A decade ago, in the remote highlands of Kashmir, I experienced a minor cultural revelation: a parcel from Amazon, bearing books unavailable in Srinagar’s bustling city markets, arrived at my doorstep. This moment crystallised my early reverence for Jeff Bezos – then a mere name to me – whose venture had begun, as a friend reminded me, as a humble online bookstore. In that instant, Amazon seemed a noble democratisation of knowledge, a triumph of nascent computer science bridging geographical and cultural chasms.
Walter Benjamin’s lament for the “aura” of the original artwork felt momentarily countered by this new accessibility; technology appeared to expand cultural horizons rather than diminish them. Yet, this admiration proved fleeting. Within a few years, Amazon metastasised into a global commercial leviathan. By 2015, its annual revenue surged past $100 billion, and Bezos ascended relentlessly, his name perpetually etched among the planet’s top oligarchs.
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