Maven: Amazed by Amazon

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Of all the industry practices of business headline writers specifically designed to put The Business Press Maven into an early grave, perhaps the most effective (I have only one foot above ground this morning) is the legitimacy they give to revenue benchmarks. The business media attach superlatives to these milestone numbers as if they mean more than growth rates or underlying profits and -- hey, what are you doing with that hammer and nails? Let me finish!

Take the headlines written about Monday's Amazon(AMZN Quote) announcement, which in most cases appear to be just that: headlines superimposed on Amazon's announcement. In this holy season, I thank God that at least the stock market, which appropriately sent Amazon's stock down, did not seem to be as fooled as the headline writers were. ...