Amazon's dominance allows it to misbehave

 As the dominant e-commerce behemoth, Amazon can misbehave and get away with it simply because it can.

It is increasingly unfriendly to customers:

  1. It has disabled comments for product reviews that often generated many meaningful discussions. This also prohibits vendors from responding to outrageous, absurd, or misleading reviews.
  2. It does not allow customers, including those who purchase on Amazon frequently, to review their purchased products unless they use a credit card to make purchases at an above-threshold frequency. Amazon gift cards are quite popular. Many people use them to make purchases without the need to use a credit card.
  3. It has shut down Amzaon customer discussion forums. 
  4. They mandate 1-click for Kindle book purchases. This is a hassle for many who use one account to make purchases for different purposes (e.g., business, personal) hence using different types of payments.
  5. They mandate the use of gift card balance if there is any for 1-click purchase. This again is a problem for many who use one account to make purchases for different purposes.
We should expect more such behaviors from Amazon in the coming years.

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