Amazon Brand Spammers Are Getting Lazy, And Letting Failed ChatGPT Queries Name Products ‘I Cannot Fulfill This Request It Goes Against OpenAI Use Policy’
If you buy products on Amazon, you're well aware of the Amazon brand spammers. These tend to be drop shippers or small (often Chinese) operations trying to sell knockoffs of whatever products might sell. But the products need brand names. In early 2020, the NY Times did an article about the phenomenon, All Your Favorite Brands, From BSTOEM to ZGGCD."
Brands that are neither translated nor Romanized nor transliterated from another language, and which may contain words, or names, that do not seem to refer to the products they sell. Brands like Pvendor, RIVMOUNT, FRETREE and MAJCF. Gloves emblazoned with names like Nertpow, SHSTFD, Joyoldelf, VBIGER and Bizzliz. Gloves with hundreds or even thousands of apparently positive reviews, available for very low prices, shipped quickly, for free, with Amazon Prime.
Gloves are just one example - there are at least hundreds of popular searches that will return similar results. White socks: JourNow, Formeu, COOVAN. iPhone cables: HOVAMP, Binecsies, BSTOEM. Sleep masks: MZOO, ZGGCD, PeNeede.
I'll admit that I've definitely purchased products from these kinds of brands (and many of them are... fine?). But the names are so obviously not serious brands, it's such a weird thing.
There have been a bunch of other articles over the years covering this phenomenon as well. Just last week, long-term friend of the site Chris O'Donnell posted about his search for a paper towel holder, and noted the naming oddities.
So I went to Amazon. This is a list of the first page companies selling the same 3 or 4 paper towel holders of questionable quality.
- DEKAVA
- ASTOFLI
- YIGII
- Fvviia
- ZUNTO
- Swaitee
- PEDORUBY
- WZKALY
- FORIOUS
- Kamenstein
- MGahyi
- theaoo
- DAZILLO
- Prodyne
- Honmein
- Mbillion
- Aheucndg
- ORLESS
- JDGOU
- CUXIXA
But, of course, in this age, if you need to come up with a fake brand, you no longer need to come up with a combination of letters that vaguely could stand in for a brand. Nope, we live in the Generative Era." You can just have ChatGPT create your name!
I'm sure it wouldn't surprise anyone to find out that this was already happening, but it appears that some of these sellers are so lazy that they've either automated the entire process, or at the very least, they're not even checking what ChatGPT is generating in slapping on a new brand.
The folks at Futurism noticed a bunch of new brands and product names for sale on Amazon using ChatGPT's rejection notice as the name. Some of the results are... pretty revealing. This one basically admits that it was tasked with coming up a brand name connected to a trademarked brand name:
And I'm wondering if they have the "I'm sorry but I cannot fulfill this request it goes against OpenAI use policy. My purpose is to provide helpful and respectful information to users" furniture in colors other than brown. Someone should ask... FOPEAS?
And who doesn't want a chair that warns you of your unethical behavior in its very name?
Amazon has since removed all of these listings, but.. there are more. I found this lovely Sorry but I can't provide the analysis you're looking for" beige table from forwillsky" for only $1,146.09. A bargain. Note how it's... um... name" concludes each bullet point on About this item."
That same company also has this Multi-Purpose Product" that has a strikingly similar name. Simplify your life!
Over at Ars Technica, they found a few more as well. Look, a purple... sorry but I can't provide the information you're looking for." Just what I was looking for.
I'm guessing these all disappear pretty quickly, but it does seem like yet another form of trust & safety/content moderation challenge for a company like Amazon that seeks to be a marketplace for all kinds of sellers.