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Local Bookstores Ask Customers To Boycott Amazon Over New Price Check App Offer
Should people boycott Amazon? Increasing numbers of retailers and publishers have been daring to ask the question, in the face of aggressive tactics by the book industry leader.
Although Amazon offers an unmatched selection of books and other products via its website, some of the Seattle-based company's recent moves, such as its book lending program and its sales tax policy, have led many retailers, publishers and politicians to turn against it. But would enough customers change their spending habits in order to force a shift in the company's behavior?
Earlier this year, a movement in California called on customers to boycott Amazon over the online store's attempts to avoid paying internet sales tax in the state.
Now an offer related to the company's new Price Check app for smartphones is causing further dissatisfaction with Amazon's aggressive policies.
The free application allows users to go into real-world stores and scan the barcodes of products that they want, using their smartphone's camera. The app then displays the cheapest price for that same product if bought via Amazon, and also allows the user to make the purchase directly from the online retailer.
As Amazon doesn't have to bear the real-world costs involved in running bricks-and-mortar retail outlets, its prices are often cheaper than those of local stores.
This Saturday, Amazon offered Price Check customers an extra incentive: up to five dollars off products whose barcodes are scanned using their app. The effect of this is to encourage consumers to use their local brick-and-mortar stores as "showrooms," while not spending money supporting them.
Though this offer does not apply to books, many local booksellers still feel threatened. According to a survey conducted this October by the Codex Group, a book market research and consulting company, 39 percent of people who bought books from Amazon had first looked at the book in a real-world bookstore.
"As frustrated bookstore owners see it, the practice allows customers to take advantage of the stores’ careful selection of books, staff recommendations and warm atmosphere," wrote the Media Decoder blog of The New York Times.
David Didriksen, president of Massachusetts-based Willow Books & Cafe, told Publishers Weekly that the offer is “another in a long series of predatory practices by Amazon. You would think that a company of that size would be willing to just live and let live for small retailers who can’t possibly affect them. But, no, they want it all.”
Yesterday, the CEO of America's Bookseller Association wrote an open letter to Amazon, describing the company's offer as "the latest in a series of steps to expand your market at the expense of cities and towns nationwide, stripping them of their unique character and the financial wherewithal to pay for essential needs like schools, fire and police departments, and libraries."
Maine senator Olympia Snow (R) released a statement calling on Amazon to cancel the promotion, stating that "paying consumers to visit small businesses and leave empty-handed is an attack on Main Street businesses that employ workers in our communities.” She went on to describe use of the app as "incentivizing consumers to spy on local shops."
Some bookstores are fighting back. For the last few weeks, John Stitch, the store manager at Diesel, A Bookstore in Oakland, Calif., has been handing patrons free "Occupy Amazon" buttons. Regarding Saturday's offer, he told The Huffington Post, "When we see shoppers taking pictures with their phones or using the app, we won't go so far as to be rude or ask them to leave, but sometimes we'll be sarcastic about it, and ask them, 'Hey, what's that app? How cool!' I think the only thing you can do is make people aware."
The author Emma Straub, who describes herself as the "resident cheer squad" at BookCourt in Brooklyn, NY, has her own solution. She told industry e-newsletter ShelfAwareness that "if Amazon wants Saturday to be a Price Check day, then we should all do a version of the same. Find something you want to buy on Amazon, whether it's a book, or a television set, or a snow shovel, and then find a place to buy it in person."
Meanwhile, Third Street Books in McMinnville, Oregon has chosen to mark Amazon's Price Check offer with a counter offer of their own: on Saturday, customers will get 15 percent off their purchase, plus a $5 gift certificate. All they have to do is provide proof that they have cancelled their Amazon account.
Amazon has thus far declined to comment about such practices that are perceived by many as predatory. It remains to be seen if enough anger can be stirred up, either by publishers, retailers or consumers, to persuade many customers to cancel their accounts.
There are many financial incentives offered by Amazon to shop on its site; the question some are asking is, are people prepared to pay for the true cost of its dominance in the marketplace?
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57 Comments so far
Show AllAlso, boycott Amazon for their denial of support for WikiLeaks! It's pretty obvious whose pockets Amazon is being toted around in.
Although Amazon may justify its commercial practices as making it more competitive with other businesses, its treatment of Wikileaks puts Amazon in the too-fascist-for-me-to-support category, for which no justification can be made.
