Amazon and Affiliates
Summer of 1998, briefly, I was held hostage — against my will — for my own good. Health issue. I recall about three of the ten days in the hospital, and the singular other event?
Horrific urination competition with then nascent Amazon’s putative “customer service” that was not responding, and not responding well, to me.
I won, but out of sheer stubbornness. It took almost two more years until I realized that Amazon wasn’t going away, and the affiliate program was a viable option for my great love of books.
Books were my Amazon gateway drug.
Amazon is accused of being a predatory retailer. Apparently, the old way of publishing — the way books were sold and distributed — apparently, Amazon has severely disrupted that pattern.
- The old ways die hard.
As an amusing side bar item, the code of “online” writing is super-dead-simple for me because it resembles the old typesetting code used in archaic newspaper systems, a distant, remanent memory of mine.
Amazon sells just about everything. While I’ll occasionally link to other items, like talismans and amulets, my primary reason for using the Wal-Mart of Cyberspace? Books.
Which is even more weird, as I really don’t like Kindle, much preferring Apple’s native iBooks as a seriously superior product, still Kindle started the eBook “revolution,” like Honda and Toyota ‘hybrids.’ Honda came first, but Toyota’s Prius became the standard.
I “published” electronically long before eBooks became popular.
My online Kindle sales are discouragingly low. Still, over time, it could add up.
Even if Amazon is a predatory retailer? As both a customer and an affiliate, I’ve discovered I appreciate the way their business runs. It treats me well.
Most amusing reference to Amazon lately?
“2003 (or 2005) was the last time there was human editing on Amazon’s home page.”
Welcome to the machine? We are your overlords, now?
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“…passed out on the living room floor with bagpipes and a Viking helmet.”
- Excerpt From: Dorsey, Tim. Florida Roadkill. HarperCollins.
“A gray-haired man behind the anchor desk reported near tragedy at a state motor vehicle office, where a man who had failed the eye exam pulled a gun and fired fifteen shots at the staff, hitting nobody.”