
Amazon’s first bookstore in New York City sucks the joy out of buying books - prakashk
https://qz.com/990164/amazons-first-bookstore-in-new-york-city-sucks-the-joy-out-of-buying-books/
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Cpoll
> The shelves are tidy, because the books are placed with their covers facing
> out

Spine-out doesn't facilitate browsing, so I can't see why this is a bad thing.
More books doesn't equate more options or a better experience.

> and prominently featuring the opinions of exemplary randos.

Fantastically dismissive, but the book buyer is also a "rando," so it's a
useful metric.

> The store selection is populist, elevating aggregate user ratings; the
> author’s name is, notably, the smallest thing on each card.

The only problem I see is that it doesn't need to be there at all. It's
prominently featured on the cover of the actual book, right above the card.

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PhantomGremlin
They've had one of these stores for a while at the Washington Square mall in a
suburb of Portland Oregon. I entered it exactly once.

As you walk in the first thing you see is a sign that says, more or less: "all
books are list price unless you're an Amazon Prime member". Which is not
something that influences me in a positive way. They're basically saying I
need to pay them $99/year to shop there.

Not that I'd want to shop there. I just don't see the point. As this article
notes, there is very very little physical inventory. You can play with
Kindles. Maybe that's the point?

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toomuchtodo
Window shop at amazon store, buy on walmart.com (which now has free shipping
over $35 with no membership). Oh how the tables have turned!

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TillE
> clutter that mirrors Amazon’s own site

Amazon has never managed to come anywhere close to the joy and value of
accidental discovery that you can have from browsing the categorized shelves
at a well-stocked bookstore, or better yet a university library. They've never
even really tried as far as I can tell, so I guess it's not a surprise that
their attempt at a physical bookstore would miss one of its biggest
advantages.

