Maybe some of have already seen this, but I hadn't seen it until it bit me in the ass today. Amazon is listing some of its standard products as Prime only, meaning only Prime members are allowed to buy it. Prime is an Amazon subscription service that gives you free 2-day shipping (to your local post office, not to your door), streaming services, and a bunch of other 'benefits'. They have gone to great lengths to push this $99 a year service on people, including delaying normal shipments and preventing you from buying what you want. I no longer qualify to reorder a SSD I bought last week since I'm not willing to become a member (nor can I try the 30 trial as I did that back when Prime was new). All that SSD research time wasted.
We were worried about net neutrality. It seems in the future we'll have to worry about subscribing to every store we want to do business with just to have the privilege of buying from them. I'll bet money within a couple years you won't qualify for sales like Cyber Monday unless you're a subscriber. I can easily see that spreading to every store: "Pay $10 at the door for big savings on all our in-store, on sale items." Stores used to give you discounts for going to them, now you'll have to pay for the honor of shopping there.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 13 2016, @11:49PM
This is stupid, and will bite them in the end. Forcing people into something they don't want never works well in the end. I can do my research on Amazon, and go buy it somewhere else. It is what people have already done to the big box stores, and this is an extension of that.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 14 2016, @02:10AM
Yeah, showrooming can cut both ways. I'm surprised nobody at B&N has figured that out; B&N should make it easy for shoppers to access online reviews on Amazon as well as their site, while providing the convenience of walking out the store with the books.
(Score: 2) by SanityCheck on Monday November 14 2016, @03:49AM
Likewise, a lot of physical retailers gripe that people come into the store, molest their merchandise, then take their phone out and order it on amazon. I am guilty of doing that myself.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday November 14 2016, @07:15PM
Forcing people into something they don't want never works well in the end.
Wrong.
Proof: Windows 10.