I wouldn't buy one effing thing from Amazon!
As if their Wikileaks policy wasn't bad enough, Amazon's labour practices are gruesome. It's time to be done with them.
It's actually called innovation. There's old ways of doing things and new innovative ways, the old ways are being pushed out by the more efficient new ways.
Third Street Books in McMinnville, Oregon seems to have figured it out and came up with an idea of their own. It definitely beats whining..
A positive reaction always beats a whine.
I use the Amazon price check app and if the difference is under 20% I always go local, but some things are 50 and 60% cheaper on Amazon. On those items I really think hard before I buy anyplace and usually I will go Amazon.
One of the really good things about Amazon is not having to interact with the retail people and the crowds. I have stores where I go that I really like the people that work there, but 90% of the time the clerks, even in book stores are ignorant of what they sell and they are slow and really don't care. Those stores where the employees engage me and interact, I always buy there first. Service is a lot more important than price unless the difference is VERY large.
"...unless the difference is VERY large."
Exactly. The way I figure it, if my choices are spending $12 on line with some huge faceless mail-order outfit (no names) or $13 supporting a local operation, I take the latter. I try to do this with as many things as I can. In some situations it simply doesn't work (stuff you just can't find nearby, for whatever reason). But probably at least half the time there's a viable option.
I also do this with a certain local hardware store that's been in the same spot for closing on 60 years. If I know they don't have something I'm after, then I'll go to the Blue Place or the Orange Place. I'll save a little by patronizing one of the latter, and I know it's not the same as Amazon vs. Local Whatever (given that Blue or Orange are physically where I am and supporting my area as well), but I'm in no hurry to see the smaller place squeezed out by the bigger players.
I think we all need to do more of this. The grand HOLLOWING OUT OF MAIN STREET effect sucks.
"It's actually called innovation."
How is using a local store's inventory for browsing and then buying on-line "innovation"? If you just use Amazon's search functions, images, and "look inside" features it's innovation. If you go local to look and feel and then say screw-you, it's unethical.
We reap what we sow, spend cheap and you'll eventually earn cheap. It's your choice, but don't chalk it up to innovation.
Capitalism at work.
"Capitalism", the eternal cop-out for having no ethics and then attributing it to an invented game where whoever collects the most points wins.
Yes, and some equate it with democracy and freedom.
erroneously, but we're going to correct that.
fricken back button!
not necessarily a good thing
I understand the criticism, but this boycott also harms readers and authors...especially the authors who do not have enough money for agents, book tours, etc.
I live in an area where the newspaper censors political speech, the public library banns some political books - There is only one independent book store in the area. Sorry, but if you like the First Amendment sometimes you have to use Amazon.
Why don't you encourage people to buy your books from your local Vermont publisher and bookstore?
Amazon is the Wal-Mart of bookstores/online retail. Their labor practices and working conditions are reprehensible.
pjd412... Thanks...I do that. Most of my readers are in other States - Calif, NJ, etc. They seem to be more comfortable dealing with Amazon because they have done it before. I prefer that people get the book directly from The Northshire Book Store by phone or the web, but it is not my call. Since the book has been banned by a Vermont PUBLIC library (which receives public funds and therefore should adhere to the First Amendment), I am grateful for any help I can get.
Rosemarie, what possible excuse could that library director have given you for such behavior??? Are there library commissioners who oversee the library to whom you could appeal? Does the lib director have a contract whose renewal could be opposed?
Mairead...Thanks...The problem is the culture of Vermont. Things like this are common here. That's why I wrote the book. I wanted to expose the censoring of political speech which is a State-wide problem - worse in the SW area. I donated copies of the book to the library - to be a good citizen and so that no one would have to pay to read it. I was, and still am, a bit surprised that the library would do this. Because they receive some public funds there now is a First Amendment issue. In addition, this is a violation of the code of ethics that most libaries follow. Because of croneyism, things like this are common in Vermont and thus far no one seems to successfully fight the system here. Some have tried. It is even worse when candidates for office are arrested because they want to participate in a debate. See photos of DENNIS STEELE ARRESTED on Google. Think of the irony of banning a book about the banning of political speech. In order to restore the First Amendment in Vermont it will take a lawyer. Know anyone???? On second thought, it might have to be a lawyer from outside of Vermont. One of the arrests of a candidate happened at the Vermont LAW SCHOOL.
