Changes to Amazon's Affiliate program, and how it affects us

[taustin]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

It is up to them how they spend their money. Entirely. But by the same token, I (and my browser) am under under no obligation to be their personal bagman in their transactions with their affiliates.

When you buy something from Amazon, you have explicitly agreed to their policies. If you don't like their policies, take your business elsewhere. Otherwise, you agreed to their policies.

[DiapDealer]

When you buy something from Amazon, you have explicitly agreed to their policies. If you don't like their policies, take your business elsewhere. Otherwise, you agreed to their policies.

Wait a sec. Where exactly did I agree to not remove affiliate codes from external URLs linking to products for sale on their website? By doing so, I'm not violating their ToS or any of their policies. I defy you to prove to me that I agreed to not remove affiliate codes from external URLs linking to products for sale on Amazon's website. To suggest that such a policy exists and that I have explicitly (or implicitly) agreed to it is utterly frickin' ridiculous. I don't need to take my business elsewhere, because cookie-blocking and URL editing isn't covered anywhere in any of their policies. Because such policies couldn't possible be enforced practically or upheld legally.

[latepaul]

Originally Posted by taustin

Then you should probably avoid doing business with Amazon. Or pretty much anyone else on the internet. Ever.

I think you misunderstood. I didn't say "I won't ever share personal data" I said "I get to decide".

Also the personal data in question is not my billing details but my browsing history via cookies. Not that I'm particularly bothered about that but I was responding to this ridiculous idea that an affiliate passing information about me via a file on my computer to Amazon is somehow nothing to do with me.

[taustin]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Wait a sec. Where exactly did I agree to not remove affiliate codes from external URLs linking to products for sale on their website? By doing so, I'm not violating their ToS or any of their policies. I defy you to prove to me that I agreed to not remove affiliate codes from external URLs linking to products for sale on Amazon's website. To suggest that such a policy exists and that I have explicitly (or implicitly) agreed to it is utterly frickin' ridiculous. I don't need to take my business elsewhere, because cookie-blocking and URL editing isn't covered anywhere in any of their policies. Because such policies couldn't possible be enforced practically or upheld legally.

I didn't say you couldn't, or shouldn't, play whatever games you want with cookies or URLs. Quite the contrary. If, as you say, their policies don't say you can't, then you have - as I implied - agreed to nothing concerning cookies or URL editing. If you buy using their cookies or affiliate URLs, then you have explicilty agreed to their policies, and have nothing to complain about.

[taustin]

Originally Posted by latepaul

I think you misunderstood. I didn't say "I won't ever share personal data" I said "I get to decide".

I understood perfectly.

Originally Posted by latepaul

Also the personal data in question is not my billing details but my browsing history via cookies. Not that I'm particularly bothered about that but I was responding to this ridiculous idea that an affiliate passing information about me via a file on my computer to Amazon is somehow nothing to do with me.

If you think it's up to you whether or not Amazon, or any other web site, does whatever the hell they want with that information once they have it, including sell it to every spammer on the planet if they so choose, you have a very imperfect understanding of how the internet works.

You cannot do business with them without coughing up certain information. The only part of that information that they are restricted in what they can do with it (beyond their own policies, subject to change at any time, per those policies) is the credit card number. Other than that, it's their information, and if they decide tomorrow to sell it to the vilest, sleasiest telermaketer on the planet, there isn't much you can do about it. And damned little even people willing to spend six or seven figures on lawyers can do about it after the fact.

I will never cease to be amazed at how anyone could possibly have ever thought that there was any privacy on the internet. The moment you send a one or a zero across someone else's wires, it's not private any more.

[BuddyBoy]

Originally Posted by jalandar

Yeah, I can think of a few sites like this, exercising no editorial control. I get why amazon would want to shut them down. In my experience, readers prefer sites that exert some editorial control, rather than listing quantity without regard for quality.

Um, not to be snarky (well maybe a little bit ), but you mentioned your own blog "recommends" 9 to 18 books a day. 63 to 126 a week.

Quality over quantity? I'm a speed reader and i don't think i could make anywhere near a third of that number in "quality" recommendations.

[jalandar]

Originally Posted by BuddyBoy

Um, not to be snarky (well maybe a little bit ), but you mentioned your own blog "recommends" 9 to 18 books a day. 63 to 126 a week.

Quality over quantity? I'm a speed reader and i don't think i could make anywhere near a third of that number in "quality" recommendations.

A rating of quality doesn't have to come from reading every book.

It comes from looking at reviews and ratings sometimes, for both the current book, or if the book is also a new release, at the author's other works.

That 9-18 comes from an initial group of hundreds.

This as opposed to the sites that just post every book they can find, or use automation tools to write their posts for them without exerting any editorial control.

But no longer. Can't afford to risk the rest of my amazon income. And I'm going to have to be very careful about promoting books at all until I can get a good grip on the new reports and the trends. In fact, I'm kinda concerned that I'll have to spend so much time watching these trends, that it will end up not being worth the time at all.

[latepaul]

Originally Posted by taustin

I understood perfectly.

Apparently not as you spend most of your post arguing against a point I'm not making. You're talking about whether I have any control over what Amazon do with my info once they've got it, I was talking about not letting them have it in the first place. Remember this was in the context of people choosing to use programs like Ghostery, blocking cookies and stripping URLs of affiliate info.

