Amazon has a patent to keep you from comparison shopping while you’re in its stores June 16, 2017, Washington Post
For anyone who still thinks something called "a free market" exists, in this corporate-controlled world, check out the latest brainchild of the controllers:
Amazon has a patent to keep you from comparison shopping while you’re in its stores
June 16, 2017, Washington Post
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/innovations/wp/2017/06/16/amazon-has-a-patent-to-keep-you-from-comparison-shopping-while-youre-in-its-stores/?utm_term=.5f47e9940224
As grocery shoppers work to digest Amazon’s massive acquisition of Whole Foods for $13.7 billion, the digital storefront recently scored a victory that aims to reinforce the company’s growing investments in brick-and-mortar retail. Amazon was awarded a patent May 30 that could help it choke off a common issue faced by many physical stores: Customers’ use of smartphones to compare prices even as they walk around a shop. But Amazon now has the technology to prevent that type of behavior when customers enter any of its physical stores and log onto the WiFi networks there. Titled “Physical Store Online Shopping Control,” Amazon’s patent describes a system that can identify a customer’s Internet traffic and sense when the smartphone user is trying to access a competitor’s website. When that happens, Amazon may take one of several actions. It may block access to the competitor’s site, preventing customers from viewing comparable products from rivals. It might redirect the customer to Amazon’s own site or to other, Amazon-approved sites. It might notify an Amazon salesperson to approach the customer. Or it might send the customer’s smartphone a text message, coupon or other information designed to lure the person back into Amazon’s orbit.
I couldn't read the linked post because it doesn't like my adblocker. As you've described it, it doesn't keep you from comparison shopping at all, it keeps you from comparison shopping using Amazon's property, i.e. the free wifi they give you. You can still use cellular service or another wifi to do your comparisons. It seems pretty reasonable to me that if you're in an Amazon brink and mortar store, and you're using their wifi, they can control what websites you're allowed to see. Don't like it, thanks to the free market, you can use another provider for internet connectivity, or you can shop somewhere else.
Thanks for your input, Infinite-monkey, and I have followed you. While your observation is strictly literally true, I would point out #1 that as a tactic it is dishonest and rather implies that Amazon cannot fairly compete and therefore must stack the deck. #2 But even more importantly, honoring what our time-span experience has been for many years in such corporate actions - especially since corporations were given rights as humans - is that this is the leading edge of what might well become a far more invasive control in this and related activities. Just sayin"... we as a society need to learn from experience and improve our learning curve if we are to hang onto what is left of our freedoms and actions.