P.S. Mairead...They don't explain why, but the latest theory is that they are doing this because I was arrested for protesting the war on March 20, 2003 - the day of Shock and Awe. At the time of my arrest I was standing in silence with my head bowed. I held a sign that showed an Iraqi child. It was one of the most solemn moments of my life.
That's truly disgraceful and disgusting.
Have you considered trying to get the ALA involved? Their members are definitely not keen on censorship: every year they co-sponsor the "banned books week" to shine a light on the very sort of nonsense you've encountered
Keith Fiels is the Exec Dir, if you want to have a go.
Mairead...Thanks. I will contact him. The problem is bigger than just about books. Too bad the ACLU is too busy to support First Amendment rights for candidates and voters. Please let me have any other ideas or suggestions you come up with. We really need one dedicated lawyer who will work for principle, not money.
I understand your frustration with the ACLU. They seem to have undergone a number of changes in the past 10 years or so that make me uneasy. Other than that they seem more ...reserved these days I can't quite put my finger on exactly what the problem is--which is why I'm still a member.
Have you tried the National Lawyers Guild? They're the ones doing Legal Observer duty at the demos, and their base goal since their founding in 1937 has been to make fundamental changes in the way the US works. They have many student-lawyer members, who might quite like to take on a cronyist bureaucracy in court, tho someone might need to cover their out-of-pocket costs being as they are students.
Mairead...Thanks, again...I just sent off the letter to ALA. No, I have not yet tried the NLG. Bill Quigley came forward when the government announced plans to re-try me after the VT Supreme Court overturned my conviction. I am sure he has more important issues right now...like people dying in Haiti.
ACLU seems to take mostly cases involving discrimination based on religion, gender, race, etc..
One issue is that when I persue this, it looks self-serving - like I'm trying to sell books. The opposite is true. That's why I donated copies of the book to the library.
In Hawaii some islands HAVE NO BOOKSTORES - or the ones that exist carry only the best sellers and no poetry, literature, philosophy, etc. And the libraries are sadly outdated. And what are handicapped people supposed to do? Many are wheelchair bound and online shopping is their only choice. Face it, sometimes Amazon is the only option, especially in rural areas where the product simply isn't available or available only at Walmart, another unethical corporation. There has to be an alternative to boycotting - if government will bail out banks why not bookstores? Either tax these giants like Amazon & Walmart, or subsidize rural businesses that can't buy in large quantities. If local businesses were given a break by the gov't and could pass that on to the community, most able-bodied consumers would probably prefer to buy close to home. But don't forget how online shopping has been a great help to the handicapped - and don't put the handicapped and people suffering from chronic illness down for not being able to physically travel to a retail market.
Come on. That's stupid. If the problem were merely the handicapped and ill, I think there'd still be plenty of bookstores.
There are online alternatives to Amazon that are ethical, socially and environmentally responsible, pay taxes and could be cheaper than Amazon.
Check out Better World Bookstore - a B corporation with a business model that puts people before profit:
http://www.betterworldbooks.com/
(Learn more about B corporations here: http://www.bcorporation.net/about)
Some others:
http://www.akpress.org/about/aboutakenglish
http://sevenstories.com/
http://bbpbooks.teachingforchange.org/%3Cfront%3E
( By the way, they have a few things to say about amazon, too: http://bbpbooks.teachingforchange.org/whatswrongwithamazon)
You're correct that Amazon has an extensive choice.
OTOH, buying from Amazon does NOT benefit authors, especially not smaller authors. Amazon takes a big cut, to the point that for smaller author / not big time authors, the authors in the end end up with only a very small amount of what you paid for the book. If you want to support authors, try to buy directly from them, not through Amazon.
~"You would think that a company of that size would be willing to just live and let live for small retailers who can’t possibly affect them. But, no, they want it all.”-David Didriksen, president of Massachusetts-based Willow Books & Cafe~
survival for the fantasy "person" or corporate entity by definition thrives only from more and ever more. you, mr. didriksen, as a limited breathing person may develop a nice customer base which supports you in a satisfactory standard. a corporation simply cannot afford such a frivolity as satisfaction. why that's tantamount to a death sentence in their little shark-tank! you, along with other locally owned businesses, create a lovely "cash-flow circle" enriching the community all around you.
i heard that 'mall*wart' even tried to buy paten rights for the 'happy-face' emoticon. these vampire mega-monopolies do not contribute to our cash-flow circle. they suck up, up and away. regardless of bull-ogna lies the maketing department tell you, the name of the game,...
