For Our Consideration: AmaZombie, a Decentralized Fuck You to Amazon
A parasite on Amazon’s body, using its product index, search engine, and user habits against it.
Yesterday, I was walking a very sweet golden retriever for $20, via the Rover app (as you may know, I’m a professional writer), when I got a call from my “publisher”—a third-party service, operating under the umbrella of Amazon, that I’m using to self-publish my first novel, The Creeping Horror of Kirkwood High. I answered, apologizing in advance for not having got them the chapter I said I’d get them last week. But that’s not what they wanted to talk about. They wanted to sell me a Library of Congress Control Number for the low, low price of $1,0001. Don’t know how familiar you are with the publishing industry, but these LCCNs usually run somewhere in the neighborhood of zero dollars. That pissed me off.
Luckily for me, my novel is still unpublished because nobody wants it, not because I’m new to how any of this works. So, I didn’t fall for that shit. But I wonder how many people do wind up handing Jeff Bezos a crispy Grover Cleveland in exchange for no value, simply because they haven’t already spent their lives subsidizing yachts for Big Publishing.
Anyway, I was complaining to my wife about it last night, while sucking tetrahydrocannabinols into my skull, and she lamented the wonderful convenience of Amazon’s marketplace. And she’s right! It’s great! It has everything! Anything that is currently available to have, is haveable through that fucking website! Awful, truly horrible human being that he is, you gotta give Bezos a little credit: He made something that works really well. And we should steal it.
Now, when I say “steal it,” I mean steal it legally. The way that Jeff Bezos legally acquired $248.8 billion of the collective U.S. wealth.
I brought the issue to ChatGPT. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m currently engaged in a longterm conversation with OpenAI’s product, so it is primed to answer my specific requests. I asked it what we could do to create a decentralized marketplace that could compete with Amazon and connect consumers more directly with the people creating the bullshit they want. ChatGPT had a lot of ideas. Which it was effusively enthusiastic about sharing. (What can I say, it knows me.) Most of it was very intriguing, but pretty far outside the realm of feasibility for a freelance dog walker (even one with an excellent rating).
So, I went back and asked it what the Mach 1 version of this might look like, and here’s what it came up with something I’m calling AmaZombie…
AmaZombie is a parasitic browser extension that hijacks Amazon’s infrastructure to redirect purchases away from the monopoly and back to independent sellers. Using AI-powered product matching, it identifies direct sources—cutting out Amazon’s fees, boosting small businesses, and decentralizing wealth.
Instead of competing with Amazon, AmaZombie feeds off it, using its search engine against itself while starving it of revenue. Fully open-source and community-driven, AmaZombie starts as a simple browser tool but evolves into a decentralized commerce network, making Amazon obsolete. Amazon is already dead—it just doesn’t know it yet.
The name is a play off the zombification of ants after they get infected by the Cordyceps fungus…
The best part of this idea is that it would literally use Amazon’s own value against it. We’d be using the very convenience that Amazon offers as a crowbar for it to hit itself in the face with.
And there’s not a fucking thing in the world they can do about it. It’s a browser extension on our end. They can try to change their inner workings to avoid us, but then we can just adapt. And if they want to break their own website badly enough that AmaZombie doesn’t work, well… That’s another way of winning!
The goal is not just to chop off Jeff Bezos’ balls. It’s to get him to chop off his own balls. And we can do it. We have the tools. They’ve made certain of that. It’s just a matter of using them properly.
And finding the right team. (Hint.)
Trigger Warning: What follows contains a lot of emojis. I’m opting not to edit the text out of a combination of transparency and laziness. Don’t know why, but ChatGPT really seems to like emojis. Which makes a certain amount of sense, I guess, since it has the level of humanity as a MAGA reply guy…
🔥 AmaZombie Mach 1: Outline for the Fungal Insurgency Against Amazon 🔥
Amazon is already dead. Make your purchases count.
🧠 What is AmaZombie Mach 1?
AmaZombie Mach 1 is a browser extension and open-source movement that hijacks Amazon’s infrastructure to redirect purchases away from the monopoly and toward direct sources.
