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posted by janrinok on Sunday November 13 2016, @11:03PM   Printer-friendly
from the we-just-want-your-money dept.

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.

Here's an article about it.


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  • (Score: 2) by FatPhil on Monday November 14 2016, @08:42AM

    by FatPhil (863) <pc-soylentNO@SPAMasdf.fi> on Monday November 14 2016, @08:42AM (#426464) Homepage
    The recent problems with the US economy have mostly been because of an excess of credit-based overconsumpton. Pay-to-play Prime encourages over-consumption, and Amazon also encourage use of their own credit card. Amazon are definitely encouraging the behaviour that is damaging to the economy. Would you call Peter Schiff "left wing"? As Peter Schiff was right (that's the name of a youtube vid, by the way, which addresses this topic).
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  • (Score: 2) by isostatic on Monday November 14 2016, @09:37AM

    by isostatic (365) on Monday November 14 2016, @09:37AM (#426474) Journal

    The people have to be able to make their own mistakes, it's a free country. If a company wants to give out credit, that's fine. If someone wants to take it, that's fine. If you want to sell your first born into indentured servitude, that's fine. It's a free country, and the public know best.

    • (Score: 2) by urza9814 on Monday November 14 2016, @09:12PM

      by urza9814 (3954) on Monday November 14 2016, @09:12PM (#426659) Journal

      ...and then when they give credit irresponsibly, the government is free to bail them out with our tax dollars!

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 15 2016, @12:29AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 15 2016, @12:29AM (#426760)

        What does it matter? Can't marry a cute young girl.