its first public offering of stock, trading with the stock exchange symbol AMZN under the NASDAQ. The price of the stock was at $18 per share. However, such initial success of Amazon became almost meaningless through the time of hardships in the mid to late 1990s.

Many of its investors disapproved the company's business tactic which did not make profits for the first four to five years. In May 12, 1997, Barnes & Noble sued Amazon for claiming to be "the world's largest bookstore." In October 16, 1998, Walmart sued Amazon for stealing Walmart's trade secrets by hiring former Walmart executives. When the dot-com bubble burst in the beginning of the 21st century, numerous companies collapsed. Amazon was hit hard as well, with its stock exchange price dropping from 107 dollars to 7 dollars.

Fortunately, just like the old Chinese idiom, "The sky clears after rain", after years of miserable events, things started to get better for Bezos and his company. Amazon became one of the few online companies that survived the dot-com bubble burst, turning to its first profit in the fourth quarter of 2001 with $5 million, on revenues of more than $1 billion.

Professor Coronado believes that Amazon's great utility of the Internet had truly a massive impact on the corporation, despite its small, difficult start.

A decade after 2001, its first years with profit, Amazon's stock will exceed 500. Five years after that, in 2015, Amazon would become a retailer giant that threatens Wal-Mart, even surpassing Wal-Mart market value.

Cyber Monday is one of many ways how Amazon uses internet to promote its sales.

Black Friday shopping has been around for many decades. As internet has become more common for more people, an Internet version of Black Friday, one that endorses internet’s convenience, was formed. The name of the new holiday is Cyber Monday. 


Cyber Monday is the following Monday after the Thanksgiving and Black Friday week dedicated to massive sales all over the internet by different websites and companies. Despite its very new formation, its growth in popularity and name recognition has been exponential, just like that of the Internet. Total amount of money spent on the Internet by consumers on the day of Cyber Monday in 2014 was $2.68 billion, increased from $2.29 billion in 2013. 

Amazon, as the leading E-Commerce network, also markets this day with great care. In fact, Amazon actually led the introduction of Cyber Monday in countries that were foreign to the concept of Cyber Monday, like Japan and Germany. Amazon registered Cyber Monday as an official day with the Japan Anniversary Association in 2012. Additionally, Amazon officially announced that it is responsible for bringing Cyber Monday to Germany.

According to Professor Coronado, Amazon isn't simply relying on the Internet to grow as a company. Amazon actually takes many initiatives to tame the beast called the Internet. Professor Coronado believes that Amazon's focus on customer responsiveness and simplicity, which truly exploits on the benefits of the Internet and on the reasons why people would use the Internet, is the key component on Amazon's success.

It is important to note such business tactics by Amazon, because, as it already has, it may influence and change the Internet in varying ways. Amazon has grown not just in terms of its size as a company, but also in importance to everyday lives of many people and also in the business world today.

The benefits of internet that helped Amazon grow may also serve as the cause of the major drawbacks for Amazon, including the frequent noted security flaws.

The Internet is very simple for many to access. There is absolutely no doubt that it served as one of the major components of Amazon’s major successes today. In fact, a research found that more than a third of American shoppers research and purchase products online, a rapidly growing trend that really helps E-Commerce companies. However, the benefits that internet brought for Amazon which served as key components for Amazon to become successful, also now serve as one of the major source of Amazon’s biggest problems. 

When someone is "simple", it is easy to hide things from them because they don't question. When something is easy to access, it is easy for everyone to access it, even those who have malicious intents. The convenience in usage of the Internet means convenience in hacking of the Internet.. Hacking has become a big problem in the internet (especially in recent years), and consequently, Hacking has become a big problem for many businesses located on the Internet world, like Amazon.

One incidence shows the flaws in the personal security of, not only Amazon, but many different websites on the Internet. One man's "digital life was {entirely} destroyed," as his Google account, Twitter account, and even AppleID account was hacked. His Google account was deleted. His twitter account was compromised and used to broadcast racist and homophobic messages. Worst of all, his AppleID account was broken into and, consequently, all his data on his iPhone, iPad, and MacBook was erased.

All this happened due to flaws in data management by different corporations -- in this case the difference between Apple and Amazon. Amazon gave the hackers the last four digits of a credit card number which gave hackers the ability to pretend as the hacked man and, thus, to all his private information. "In short, the very four digits that Amazon considers unimportant enough to display in the clear on the web are precisely the same ones that Apple considers secure enough to perform identity verification."

This flaw in companies management on their customers' private information caused this hacked man to lose "... more than a year's worth of photos, covering the entire lifespan of..." his daughter and other documents and e-mails, along with many others with similar, devastating damages.

Internet has provided Amazon with many benefits. It is clear that without the internet, Amazon could not have bloomed as widely as it has now. However, nothing is perfect, including the internet. That is why Amazon should work hard to solve problems that come inevitably with the using of internet.

Amazon produces a very useful service for many, and we should be grateful for its services. Just as much as we are grateful for its services, we should also be cautious and take measures to prevent hacking as much as possible from Amazon. The old saying, “beauty is in the eye of the beholder” could apply here: The usefulness is in the ability of the user.

Government Cybersecurity Proves to be Weak Once Again With the Hacking of CIA Director John Brennan's Email

CIA Director, John Brennan, who had his
AOL email account hacked by group of teenagers

This wasn't the first time that the government has been hacked. Still, what's more traumatizing about this hacking compared to the hacking done earlier this year by the Chinese?