"dissatisfaction guaranteed!"
I use the library and for my IPAD, I use Overdrive. free software program that lets you download free Ebooks . However, the books do come from Amazon for some reason, but they don't get my money
"<" sarcasm ">" The local Bun & Run has a price check app that will read your restaurant's menu, and then they can deliver the same meal to your table for 20% less, maybe 50% less. What's more, their mobile waiter will accept a lower tip than your restaurant's waiter. "<" /sarcasm ">"
Why is it that a coworker promoted to be your manager suddenly has the power of life and death over you? A few months ago, in many cases, he or she was joking with you as you sat in back-to-back (literally) cubicles. Now, after the promotion, when the old-style top-to-bottom hierarchy of a corporation blunders and has to lay off people, your coworker of a few months ago signs off on your layoff. If he now has the power to send you into an intractable Recession without adequate severance pay or health insurance—and then “bad-mouth” you to his peers and superiors at corporate parties and clubs, shouldn’t you have the right to bad-mouth—or tell the truth—about his weaknesses?
But, in the quintessential multinational firm with a head office drawing up plans and issuing commands to international satellite facilities that build a local version of “Product 1,” you have no rights, either before or after your layoff. If you bad-mouth your ex-boss/ex-coworker, you are labeled as “erratic” or a “misfit” or “don’t hire him, his memory isn’t 100%” or “he hates company parties” or “I saw him steal a package of Xerox paper one day.” And your hole grows deeper. The damage inflicted without thought, casually, by your ex-friend gains momentum until people believe everything is your fault: “He hasn’t been hired in two years! There must be something wrong with him!” Your network of loyalists dwindles, until, one day, using a free movie ticket received for donating blood at your church, you see this ex-coworker in the theater’s lobby: A sideways glance. “Hello, Mr. Smith,” he says to you. You stare into his eyes and say nothing. You call your child near to you and slip into your movie—one you hope he is not also going to see. I've been thinking lately that capitalism is nothing more than proof of evolution, in which the fittest or most adaptable survive. Since we are creatures of evolution, we accept this kill-or-be-killed mentality without question--except the preposterous one: "Can't we all just get along?" Perversely, the free-trade agreements pioneered by Bill Clinton and largely responsible for there being 40 applicants for each open position in my life’s work—editing, writing and proofing—likely heed the beginning of the end of the “quintessential multinational firm,” according to a valuable little book called, “Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything,” by Don Tapscott and Anthony D. Williams (Portfolio/Penguin, New York, 2010).According to the authors, that old-fashioned multinational “was modeled on a hub-and-spoke architecture. A head of office drew up plans and issued commands to an international network of satellite production facilities that built products for local markets.” “This market-by-market approach to organizing production no longer makes sense in a global age,” the authors write. “National silos gave rise to bloated and expensive bureaucracies that deployed inefficient, incompatible, and often redundant processes for making and marketing products locally. Insufficient knowledge transfer across organizational boundaries and departmental silos meant that most multinationals failed to seize opportunities for innovation and cost reduction. Now that global business standards and info technologies envelop the planet, the cost of coordinating a distributed global business is infinitely cheaper than just a few decades ago.” This is what caused the Crash of 2008 and the rise of the elite 1%, leaving the 99 percenters to struggle for survival just as the inhabitants of the great Mayan civilizations struggled to survive when the Spaniards attacked with guns, steel and germs 500 to 600 years ago; just as the makers of horse carriages struggled when the car was invented about 100 years ago; just as trains and ocean liners petered out after the airline industry skyrocketed in the 1940s and 1950s; just as farmers struggled and had to migrate to cities to squander out a “living” wage during the first Industrial Revolution from 1700 to 1900. This is what Occupy Wall Street—and all of the Occupy protests--are fighting. Do you think they will win? Doubtful. A friend of mine told me that he went to his union’s meeting about a week ago and there was no “fire in the belly” of his fellow union members. It seems that after the police brutally, in the dead of night, scrambled Occupy Wall Streeters from Zuccotti Park in lower Manhattan and trashed laptops, tents, sleeping bags, and backpacks, there may be too few people, whether young and with nothing to lose or not, willing to face life-ruining jail time or injury. My friend said there, so far, appear to be very, very few Tim DeChristophers willing to brave two-years hard time in a federal prison to try to change the 1% elite, which has this universe’s