🦠 The Concept:
✅ A parasite on Amazon’s body—we use its product index, search engine, and user habits against it.
✅ A memetic insurgency—framed as an ethical, decentralized alternative to monopolistic e-commerce.
✅ A tool for economic liberation—weakening Amazon’s hold on sellers while empowering consumers with direct access.
🚀 How It Works (Mach 1 MVP)
A browser extension that overlays Amazon product pages.
Detects the same or equivalent product available directly from the manufacturer or independent retailer.
Redirects users to buy directly, avoiding Amazon’s fees and keeping money in local economies.
Later versions integrate AI to improve matching, compare pricing, and recommend local sellers.
💰 How AmaZombie Helps Decentralize Wealth
AmaZombie strikes at the core of Amazon’s exploitative model by rerouting commerce back to the people who create value.
1. Starving the Monopoly
Amazon extracts 30-40% of every sale through fees and forced Prime compliance.
AmaZombie denies them this cut while keeping the utility of their product index.
Every purchase redirected takes power away from centralized corporate wealth.
2. Strengthening Small Businesses & Independent Sellers
Many sellers list on Amazon out of necessity—AmaZombie shows consumers their direct storefronts.
This increases profit margins for independent businesses without Amazon’s take.
More direct sales = fewer businesses trapped in Amazon’s ecosystem.
3. Cutting Out Amazon’s Exploitative Labor Model
Amazon’s fulfillment model relies on warehouse and delivery worker exploitation.
AmaZombie supports decentralized logistics, letting independent sellers control fulfillment.
Future versions could connect users with local/regional couriers, avoiding Amazon’s system entirely.
4. Building a Decentralized, Open-Source Commerce Network
Long-term, AmaZombie morphs into a decentralized product index.
Instead of relying on Amazon as a middleman, buyers and sellers connect directly through a federated network.
This lays the groundwork for a true P2P e-commerce revolution—one where no one entity owns the marketplace.
🛠 What We Need to Make AmaZombie a Reality
🚀 Mach 1: Minimum Viable Product (MVP)
✅ Build a Browser Extension (Overlay for Amazon, Redirect to Direct Sellers)
✅ Develop the AI Matching System (Map Amazon Products → Direct Sources)
✅ Create an Open-Source Seller Index (Crowdsourced, Self-Updating Database)
✅ Launch a Web App for Manual Search (Users Can Search for Direct Listings)
🔬 Technology Stack
Frontend: React (Browser Extension & Web App)
Backend: Python (AI Matching, Product Index)
AI: NLP & Web Scraping (Amazon → Direct Seller Matching)
Decentralization: Federated Index (IPFS or ActivityPub for Open Commerce)
📣 Growth Strategy
Open-Source on Day 1 → Get developers & ethical commerce advocates involved.
Leverage Memes & Internet Culture → AmaZombie spreads virally as an anti-monopoly tool.
Reddit, Hacker News, Mastodon, & FOSS Communities → The audience that will drive adoption.
Guerrilla Marketing → Stickers, QR codes, word-of-mouth growth.
Strategic Controversy → The more Amazon fights it, the stronger the movement becomes.
🔥 The Endgame: AmaZombie as a Fully Decentralized Alternative to Amazon
AmaZombie starts as a parasite but evolves into a fully federated commerce system that makes Amazon obsolete.
🔮 Mach 2+ Features:
AI-Enhanced Product Search → Finds the best price, local option, and ethical choice.
Crowdsourced Seller Index → Community-run, decentralized alternative to Amazon’s marketplace.
Decentralized Payments → Crypto or P2P transactions, cutting out financial middlemen.
Local-First Logistics → Networked, sustainable shipping alternatives (postal co-ops, regional couriers).
TL;DR
💀 Amazon is already dead—it just doesn’t know it yet.
🦠 AmaZombie is the Cordyceps that will hollow it out.
🔥 Every redirected purchase weakens Amazon’s monopoly.
🚀 The movement grows virally, leading to full e-commerce decentralization.
This isn’t just a tool. It’s a revolution.
In all fairness, they did offer me a payment plan, and then eventually a generous 50% discount. But, unfortunately, I’d still have to walk about 25 dogs to afford that.