The email of the director of America's, arguably, most important intelligence agency has been hacked by a thirteen year old.

Two other teenagers worked with the thirteen year old to form a group called "Crackas With Attitude." As a group, the three worked together to hack into John Brennan's AOL email account.

The damages are just as bad as the situation sounds like. More than 2,500 email and instant message addresses of other high-ranking government executives were yielded along with the director's email account. Other very important information, like Brennan's 47-page application for top-secret security clearance and the Social Security numbers and other personal information of numerous other top CIA officials were seized by the teenagers, as well.

To go beyond the scopes of hacking into Brennan's email, the hackers further embarrass the CIA by contacting the media, telling how he managed to hack the email and demanding the CIA director to stop killing innocent people in Palestine and free them.

The hackers who call themselves as "Crackas With Attitude", or simply "Crackas", weren't satisfied with just the hacking of an email. The teenagers who are still not caught nor identified actually had series of phone conversations with the New York Post, where they described how exactly they managed to hack the director's email and what their purpose was in their action.

The hackers referred to their tactics of hacking the email as "social engineering", in which they tricked the Verizon workers into giving Brennan's personal data, which the hackers were able to use to trick AOL into resetting the password of Brennan's email.

WikiLeaks twitting that they have received
and will soon release hacked information
obtained by the CWA.

Once they got a hold of information from Brennan's email account, they posted them on their Twitter account, @phphax, which has now disappeared, and other sources of media, such as WikiLeaks, who promise to release them.

According to WIRED, The hackers also constantly contacted Brennan, resulting in his deletion of his account altogether. The hackers referred this communication process with Brennan, "a prolonged cat-and-mouse game with the CIA director."

One of the tweets that the CWA
tweeted before the account was deleted

When Brennan asked the Crackas what the reason behind their actions was, the hackers, who reported themselves as non-Muslim American high school student, responded, "We just want Palestine to be free and for you to stop killing innocent people."





Brennan should not be criticized so hard, as the cybersecurity of the entire government proves to be pretty weak with the Chinese cyber-attack on the OPM earlier this year.

Some people are wondering why Brennan did not just use an email protected by the government cybersecurity. The answer is pretty obvious -- it's not proven to be a stronger protection than the typical email services like AOL, Gmail, Yahoo! mail, and more. In fact, some people actually suggest that it may just be more vulnerable than those popular email services.

New York Times explains that the reason why the government is so vulnerable to cyber-attacks. One obvious reason is the nature of the Internet, which was built for openness and speed. It wasn't built for 'security'. It's very hard to defend and exclude things in an environment that was initially created for accessibility. The other reason is that for the government, being an old, huge, bureaucratic organization it is, it is especially difficult to change readily to defend effectively against the quick, new methods of cyber-attacks.

The organization concludes that you simply cannot protect yourself completely on the Internet. It suggests that the best way to deal with cyber-attacks is to take steps that makes the hacking job harder for the criminals, most notably by changing your password frequently.

The conclusion of the New York Times is supported with the hacking of the OPM, or the Office of Personnel Management, earlier this year by the Chinese. OPM is a government agency that manages the civil service of the federal government by "recruiting, retaining and honoring a world-class force to serve the American people."

The OPM stored many personal information of the US governmental staff, including ID and security clearance information, Social security numbers, names, addresses, financial data, and even biometric data, including fingerprints.

Considered as the largest breaches of government data in the history of the United States, the breach, believed to have started by the Chinese in March of 2014, was only noticed by the OPM in April 2015. The number of Americans who had their information stolen that was first thought to be 1.1 million then increased to 4 million in June 2015,  went up to 21.5 million.

There are no guarantees that a government system that failed to protect very private information of millions of government employees to be able to protect an email of a single person.

Brennan cannot be blamed for not utilizing such faulted system, especially at the cost of relative inconvenience and slower speed.


Cyber-attacks has increased in numbers and severity mostly due to the increase in Hacktivism, or the use of computers and computer networks to promote political ends, chiefly free speech, human rights, and information ethics. It now constitutes half of all major motivations behind cyber attacks.

In response to such phenomenon, the government needs to improve its cybersecurity so that government cyber-attacks like the Chinese attack on OPM can be prevented and that the employees can trust on its cyber protection and use its features.

Until then, the government will constantly suffer from data breaching and other types of serious cyber-attacks that can seriously threaten, not only the government, but also, "We, the people."

Robo-Advisors Are A Great Replacement For Human Advisors

Korean forward Son Heung-Min nets hat trick for South Korea in the international soccer match against Laos.

Soccer, without a question, is my favorite sports, as it is for the majority of the people in the world. I follow club soccer, along with international soccer. South Korea is not the best international soccer team in the world, but as I do come from there, I try to read more news about what's going on in the team. I also follow the English Premier League. In order to view some news about soccer, I visited espn.com and saw this news. Immediately, it caught my attention because one, it is about soccer, two, it is about the South Korean national soccer team defeating the Laos national soccer team in a friendly match with a remarkable score of 8-0, and three, Son Heung-Min, the Korean forward who scored a hat trick in the match, recently signed for an English Premier League team, Tottenham Hotspur F.C., and I really want both him and the team to do well.

JOUR289I - September 3rd, 2015

First day of class