two prime weapons—money and power. It seems that more and more multinationals are moving to a new model, a truly global firm that breaks down national “silos.” “This is not a multinational with a new twist. Smart firms are abandoning the multinational model completely,” the authors write. Today “supply chains” are becoming “value networks.” “In the past, companies like Boeing wrote detailed specifications for each part and asked suppliers to build to plan. Boeing gathered the parts on the plant floor and spent weeks assembling a single plane. Today, suppliers co-design airplanes from scratch and deliver complete subassemblies to Boeing’s factory, where a single plane can be snapped together like Lego blocks in as little as three days.” “Handing significant responsibility for innovation over to suppliers signals an important change in how companies compete.” Bringing new products to market now means working with a vast “ecosystem” (a word the authors use, rather oddly, considering the global warming consequences and economic consequences being ignored in the never-ending quest for greater profits for shareholders) of partners that possess complementary skills. Innovation is less about inventing and more about orchestrating or coordinating good ideas,” the authors claim. But they never touch upon any negative consequences of this new business model or the “collateral damage” it already is bringing by destroying the middle and lower classes while depleting their retirement funds or health insurance or educations. The authors instead say, “Boeing and BMW are not giving up on innovation. Both companies are taking advantage of the resources they have ‘freed up’ to focus on improving a few dimensions of value that ‘matter most’ to their customers.”
This comment reminds me of the YES MEN film, in which the Yes Men parodied "business consultants" who exulted they had calculated that, in these days of supply chains, actual slavery was even more expensive than simply outsourcing work to workers (er, slaves) in cheaper foreign lands, due to the fact businesses had to actually pay more to keep domestic slaves, well... alive. In the same film, they parodied "business consultants" who came up with the idea of using recycled human shit as a food product for poor people... an idea that is coming to pass, along with the dirt cookies of Haiti. Slaves... the new Middle Class.
I stopped buying from Amazon when they booted Wikileaks. I asked those who have given me Amazon gift certificates to get it from somewhere else so last year's was from Powell's instead.
That's what prompted me to erase my 200+ reviews and vow to never visit their site again. It's unfortunate that Amnesty International's US branch uses Amazon as its check-out medium...so you have to register with Amazon to use it. I refuse to, and as a result, AI will get no purchases from me at its store. Too bad, because AI is a worthy concern--unlike Amazon. When we abandon local businesses, we ensure that our immediate community will be desolated. This is a lesson Americans have yet to learn, on either a national or local level. Personal relationships like there used to be with the mom-and-pop stores are replaced by the below-subsistence wages paid to a harried, overworked person in a franchise box...with the proceeds going away to some huge corporation that couldn't care less about the local community.
The heaviest chains are those people willingly place on themselves.
I was telling people to boycott Amazon as long ago as 1996, about when they first began. I owned a small independent bookstore then, and Amazon's whole approach was precisely to run small indies out of business ASAP. In this they mostly succeeded, as there are very few real independents still operating anywhere. They had the full support of the major publishers, BTW. Amazon has never been about anything but being the WalMart of bookselling online, and now it sells everything but pizza, and will likely go there before long, if there's a buck in it. There were many customers even back then who would come to my store to check out what looked interesting, then go home and order it from Amazon. This was going on all over the country every day, and soon small independents couldn't survive. I would disabuse customers of the myth that Amazon had titles I couldn't get, because I could get ANY titles, so long as they were in print. The only difference was I'd have to special order them, which I did every day, and it would take 3 or 4 days to receive the order. By the time they'd order it from Amazon, I could have had the book in their hands. But of course price was the difference, and many folks would prefer to save a dollar over supporting local businesses.
Amazon plays on the cupidity of American consumers like this every day, just like WalMart, which has shut down countless small businesses over the years. Clowns like "chameleon " can call this "innovation" all they want, but it's sheer predatory business practice, the hallmark of capitalism. Unless one thinks monopolization is "innovative." Efficiency my ass. Amazon depends on a HUGE flotilla of UPS delivery trucks to disseminate their wares around the continent. Their ecological footprint is enormous, but I suppose that makes them more "efficient."
