UPDATE – 16th August 2015 – Great new New York Times article:

Inside Amazon: Wrestling Big
Ideas in a Bruising Workplace

The company is conducting an experiment in how far it can push
white-collar workers to get them to achieve its ever-expanding ambitions.

And reaction in Forbes:

How People Who Work for Amazon Really Feel

gawker.com has published a series of whistle-blower articles exposing the darkness at the heart of Amazon.    These are hugely important articles, but seem to have received very little media “oxygen”.    The revelations are important information for all Amazon customers.

• 60 Minutes Decided To Stop Blowing Amazon
• Amazon Thinks a Guy Who Bought a Scale Is Definitely a Drug Dealer
• Amazon and the Squeezing of the Middle Class
• Amazon Is a Time Thief, by an Amazon Employee
• Inside Amazon’s Bizarre Corporate Culture
• Amazon Insiders Tell the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
• “I Do Not Know One Person Who Is Happy at Amazon”
• Working at Amazon Is “a Soul-Crushing Experience”
• At Amazon, Even the Part-Timers Are Miserable
• Amazon Deserves All of Its Bad PR
• Let’s Boycott Amazon! Now Where Do We Buy Stuff?
• To Get a Zappos Job, You Have To Spend Months On Its Social Network
• “Mad Prime” Stephen Colbert Enlists In the Boycott of Amazon
• Amazon Workers Will Not Be Paid For All Their Time At Work
• Christmas At Amazon: One Man’s Story

These articles, in combination with my own first-hand interactions with the company have convinced me that Amazon‘s corporate culture is sociopathic, with no concern for the negative impacts on the lives of their employees and on society as a whole.  I interviewed at Amazon Vancouver, which is what made me realize the horrors within.  I didn’t know before that.  Individuals who have any moral backbone must acknowledge that Amazon should be shunned and boycotted in response to what we now know about them.

I will never work for Amazon.    I will never again give my tacit approval of their behavior by being their customer, no matter how convenient their services may be.  There are alternative service providers.   I have returned my Kindle Fire HD tablet.   I am seeking to convert my previous Kindle eBook purchases into open formats.

Some things are much more important than money.  Amazon have crossed a line in the sand for me, and I will not be silent and complicit in the face of such appalling business practices.

(There are the PERSONAL OPINIONS of Bob Summerwill, and should not be taken to reflect the position of his employer).