[soulfuldog]

Many thanks for the info on where the details were on the eReaderIQ site. One of the first pages I tried was the "About Us" page but didn't notice that little bit at the bottom....

Which is why I will no longer be using the links for that site. They should be far more up front about it, it should be made clear, not listed in small text at the bottom of one page. As previously mentioned I use a well known (in the UK) money saving website and am happy to click on the links that earn them money because they are very up front about it. I'd also be happy to use something like arcadata's posts in the deals, freebies forum here, because it's obvious it's an affiliate link.

[taustin]

Originally Posted by latepaul

Apparently not as you spend most of your post arguing against a point I'm not making. You're talking about whether I have any control over what Amazon do with my info once they've got it, I was talking about not letting them have it in the first place. Remember this was in the context of people choosing to use programs like Ghostery, blocking cookies and stripping URLs of affiliate info.

Does Amazon's shopping cart even work without cookies?

And you still can't buy anything from them without giving them plenty of personal information, like your credit card number.

[copyrite]

Originally Posted by jalandar

In fact, I'm kinda concerned that I'll have to spend so much time watching these trends, that it will end up not being worth the time at all.

How's that Dire Straits song go?

[jalandar]

Originally Posted by copyrite

How's that Dire Straits song go?

The book blog has mostly been a labor of love about something I was passionate about. I earned enough off of it to justify the time I spent on it versus other things I could be doing with that time in my workday to earn more income, but with that source of income now looking like it will be significantly less, it is going to be hard to justify to myself.

Anyone who thinks this is about "money for nothing" is just plain ignorant about the level of work involved, and probably needs to educate themselves before posting to just sound witty without being accurate.

[JoHunt]

never mind

[copyrite]

Originally Posted by jalandar

The book blog has mostly been a labor of love about something I was passionate about. I earned enough off of it to justify the time I spent on it versus other things I could be doing with that time in my workday to earn more income, but with that source of income now looking like it will be significantly less, it is going to be hard to justify to myself.

Anyone who thinks this is about "money for nothing" is just plain ignorant about the level of work involved, and probably needs to educate themselves before posting to just sound witty without being accurate.

IMO the mostly labor of love isn't a labor of love anymore if you have to justify continuing because you have to do more work to make what you were making before Amazon made this change.

I have no problem clicking on a link with an affiliate code in it which clearly you took the time to code (or globally copied and pasted), *if* I choose to purchase from you. If I then choose to purchase a Kindle it would be nice to see a message that says "Hey ya know you're still putting $$ in Joe Blow's pocket?". That's what I perceive as the nothing part. I think most folks assume you're making a profit only on the coded link, not on additional purchases. I'm sure this thread has been eye-opening for some readers.

[jalandar]

Originally Posted by copyrite

IMO the mostly labor of love isn't a labor of love anymore if you have to justify continuing because you have to do more work to make what you were making before Amazon made this change.

I have no problem clicking on a link with an affiliate code in it which clearly you took the time to code (or globally copied and pasted), *if* I choose to purchase from you. If I then choose to purchase a Kindle it would be nice to see a message that says "Hey ya know you're still putting $$ in Joe Blow's pocket?". That's what I perceive as the nothing part. I think most folks assume you're making a profit only on the coded link, not on additional purchases. I'm sure this thread has been eye-opening for some readers.

Frankly, I think you want to know info that has no bearing on you and your relationship with the merchant.

The merchant is the one who made the terms.

They want raw traffic, and have decided to pay that way. And they still do want that, despite the new policy, just something is going on with regard to ebooks that we have all still not completely figured out. They still are allowing us to link to free mp3s, prime videos, and the ever popular "odd items no one will buy" method to send raw traffic to amazon and get paid for indirect purchases in exchange for funneling the raw traffic to them.

They know that the more raw traffic they get, the higher the amount of purchases people make there.

You have no "right" to know all the details of the relationship between amazon and the websites. And in fact, the ONLY time you do at all is when the website in question is making a recommendation. And that doesn't require the full depth of disclosure you seem to think you have a right to. I run another website referring people to professional service providers in a couple industries I work with in this region. I disclose on the site, that the service providers who will be answering their inquiries pay our site to receive those referrals. Do we do it in BIG LETTERS right next to every link? No. Do we detail the half a dozen different ways these providers may be compensating us? No, the details are not relevant to the customer, only to us, providing the referral service, and to the companies who contract with us for these referrals. The customer has no need to know if that payment it us is one time, or will be based on all their future billings with the company as well (and we have referral agreements that work both of those ways). The company consider the payments the "cost of customer acquisition" and we keep our fees so that they are competitive and in fact usually less than the company's costs of customer acquisition via other traditional means.

But the customer doesn't know, or need to know, those details. Either they find they like the company that their inquiry was referred to, and became a customer, or they didn't, and moved on. All of the specific details of how we get paid for those referrals are none of their business, and have no impact on their relationship with the service provider as a customer.

What amazon pays an affiliate, and under what terms, should be no concern of yours. Where we are required to disclose it to you, to comply with transparency laws, we do, as amazon providers. But that doesn't mean we have to reveal each and every way in which amazon may make the compensation to us for getting your eyeballs on their site.