There are other places to order books online besides Amazon. Try Powers, out of Portland. It's a very big independent, but at least it's not Amazon, Jeff Bezos doesn't own it, and it doesn't have predatory business schemes to make bookselling impossible for local stores. Amazon is definitely an arm of the vampire squid nature of capitalism as it's actually practiced. (See Matt Taibbi).
You've been up at the sharp end -- how would you set things up, if you could? Sears and Monkey Wards were the first to do what Amazon did. Walmart is different, in that they do have storefronts. Sears managed to kill off quite a few local general stores by providing better quality at a lower price even when freight/post was factored in.
How would you set things up such that people would choose to deal locally and feel good about it? It's a serious and important problem, for all the reasons you gave.
It's a complicated question and I doubt I have any airtight answer. But it finally comes down to getting the public to actually CARE about local economies, instead of only caring about a few dollars they might save at Walmart and Amazon. This is the same problem that exists on multiple levels. There are always a few who get it, and refuse to shop at these predatory stores and online sites, but it's always a minority. It's probably the exact same minority that really opposed the invasion of Iraq in 2003.
So it will never be up to me to "set things up" because I've been written out of the equation, along with many other small retailers. The problem is ultimately just how capitalism now actually operates, not the ridiculous theories of how it "should" work if only we had enough regulation and people started playing by the rules. Amazon was able to pull off its predatory stunt because the system specifically allows for such practices. We pretend to be against monopolies, but in practice and in everyday commercial life, we accept them as part of the system over which we can't possibly have any control. This should be part of what OWS is about.
Until the system we'd sleepily accepted as inevitable and sacrosanct is changed dramatically and radically, the phenomena of Amazon and Walmart will keep rolling over and burying alive anyone trying to make a living in those areas that such vampires have claimed as their sovereign and exclusive right. Amazon gets away with what it does because it has not been permitted to openly and vigorously challenge capitalism. OWS may help change all that.
Well of course it won't -probably- be up to you to set things up, but I asked because I suppose you've thought about it, and your thoughts would definitely be worth reading since, as I said, you've been up at the sharp end.
I've yet to visit Portland, but I'd be sure to check out Powell's if I do.
I make it a habit of going to Strand Books every time I return to New York. Their prices are competitive with, and sometimes beat, Amazon's.
One more thing--for those who believe Amazon is their only way to buy books. Look into Better World Books, a for-profit company that donates a lot of its proceeds to literacy programs around the world. Also, a lot of the books they sell are library books headed for the pulping machinery, so they keep a lot of worthy books in existence. Finally, they don't charge for shipping (unless you want to pay fifty cents for their "green" packaging), ever. New and used. This is not an ad, I have no relation to them at all--except as a customer. It's still best to shop locally, though, and I've "adopted" a progressive bookstore close to my town for that purpose. Local power is people power.
Might suggest to Amazon they pay the bookseller for the referral or allow the customer to purchase from the bookstore using their Amazon account. Customers could pay somewhere between the Amazon price and the bookstore price depending on the customer's finances and frame of mind. Possibly even pay extra as a token of appreciation. Potential partnership rather than canniballistic behavior.
Amazon won't be in such good shape if people reduce their reading because they never get to experience small bookstores and other peoples passions for books.
I've used Amazon's Canadian site for several years now. I was prompted to do so for a few reasons. My local bookstore had refused to order in sensitve material whereas Amazon obviously would. They also had some pretty incredible prices sometimes, charging literally 50% less on some titles carried by local vendors. I was a broke-ass student at the time and paying $50 for a title I could order for around $30 was hard to stomach. Now I'm a little more secure financially and have recently gone back to the local bookstore which is still going strong. The price difference is often only a couple bucks on a typical book, barring those which are for my hobby.
The financial reasons are a factor, but also my desire to strengthen my community. My local bookstore also acts as a venue for artists, musicians, and poets. They sell tickets to the live theatre in town which we buy season tickets for. In short, they are a part of the community which Amazon never will be. I did not know about their issues with Wikileaks; one more reason to feel good about supporting my local. It's out of my hands, but I do think my local occasionally buys directly from Amazon. They can get it online, mark it up 10-15%, sell it to me, give me my 5% loyalty rewards, and still make a profit. Too bad Amazon is still getting their cut...
alibris.com - alternate online - worldwide network of used bookstores. I have also found fairly recently published books, as well as a great many things that are
otherwise not available locally. I live over 30 miles from the nearest store, so
any time I can save driving is seriously considered. Deliveries are by mail,
which comes 6 days a week anyway. Prices range from .99 to several dollars, depending on age and condition, as well as quite a bit for first editions, and autographed copies. Search function works very quickly, and is accurate and comprehensive. I have no other interest beyond being a long-time customer.
