Maentwrog, Wales – I’ve always had a soft spot for Amazon. Perhaps too soft. I’m not ashamed to admit that I have purchased a number of items from the online megastore in the early hours of the morning when I was perhaps too, err, relaxed, to know better, only to find a day or so later that I already owned the CDs and DVDs that had just dropped onto the doormat.
It has occurred to me that Amazon should perhaps supply breathalysers for raddled old fools who buy half a dozen CDs on impulse when they’re tired and confused, so it was quite refreshing to discover today that someone at Amazon UK had obviously had a lengthy and enjoyable lunch and priced some 50 MP3 albums at 29 pence, or 47 cents in real money.
The bargain prices were particularly impressive given that individual tracks on the albums were still listed at 69p ($1.12) each, meaning a saving of almost twenty bucks on downloading each album.
Naturally, I felt compelled to see if the whole affair was a ghastly hoax and purchased five complete albums for the grand total of £1.45 ($2.36). Imagine my delight when the order was accepted and my downloads completed.
Sadly it would appear that whoever was responsible for the special offer has either sobered up or, more likely, been fired, so that the Led Zeppelin Mothership double album I bought for 47 cents is now priced at $14.64.
Of course, the great benefit of downloading the albums rather than having the CDs posted to me is that I already have the little suckers safe on my hard disk and Amazon can’t bleat that there had been an administrative error and ask me to pay more before shipping the product.
Don’t you just love internet shopping?
