BOC: HW: Amazon Deal

[Jon Jarrett]

On Wed, 24 Nov 2004, M Holmes wrote, of Amazon:

> Apart from them being unable to find one thing (not a book) that I
> ordered, I've been a happy bunny. I was also worried when they took over
> Bibliofind, which I used to use, but their "Find it Used" service has
> proved pretty damn good also. The only trick is having to compile orders
> so that I don't have to pay postage.

        I was working in second-hand bookselling when Amazon took over
Bibliofind, and my impression then was that they had no idea what to do
with it. Bibliofind had been a useful little provider which often stocked
stuff that other people didn't have, and initially any search you did in
it through Amazon, if it failed, dumped you out at the main Amazon search
page which looked a lot as if they were trying to route second-hand buyers
to buy new stuff instead. Odd, because the margins are higher on
second-hand stuff, but perhaps not for Amazon. However they seem to have
picked up on the reseller model now and are also, because of this, on
the music side of things, the only place other than Gemm I can find a lot
of stuff I currently want. Gemm has never inspired me with confidence, and
I still have the prejudices against Amazon I inherited from my old jobs,
so this is causing me difficulties. But on the other hand, it also stops
me spending money... Yours,
                            Jon

ObCD: The Heads - _Undersided_ (and so should you all be, it's great)
--
                Jonathan Jarrett, Birkbeck College, London
    jjarrett at chiark.greenend.org.uk/ejarr01 at students.bbk.ac.uk
  "As much as the vision of the blind man improves with the rising sun,
       So too does the intelligence of the fool after good advice."
       (Bishop Theodulf of Orleans, late-eight/early-ninth century)