The Aardvark Speaks: It's official

March 09, 2005

It's official

Amazon wishlists are most useless thing on earth.

And that's because the following thing just happened to me yet again:

At some time in the past, I put an item on the wishlist.
Nobody buys it, of course.
At some point I want it, so I either order it from Amazon myself or start looking for it elsewhere, find it, and buy it.
I immediately delete the item from my wishlist.
A few days after I get the item, I get a parcel from Amazon with the very same item in it again, because somebody ordered it for me briefly before I deleted it.

This has happened to me four times now. Considering that I only ever got five items from my wishlist, this is a pretty disastrous rate.

Only once did the person who bought me the item pick one of the other items that are also on my wishlist. In all other cases I got the very one item that I chose to buy and just managed to get a day or so before.

Which proves that the people who buy me stuff from my wishlist are all pretty gifted psychics.

Anyway, to spoil my upcoming birthday, this has just happened again. And whether it's due to psychic abilities or to Murphy's Law, this is just ridiculous — and please don't get me wrong: this is not at all about spending £18 on a DVD that I could have got for free, it's because it would have been so great to get it as a birthday gift from my friends, and it just didn't work out that way.

So if anybody wants my duplicate copy of Raincoat, which could easily be the best Indian movie from 2004 [official site | Review], send me an e-mail, and in exchange for a couple of IPCs to cover for the postage, I'll mail it to you at no extra cost.

And from now on all I'll ever put on my wishlist is stuff that I don't really want. Just to be on the safe side.

Posted by Horst on March 9, 2005 04:59 PM to books & bookkeeping | Tell-a-friend

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Comments

laur said on March 9, 2005 06:59 PM:

Oh, c'mon, it's not that bad. Don't you know anyone who likes the same things you do, so you could give one as a gift? Don't see it as a profit and loss column issue. You should be flattered that someone picked your favorite item. If I were to choose something from your wish list, I would make damn sure you liked it enough to have bought it already.

Horst said on March 9, 2005 08:41 PM:

Yes I know, I was just so angry when I opened the box... I'm back to normal now.

dieter said on March 10, 2005 09:30 AM:

So you already found someone who takes your extra copy of Raincoat, or have you decided to keep it after all?

dieter said on March 10, 2005 10:40 AM:

Hey wait!
If I pick an item from your wishlist and order it for you, it does not get marked in some way, in order to prevent others from ordering the same item for you???
Even if I decide to order that item somewhere else, it would be a good idea if I could tick it off on your list (that, of course would require some form of identification...)
Maybe you should contact Amazon on this matter. They are said to be open for innovation whenever there is a comparatively way to increase customer satisfaction and thus sales.

Horst said on March 10, 2005 11:07 AM:

Unless you click an extra hidden link on the wishlist, you don't see which items have been ordered for you - apparently this is done on purpose so as not to spoil the surprise.

Also if you order something from Amazon, the item is not automatically removed from the wishlist, as theoretically you could be ordering a second copy or a copy for someone else.

Add to that the 4-6-week delay that can occur between somebody ordering an item for me and its actual delivery.

This means that I would have to remove the item from my wishlist 4-6 weeks before I buy it myself - and/or check the wishlist's hidden link on an almost daily basis for whether someone has bought me something. Since I only get about 1-2 items per year from the list, this is clearly not something I am constantly thinking about.

What really freaks me out is that this is a list of 8-10 items, and people always seem to pick the one item that I chose to buy myself. Either they know me better than I think or they're all psychics. Spooky.

As for the Raincoat DVD, I'm in negotiations with the people who bought it for me whether they want to return it to Amazon and collect a refund. Or I could try to sell it and give them the money back. Or buy a different DVD with the money.

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