Though I've been boycotting Wal*Mart and most big box and franchise outlets for decades, and am not happy with some of Amazon's policies (it seems that the bigger a corporation gets the uglier its tactics), I do the majority of my shopping on-line from Amazon - not just books but nearly everything I need (which is little, given my subsistence income).
While I prefer supporting local merchants who know how to take care of their customers, living in a rural area means driving long distances and contributing to global warming, pollution and fossil fuel depletion. It's much more efficient for UPS or FedEx to make one trip to deliver many packages than for me to get into my pick-up truck (needed for work) to drive to the nearest retail outlet.
In balance, I buy all my food from farmer's markets, the local health food store or the family-owned supermarket. And I buy all my gasoline from CITGO, which is owned by the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela (and was the only petroleum company to donate free heating fuel to low-income Americans).
There are no simple choices in this crazy world we've created. The late great environmentalist Donella Meadows once figured that using disposable plastic diapers was actually less ecologically damaging than buying, washing and bleaching cotton diapers (because of the heavy pesticide use on cotton, the volume of water needed to grow, manufacture and service it, and the amount of chlorine going into our water systems).
Yes it does appear more efficient for UPS to deliver you stuff than for you to drive to town. We should have the freedom to consider that option. But we should also have the freedom to consider a much much better option. First, does it make sense for the Wizard of Oz to have octopus tentacles slithering out to all corners of the land? Just had to paint an ugly picture of an ugly scenario. We'd rather have the people puttering around the countryside. Doesn't that seem more idyllic? News is that yes we CAN have an idyllic world! Yes, we CAN make it, thrive even, in an idyllic world. So we just make up our minds we're going to let that be the motivator that rolls us out of bed every morning and go to work. We're not working for anything less than our idyllic dream. So we build little villages around the countryside and each has a truck that goes to town for supplies, brings it back out to the village general store. People go to the village general store once a week, and go to the bigger town once a month. Normal stuff. Been going on for thousands of years all across the globe. It's called localism. Nothing new. Idyllic.
Underlining the Huffington Post's reportage of corporate crime is the very familiar liberal philosophy that goes something like this: Oh well! It's a crime but what are we going to do about it? We can't do a thing, and would we even want to restrict freedom in the land of the free?
Yes, let's restrict the freedom of godzilla monsters like Amazzon, Starbuks, Boeingg, and Micro$oft, all located around Seattle, monsters that specified OWNERSHIP of their respective markets is the thing to strive for. Another one is Intel operating out of Portland OR and Santa Clara CA. Amazing how monopoly thrives in such liberal places, ehh? I guess the people there could boycott the monopolist by denying it human labor? Oh then it would be tough to "make it" I guess.
Oh monopoly!
I guess Merkans could dream up something better. And it should be obvious. We want to keep the mom-n-pop brick-mortar shops. We want a society of small farmers, craftsmen and merchants. We want to melt down the monopolists. In their place we will have our networks to streamline our mom-n-pop shops. They will provide everything the monopolists now provide. You know Amazzon does provide communist central command for locating books. Our public libraries can do the same. I think you're getting it. Yes, public enterprise can do anything/everything that Micro$oft, et al, can do but for 1/5 the cost. You know it. So no excuse for not boycotting the west coast monopolists, eh? That will mess up their economies won't it? Now that's progress! (tough for liberalism, yes)
I use Amazon to read the reviews of products, then I go find them in a local store. I'd rather get a product in person if possible and support local business than to have to wait for it.
Amazon sells ISBN 9780852652398 - the book that spilled the State Department's dirty secrets.
Considering that most young people don't even read books any more, unless it's for school, Amazon is great. After my local bookstore, a few years ago, , had a clerk give me a blank stare when I asked for a copy of 1984 , I've done all my book shopping online. I'd much rather buy rare and hard to find books off Amazon, then go to my local bookstore and have to deal with a pop culture selection. But I'm sure me saying , plus the place I live now is FAR from any local bookstore, so its ether buy online or stop reading ...