I like Amazon, but…

Updated on April 23, 2008 By Ken Begg 9 Comments

It helps that Amazon is a pretty good store in terms of easing my conscience when I flog them so much, but I have to admit, this consumer notice they sent me left me…unimpressed:

“We’ve noticed that customers who have purchased or rated The Marx Brothers Silver Screen Collection (The Cocoanuts / Animal Crackers / Monkey Business / Horse Feathers / Duck Soup) or other films in the Universal Studios Home Entertainment Boxed Sets category have also purchased Crossing Jordan: Season 1 on DVD. For this reason, you might like to know that Crossing Jordan: Season 1 will be released on May 6, 2008. You can pre-order yours at a savings of $17.99 by following the link below…”

I’m not saying there isn’t somebody who has bought both of those DVD sets, but I will admit, it doesn’t seem a natural match to me.

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  • fish eye no miko

    I think I know what it is. After the Marx Brothers thing, it says, “…or other films in the Universal Studios Home Entertainment Boxed Sets category…”

    And, looking at the specifications for Crossing Jordan on the IMDb, I see that one of the companies involved with it is… Universal! So I’m guessing a little company cross-promotion is going on here.

  • BeckoningChasm

    I think a lot of the Amazonian confusion (at least for my own account there) is that I sometimes buy gifts for folks via Amazon. Amazon doesn’t know that, so it assumes I want to buy everything I’ve ever “touched” there.

    IMDB is sometimes similarly affflicted, if you look at the “Movie Recommendations” at the bottom of an entry. I’ve seen some really, really strange matchings there–if you liked “Happy Gilmore,” you might like “Gremlins.” (A real life example.)

  • fish eye no mikof

    BeckoningChasm said : I think a lot of the Amazonian confusion (at least for my own account there) is that I sometimes buy gifts for folks via Amazon. Amazon doesn’t know that, so it assumes I want to buy everything I’ve ever “touched” there.

    Except I don’t think that this was just a recommendation on Amazon’s Page when he looked at it, this was an e-mail they sent him specifically saying, “Since you bought ‘X’, you might like ‘Y’.”

  • ericb

    The some of the things that Amazon “thinks I might like” are simply insane. It’s actually kind of amusing in a “how did they figure that” way. Marketing is a very strange science.

  • I’d appreciate the recommendations more if I were pointed to other books by the obscure and midlist authors I read rather than some big name author who writes in the same genre.

  • Roger H

    What happens to me is that someone will send me a link or I will see a link in a blog for some funny book title like “Animal Sex and other Hobbies” and then you will have that in your cache/cookies for a while with very odd recommendations that you have to explain to your wife.

    Don’t even get me started on Tivo recommendations.

  • PCachu

    Never missed Melrose Place
    or Lost in Space
    I’ve seen each Amazing Race
    and Without a Trace
    But I only watched Will & Grace
    one time, one day
    Wish I hadn’t, ‘cuz TiVo now thinks I’m gay

    Ah, Mr. Yankovic. Is there any situation for which you are not relevant? No; no, there is not.

  • I keep hoping to see something honest like “If you like Carrot Top’s ‘Chairman of the Board’ then you might like ‘Final Exit'” or “If you like ‘Little Nicky’ then you will watch almost anything”.

    I have yet to see a site honest enough to do that.

  • I once had Amazon recommend me the Indiana Jones trilogy. One of the purchases it cited was a book on references to homosexuality in the Bible. I don’t know.