The Problem With Amazon (and Apple)

I’ve become quite annoyed with Amazon.com (and Apple) lately. Even though I’m enamored with their new cloud computing initiatives, like S3, their core business practices are increasingly making me cringe and question my future relationship with them. First, I’ll give a quick rundown. Basically, in my opinion, Amazon seems to be systematically withholding shipment  of orders for customers selecting their free shipping option. I’ve thought this for a while, but as I don’t order a lot from Amazon, I’ve never been able to definitely decide if this was the case until this week. Additionally, Amazon has begun to play strong-arm tactics with music and book publishers as part of its ever increasing price and distribution war with Apple (granted, Apple does this too, which is wrong). First, there were reports of Apple demanding music labels permanently end their relationship with Amazon with respect to Amazon’s cheap $5 or so digital album sales. These were good for consumers, and if the labels are ok and willing to discount their products in any way, then no one company (whether Apple or Amazon) should deny their ability to do so. Today, it’s been reported that Amazon in playing roulette with various large publishing companies, pulling ALL of their paper and ebooks from sale unless they agree to a new three-year ebook contract with Amazon, which would  Kindle availability of all ebooks and ban publishers from selling their ebooks cheaper elsewhere (read: Apple’s iBooks store). Apple started this by requiring publishers not to sell their wares for cheaper elsewhere, and Amazon is just following suit. Amazon used to sell Kindle ebooks at wholesale prices, which is how it should be. Again, these sorts of pricing decisions should be the sole responsibility of the publishers, not demanded by content distributers, stores, or legal contracts. Pricing and availability should be flexible and apt to adapt to the market environment, otherwise everybody suffers. That said, I vehemently dislike exclusivity deals among distributers - products should be available everywhere, and let the market compete over best price, just like in the non-digital world. You can read more about this in an article from the New York Times.

As far as shipping goes, here’s the story: Last week, I order a book & a DVD burner from Amazon. I select free shipping, ok with not receiving the items right away. In my opinion, it’s ok to wait for longer for delivery if the items are in shipment, using ground or some other slow and presumably cheaper delivery process. However, waiting just for the items to ship is not right, especially when they seem to have been deliberately held-back just to make me mad.  In my case, no part of my order was packed or shipped until exactly a week to the hour from my original order. Then, only the DVD burner ships (out of a distribution facility in GA, on its way to AZ). The following day, the book ships separately from a distribution center right across town in Phoenix, AZ. That’s right, It took Amazon a week to pack & ship something out!!! If I had not selected free shipping, it apparently would have shipped out right away. It doesn’t seem like Amazon was moving things around internally to save costs, nor was anything out of stock, & they still ended up shipping in two separate packages. The only reason for taking so long, in my opinion, is to persuade people not to use free shipping and to upgrade to their Amazon Prime service (free 2-day shipping for aprox. $80 a year, which doesn’t make sense for infrequent purchasers). What other explanation could there be?

Honestly though, what is Amazon achieving by withholding shipment in such a maner? It doesn’t seem like they’re saving costs, because free shipping seems to be the exact same as standard paid shipping, and they’re shipping my order in two different packages. The only thing Amazon gains is the ill will of their customers for taking so long to ship when their competitors ship much quicker. For example, I’ve never had to wait more than 48 hours (usually 24) for items to ship with free shipping from competitors like Newegg, Buy.com, & Barnes & Noble. Honestly, with such a policy, why should I buy from Amazon & not their competitors? What’s amazing though, is I’ve found very little on the internet talking about this. Some people say they do, others say they don’t. At least for me, I’ve noticed witholding of various degrees the last number of times I’ve ordered from Amazon. Withholding shipment like this is simply unacceptable & is a great way to piss off the customers which Amazon depends on! Way to go!

Disclaimer: All statements and opinions in this piece are my own. I have no proof of Amazon witholding shipment of orders, only my personal experiences with their shipment times in relation to that of their competitors.

Amazon Kindle 2.0 Wish List

I’ve been looking at the Amazon Kindle for a while now, and have never been quite ready to take the plunge and purchase the device for its $350 asking price. Don’t get me wrong - the Kindle is a fantastic little device, I think truly heralds the forthcoming e-ink revolution. However, there is a lot of room for improvement, and with the recent rumors about a forthcoming Kindle 2.0 (next year) and a “Kindle for students,” I thought I would weigh in with some feature suggestions that would truly excite me:

• Smaller, thinner, lighter - better design (Apple-like), black/metal (since white gets dirty)
• Richer formatting: Perfect for textbooks, images, and those many newspapers & magazines
• Native Document Viewer/Editor: Supporting .doc, PDF, rtf, etc., supporting direct copying via USB or wireless without having to convert the file or pay a “small fee.” Being able to edit (with keyboard)/annotate/highlight said documents would be an extra special touch).
• PC Viewer Software: Lightweight PC/Mac viewer, allowing us to view our Kindle purchases on our computers in full color, synced over the air with all of our annotations,bookmarks, and highlights. Being able to view richly-formated color pages would be perfect for textbooks, with diagrams, and newspapers with vibrant images.
• Multi-Lingual Dictionary: As a language student, consistently reading French novels and textbooks, a multi-lingual French and French-English dictionary would be a fantastic addition to the built-in English dictionary (as long as its quick/easy to lookup needed words) - great for when reading my Le Monde newspaper subscription as well!
• Touchscreen
• I don’t care about the media features, as I would listen to MP3’s and audiobooks on my iPod anyway - focus on books and document viewing, and maybe through in some internet features to take advantage of the Whispernet (at no or a very small fee), such as:
  • Web browser
  • Google Reader RSS integration
  • Email reading (with push)

The Kindle gets a lot right, including cheap book prices and fantastic (repeat - fantastic) newspaper and magazine subscription options, at great prices. I especially like the international options, such as Paris’s Le Monde. Hopefully, Amazon can bring more non-English/international novels and material into the kindle universe in the future. With richer formating, multi-lingual dictionary, and a native document viewer, the Kindle would be a must have device - and I would be right in line among its first buyers!