This is my March 8, 2001 pitch to Jeff Bezos on why Amazon ought to offer web services. I'm uploading it now because I'm referencing it in my forthcoming book, WTF: What's the Future and Why It's Up To Us, due from Harper Business in October 2017, and want people to be able to take a look at it. This is of historical interest only.

1. Amazon.com’s Web
Services Opportunity
March 8, 2001

2. Amazon.com
• One of the most recognized brands of
the digital age
• World’s premier bookseller
• A key information service for the book
industry
• Leading player in other ecommerce
markets
• Gains market advantage from perception
as a leader and innovator

3. Amazon as an Information
Service for the Publishing
Industry
• Has replaced Books in Print as the
most widely-used source of
bibliographic information
• Descriptions, Covers, TOCs and
other rich cataloging data
• Ranks and user recommendations
provide unique added value

4. Other Information Assets
• Alexa
• Internet Movie Database
• …
Already Amazon is used as an
information resource as much as
an e-commerce platform.

5. Web Services
• “The network is the computer”
• XML interfaces provide
programmatic APIs to web-facing
databases
• Innovation will come from APIs
that support “unintended
consequences” not vendor lock-in
• XML-RPC and SOAP the
emerging standards

6. O’Reilly’s Premises
• “The future is here. It’s just not widely
distributed yet.” - William Gibson
• Innovations show up first in the
“hacker” community as independent
developers push the boundaries of new
technology
• “Screen scraping” is a precursor to
widespread web services
• A platform strategy beats an
application strategy every time

7. Possible Web Services
Opportunities for Amazon
• Market Research
• Amazon-enabled library catalogs
• Programmatic purchasing - a next
generation affiliates program
• B2B integration with suppliers
• “Cool” consumer services to build
brand - e.g. bibliography
generator

8. The O’Reilly AmaBooks
Service
• Publisher market research
interface to Amazon database
• Internal O’Reilly project; other
publishers have similar projects
• Opportunity to generalize this tool
and sell to publishers
• Amazon could do this, or could be
an Amazon/O’Reilly joint venture

9. Other Amazon Screen
Scrapers
Search Engines
Public Rank Spiders
• http://bibliotrack.com
• http://www.amazonscan.com
• Many private efforts (O’Reilly, AW, etc.)
Price Finders
• http://www.isbn.nu
• http://books.langenberg.com/
• http://www.bestwebbuys.com/books/
• http://www.addall.com/
• http://www.bublos.com/
Many other specialized programs

10. Screen Scraping vs. SOAP
• Amazon web page for
Programming Perl: 68,000 bytes
• SOAP response for data we
actually need: 700 bytes
• 1000 titles: HTML 24,000,000
bytes, SOAP 8000 bytes

11. The BookScan/BN Service
• Publisher access to BN/Borders
sales data
• Subscription fee from $1500 to
$75,000/year
• Publisher sales figures only; none
of the industry trend insight of an
amaBooks type service
• We could do much better!

12. Amazon-Enabled Library
Catalogs
• Dozens of vendors offer library
card cataloging systems
• None have the power/flexibility of
the Amazon interface
• An API would allow those
vendors “powered by Amazon” to
deliver a superior product
• License revenue to Amazon, plus
brand reinforcement

13. Public APIs for Web
Services
• Establishes Amazon as a platform
for community innovation
• Affiliate-like self-service setup
gets a web services client id
• 1000 free queries/day allows
experimentation and open source
development
• Higher-usage services pay for
access

14. The O’Reilly-Amazon
Partnership
• Prototype interesting
services
• Fund and spin out those that
aren’t core to Amazon or
O’Reilly
• Have fun
• Build our brands and
reputations as innovators

15. Benefits
• Establishment of standards
• Brand Extension
• Revenue
• Internal excitement
• PR & goodwill

16. What Would I like Now?
• Commitment to a Public SOAP
API
• Help publicizing the bottom-up
web services idea (e.g. Amazon
programming contest, keynote at
open source conference?)
• Indication of interest in
commercializing AmaBooks

17. What Else Should We Do?
• Keep involving open source and
other independent developers in
building the next generation
Amazon
• Keep in better touch about ways
O'Reilly and Amazon can work
together
• Build relationships with other key
internet companies like Google