[joshamania]

I don't see why so few people seem to understand that Amazon's key feature is as a payment processing facilitator. People don't shop at Amazon because they have the best deals or have the best logistics or whatever. They shop at Amazon because they can generally find almost anything on there and have it on its way within seconds. People use Amazon because they don't have to think about it. They don't have to get out their credit card or even think about credit/debit cards. It's so damn simple I really don't see how anyone else is really going to compete. The absolute number one reason I don't go to Amazon competitors to buy things is having to deal with payment processing (from a customer standpoint). The only time I don't use Amazon is that rare occasion when Amazon (or one of their "partners") doesn't have what I want.

[_rpd]

I disagree. Their core feature is rapid, reliable delivery of the ordered item. Other sites are cheaper than Amazon, but I don't trust them to actually deliver what I order in a timely manner.

When I do shop elsewhere, I don't mind entering payment details as long as I'm not required to save them (I don't trust most sites not to be hacked and leak my payment details). But if I ever get a delivery time over a week or a 'back ordered' status, I cancel the order immediately, because I know that they don't really have the item on hand and are just gambling that they can broker the sale at a profit. I've had merchants outright admit that they can't fulfill an order unless they can add some high margin accessories to an order. Not a game I'm interested in playing.

[hutzlibu]

Also returning things and knowing, that they deliver on time (mostly).

At a random online shop: are they trustworthy? do they really deliver on time? Are those reviews legit? etc. etc. Before I deal with that, I just order from Amazon. Convinience.

And yes, once you are in prime, you are even more bound and inclined to it.