Quote:
Originally Posted by axel77
Maybe I should patent a "one click patent registration", so people can patent ideas with one click only...
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If you can pull that off, you should patent it! (By the way: Where did it say the button was patented? The "Buy with 1-click" text is trademarked, but that's not the same thing as patenting the button process.)
This is a strange issue, given the power of search engines today: If you think about it, Amazon is really no more to the consumer than a search engine with a built-in pay feature; as the rest of the web is diversifying everything, Amazon is somehow concentrating buying to its one portal. And there's absolutely no reason it has to be that way.
Today, you can buy directly on most sites, or use PayPal or something similar at others (like mine). If you already have an account there, you can get service almost as simple as Amazon's 1-click system (which requires you to set up an account with Amazon... not exactly an abbreviated process in itself, and opening you to ID risks and targeted ads).
So let Amazon morph into the 800-pound gorilla on the selling island. It will only discover that it's not that hard for its customers, and retailers, to swim to the next island. And when Amazon discovers that it is losing accounts, maybe it will see the error in its ways.
Speaking for myself, I haven't been molested by Amazon yet... I'm too small a blip on their radar screen... but I'm not so desperate for their support that I would stick it out, no matter what. If they get too ugly for me, I'm gone.