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One of the reasons why I bought a Kindle once I'd decided to get an ereader was because it was an Amazon product. Of course Amazon isn't my friend, but it provides useful services.
When I moved to a non-anglophone country in the 1980s, I wanted to be able to go on buying English books. At that time I had an account with Blackwells, whom I had known since my undergraduate days as the bookshop for Oxford university (They are also academic publishers). I sent cheques and orders to Blackwells and eventually got back parcels of books. When I was in England I sometimes went into Blackwells in Oxford and looked at books or paid money into my account. Eventually, Blackwells decided to go onto the internet and they made a real mess of it (I expect by now they have it sorted out, but that was then, sometime in the 1990s). I got very fed up and decided to try Amazon. There was no comparison. Amazon were smooth and efficient and I have found them to be very reliable. I would say that OTW the Amazon experience is good for customers.
I would prefer not to be locked in with the Kindle, but on the plus side, I don't think the ebook market would be booming the way it is without Amazon's intervention. The Kindle effect is huge. Since I acquired mine in August last year, many more back titles have been added and it seems more and more common for newly published books to be available in e-format as well as dt-format.
That may well be due to Amazon's finding ebook business easier that dt. But whatever the reason, it benefits ebook readers, even ones who read only in ePub.
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