If Google’s target is Amazon, watch out

Amazon Prime is like a club where you pay $79 a year, and all your qualifying Amazon purchases get free two-day shipping or one-day shipping for $3.99 per item. See related story on Wall Street Journal site .

This service is so convenient that many subscribers say they always check with Amazon before buying anything.

I could go into a longer exposition regarding the service and why it works for Amazon so well, but the idea itself has a checkered history. The overarching question: What’s up with Google doing this?

You have to wonder whether Google is planning to put up a branded online store. Investors can easily conclude this to be the case. The writing, in fact, has been on the wall for some time. Google GOOG -0.07% has long had a popular shopping engine originally branded as “Froogle.” That’s one clue. More...

12-04-2011 02:32