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Amazon Offers 2-Day Shipping For $79/Year
stevejsmith writes "Amazon.com has announced their Amazon Prime service. For $79, you get free two-day shipping on all items, upgradeable to overnight shipping for $3.99 per item. The offer applies to most media (books, DVDs, CDs, etc.) and can be shared among "up to four family members living in the same household." Apparently the only way they will enforce this family-only sharing clause is by mandating that your "family members" know your birthday."
That's not a bad deal... I can see this being especially useful in university residences. Just get one person in the building to buy a membership and collect their $2 from everyone who wants to use it... and free shipping for the rest of the year!
I store my recipes online (the way nature intended)
The free shipping/$3.99 overnight is only available if you purchase directly from Amazon. i.e. it is not available if you purchase from third party Amazon Marketplace or zShops sellers.
For many items, Amazon is actually competing with third party sellers that are selling on their site. This new service might be the incentive necessary for many people to not buy from third party sellers, but to only buy from Amazon which will result in more money for them. That could be one of the reasons behind introducing Amazon Prime.
Exactly why this new service sounds like a waste of money to me. Regardless of what sort of shipping speed I select, it has always been my experience that Amazon ships when they're ready, and their projected dates often have no relationship to reality. I have even received items in the mail on the same day that I got an email from Amazon apologizing that they wouldn't be able to ship the item for some time. Whoever sends the emails that project shipping dates needs to communicate with the folks who are actually shipping stuff out the door.