Dan Caplinger

local retailers here who do business across the country, even across the world.

But they wouldn't have been able to do that if they didn't have Shopify, if they didn't have Amazon, if they didn't have relationships with these bigger intermediaries.

And yeah, they give up money in order to have exposure to that.

So far, it's been profitable for them, or at least more profitable than just having the local business.

I worry over the long term if take rates continue to go up, if Amazon, eBay, Shopify keep trying to get bigger fractions of that dollar.

Is there a point where their retail partners, the folks in the trenches, finally decide, you know what?

You're not leaving enough for us.

We're going to get out of that.

It's like, are they killing the golden goose as a result of that?

I don't think we're there yet, but I do look for that as a potential future risk.

You know, I think I kind of share Asit's thoughts about this.

It's easy for me, easy for a lot of people to focus on things that aren't going well.

You know, prices are up, housing's expensive, lots of things are challenging today.

But even in those tough times, what I kind of fall back on, what I see a lot of other people falling back on too, is just how much support you can get when you're going through a tough period.

It seems like

No matter how much the suffering, you know, the whole world may be suffering.

Everybody in your community might be having difficulties.

But when something really happens that takes the whole collective effort of everyone to get through it, it's just amazing how people come through, get together, put differences, little petty differences aside and really help to support each other.

I've benefited from that this year.

I've been really appreciative of that.