> Amazon also had your entire purchasing history, and its servers could instantly compute recommendations you would be likely to accept.
I wish. I have long been surprised at how poor Amazon recommendations are given that they have a large pool of actionable data: things I have actually purchased. What else could be a stronger signal?
I have even informed them which purchases not to use as a basis for recommendations, or when recommendations they have made are not interesting (at least, those that are made from my page while signed in, no ability to do so with the emails they send).
I preorder plenty of technical books, so Amazon could easily suck more money out of me if they kept me informed on up and coming books by authors I have purchased from, or in the specific area I purchase in. Instead, I seem to get weekly emails about the latest "popular" books in a very general area (e.g. programming).
Yeah, I have a long purchasing history of sci-fi novels. But then I buy a book about UX and another about value investing, suddenly my recommendations are all replaced by Warren Buffet and web design books...
Sci-fi novels are an area where I need a large amount of discoverability to find new authors - recommendations are very useful. Not so much when I break my trend and buy a stock market textbook.
Sure there is, in the top left there is a link for "<your name>'s Amazon", click that, then in the toolbar in the middle click "Improve your recommendations". You'll get a list of all your purchases with a checkbox by each one to disregard it.
Sure, it was Don't Make Me Think by Steve Krug. Quite good, although just a basic short intro book on web usability. I'm generally hopeless at design, so it's given me quite a few ideas. Namely remove 80% of the wall of text on my site!
I've also picked up The Design of Everyday Things by Donald A. Norman. Haven't got around to reading it yet as it's not about the web, more just everyday design and usability, but it came highly recommended.
I wish. I have long been surprised at how poor Amazon recommendations are given that they have a large pool of actionable data: things I have actually purchased. What else could be a stronger signal?
I have even informed them which purchases not to use as a basis for recommendations, or when recommendations they have made are not interesting (at least, those that are made from my page while signed in, no ability to do so with the emails they send).
I preorder plenty of technical books, so Amazon could easily suck more money out of me if they kept me informed on up and coming books by authors I have purchased from, or in the specific area I purchase in. Instead, I seem to get weekly emails about the latest "popular" books in a very general area (e.g. programming).