Amazon.com (OT)

[flying_ford_anglia]

Original Yahoo! HPFG Header:
No: HPFGUIDX C2583
From: flying_ford_anglia
Subject: Re: Amazon.com (OT)
Reply To: [Yahoo! #2549] Amazon.com (OT)
Date: 6/22/00 7:13 am  (ET)

"A lot of you mention the name of Amazon.com, obviously blissfully
unaware that they are halting the progress of the internet."

I checked out Nicholas' Amazon comment and he has a point. For those who
didn't look at noamazon.com, it relates to Amazon.com's patenting of
the 1-click facility (saving billing information for repeated users),
which many large booksellers claim is preventing them from competing
with Amazon.com.

Their argument is that the 1-click software is not sufficiently mysterious
to have deserved a US patent; apparently, a patent isn't merited if an
expert in the field could work out how to reproduce the 'invention'.

Barnes and Noble, in particular, face an expensive lawsuit if they
attempt to offer a similar facility on the Internet. The noamazon.com
site lists a large number of booksellers' web sites, but it's not clear
whether they are supporters of this lobby against Amazon.com, or just
listed as alternative vendors.

Quite apart from this situation, I learned from another source that
Amazon are making a loss on every book they sell (hardly surprising). They
can't keep that up and survive, so, either way, it looks like they will
be forced to compete with other companies or die the death...

Personally, I think Amazon provides a brilliant service and if it wakes
up the bookselling industry, all power to it. However, it's not healthy
to have a monopoly.

Neil