I assume somewhere there's a team hitting their AI query KPI's due to this, but I really wish they'd shut off a few server racks and save everyone the annoyance instead.
I find this question very interesting and I want to predict where things will head. On one hand Amazon has a lot to lose by giving up control on how their website is used. Ideally they'd like to control the full end to end experience. What happens to the work they put in their UI? All those endless A/B experiments to make the buttons look perfect?
But on the other hand - this is where things are heading. They can't stop agents from using their website. Not for long. And they have a lot to gain because overall purchases will increase since. They can accept it and create a plugin and try to offer as much "branding" as possible inside it. Or they can completely go against agents and block it.
Then you have to wonder, what really is the moat here? Amazon's logistics and its relations with partners and customers (return policy etc) and the trust it brings. The UI part dissolves and is no longer important.
Maybe they want only an allowed list of agents access to Amazon? Maybe that's where things are heading? They sign deals with maybe just OpenAI (for example)? Its not like Amazon makes their own agent + model. I would hate it things fragment this much.
The everyday person is told to get over it and accept that AI is here so adapt or die. Companies start reducing headcounts to be replaced with AI. So now, a company is having to accept that people are using AI in ways they don't like so they should adapt or die as well too, right? I have no tears to shed if Amazon loses control. Also, it'll be one billionaire battling another billionaire at that point, and I'm kind of okay with that chaos. My world is no longer in my control so fuck 'em is my stance
This is just going to get worse before it gets better. More large sites are likely going to block or attempt to block agents because they're so reliant on ads for revenue or exploiting human psychology.
These orgs have a lot to lose. But the company? Not so much, they will make it up and more - agents are great to use.
And yes ads are hard to place because agents let you bypass all this and give you a nice filtered view of exactly what you need.
Where do you think the world will head? Maybe Amazon will sell their inventory for agents at a hefty API price?
I get it. It’s tempting and alluring. But no - reimagining something takes a lot more work than sticky taping an agent on. Impatiently waiting for all this agent stuff to fek off.
That's a main advantage of running your own local claw setup using your residential connection -- difficult/impossible to block.
That said, eventually a site blocking all agents would be like blocking all search engines, something that hurts more than it helps as agentic interactions become "the norm". WebMCP or similar support will likely be a basic expectation at some point.
There is, it’s called an API
Cloudflare for instance does allow indexing by Google and Bing I think by default, but does challenge other bots. Double check me I am speaking from memory.
The generally quoted return rate is 5% to 15% (and it varies by category). If Muse identified purchases are generating returns of 10% to 30%, then amazon is probably going to crack down on it. (Amazon Sellers pay from 30% to 50% for customer returns from their own pockets. https://medium.com/@myrealprofit/how-much-do-refunds-really-... )
No matter what I'll continue to use some AI agent and some shopping provider.
It’s clear why Amazon is doing this from a business perspective, but this is a stop gap for them. They will need figure out a better plan for people using their agents.
Does anyone have any meaningful use cases that have actually improved your life in some measurable way?
I’ve tried hard and beyond filling out some tedious forms in about the same time and energy as just doing it myself, I’ve not personally. I’ve tried hard. So I figure it’s probably my lack of creativity given the prevalence of fans. But every time I ask, I get no meaningful responses. So it makes me wonder if all the fans are just product managers on those products?
I hate having to work through random UI. I just wanna get stuff done.
We should see this improved version soon.
They just don't want to, because there's no ads. The human gets removed from the loop of visiting the site entirely. And it doesn't say Amazon all over it.
I’ve already used it to handle customer support request calls. I see 30+ minute hold+conversation times and generally the issue gets resolved. That is hugely empowering.
Something like declaring agents as representatives of consumers and blocking them violates ADA or just shouldn’t be allowed unless they are abusive.
Lacking that, it seems it’ll be an arms race between offense and defense. At some point, computer control probably wins (running my browser, on my computer, is pretty difficult to detect with reasonable f1 score)
majorchord•47m ago
Otherwise people could just use local agents on their own machine controlling their existing browser/logins as they likely already do, without issues.
JumpCrisscross•32m ago
esafak•26m ago
awongh•10m ago
I think the arguments for these kinds of near-monopoly companies being true market-driven capitalism seem more and more false.
The idea that Amazon will tell you that you don't even own the right to your own shopping experience tells you everything you need to know. Apple owns your device and Amazon owns the right to show you whatever price/product they want, regarless of your search intent.