You rang?

Missed out a word, that should say " including the latitude and longitude . . ."

There is an easy solution do not shop on Amazon

Except for my Kindle - and I download little onto that from them - everything they offer is usually available on for the same price from the same suppliers on ebay or countless other sites.

Amazon provide me with a very useful catalogue to check things out, before I go to anther site to make my purchase.

I highly recommend Waterstones for books.

Here's another vote for Waterstones, I use them all the time. A clear easy to use website without irritating ads popping up all the time.
I don't look on Amazon, and I find the door bell information in Elegran's post alarming, but not surprising somehow.

I love Waterstones but we don’t have one anywhere near us and it’s quite a trip into the city centre. I have very little spare time as it is and Amazon is just so convenient when i can have something delivered to home or work at no extra cost.

I have often worried about those doorbell thingies. My DS has one .

If you want "The Mirror and the Light" you will pay £12.50 at Amazon but £18.00 at Waterstones.

I would rather buy from an independent, personally, but I don't have one nearby any more. For books I struggle to buy the ones I want at Amazon comparable prices.

Just as many people can't do all their shopping at Waitrose, not everyone can afford to buy all the books they want at Waterstones.

The doorbell issue is something else.

Having watched the Panorama programme the other week, I very much doubt if I will be buying from Amazon in the future.
I must admit that the reason I shopped from them in the first place was mainly because a lot of the items they sold were cheaper than in many shops or they had items that you either couldn't find anywhere else or would have to travel a fair distance to buy it
But over time, I find that they are no longer the cheapest, now they have disposed of most of the record shops and independent book shops and even some clothes shops. Items sold in their marketplace are more often than not cheap trash from China (that you often don't realise are from there until it takes 6 weeks to get to you, despite stating would be with you in 3 days according to the order system) . I am also sick and tired of being bombarded with demands to pay per month to get "free" delivery! When you pay £8 per month it's not free !
My account is now closed - the thought that (if I had a Ring doorbell) they can track each time the bell or app is used, fills me with horror - no guarantee that no one will hack into the system is there?

I needed a new kettle at the weekend and discovered that once I had added postage on Amazon was the most expensive. I went to a local hardware shop and bought it cheaper than anywhere else.

Gillybob Waterstones, like Amazon, is available online.

Conspiracy theories are still alive and well then....I have nothing to hide so don’t ‘fear’ Amazon...I.D.Cards.... my Sainsbury’s /Tesco loyalty cards.... all of them know of my predisposition for semi-skimmed milk, Warburtons bread ...and Amazon definately knows I’m an avid reader, and listener to audible( or could that be sending me secret messages/signals)...time to get out the tin foil hats folks.

....oh and doesn’t Gransnet have it’s share of pop-ups

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

It occurs to me that the data Amazon collect have might be useful to the police if a crime occurs associated with the property. That is, if Amazon gives them access to the info!

I don't think Gransnet pop-ups have your geographical co-ordinates, Saggi. Those are sent to the Amazon database from the doorbell technology bought from them by customers who were not aware that they would be recorded.

Your IP address is available to anyone that you send an email to and from that your geographical address can be easily looked up.

I like the fact that adverts are relevant to what I am interested in.

You made me laugh Saggi, particularly as when I opened this thread I got a pop up asking me to agree to all the people my information would be shared with (I went in and selected 'reject all'). My life is an open book but I won't be buying anything from any ad that pops up uninvited on my computer so why waste their time!

As all my pop ups on Gransnet are Flemish I will assume it is geographical. I was just remined of a Political Forum here, which I am already attending so they must be checking my emails somehow too.

I am a self confessed Amazon nut, Alexa is my best friend, I am family hub for delivery of on line orders.
Example , study guides for GCSE /A level bookshop 7-10 days Amazon next day ,one of my favourite things is we have a classic motorhome do 26/30 day trip around UK love fresh coffee use the bags when travelling carry 30at a time order get delivered to there pick up point /lockers , going into next and picking up coffee always a bit of fun

It’s very easy to hide or change your IP address. All you need is a VPN (virtual private network).

A VPN will switch your IP address by virtually placing you in a different location. When you use a VPN, your internet traffic is routed through an encrypted tunnel so that no one, not even your ISP, can see what you’re doing online.

I'm virtually housebound, I can only get out of house on days I'm well enough to go out and if there's someone to push my wheelchair for me and those can only be short shopping trips, I don't have the energy to browse, comparing prices when I am out. I use Amazon Prime, I wouldn't dream of buying an Alexa or anything along those lines, we won't even have a smart meter installed but we have nothing to hide, we just appreciate privacy inside our home. Having said that Sky know quite a lot about the kind of programmes we enjoy, they possibly can even deduce at what time I go to bed, our greengrocer/specialist grocer knows when we're being good and eating wholesome foods or if we're straying by ordering lovely biscuits not easily obtainable elsewhere, everyone collects data about their customers. I'll continue to use Amazon, I've had some great bargains from them, I've ordered something today that will arrive with my daughter tomorrow and some items I've ordered have even arrived the same day, something I find absolutely wonderful. For some of us it's a godsend, I also use mine for Amazon to donate to a charity with each purchase I make. The television programmes are pretty good too, all in all I think paying £79 a year to have everything I order delivered without extra delivery payment (I only buy Prime delivery products), and a wide choice of television viewing pretty good value for money. I've been using it for years and never been disappointed plus I can do my shopping without someone else seeing exactly what I'm buying, there's very little privacy for attendant type wheelchair users when out shopping.

I don't think it is just Amazon by any means.

Any technology these days has access to your life even your living room and bedroom, be it hearing or seeing.

Baby monitors, TV's, whats app, Apple...to name but a few.

I was alerted to Amazon last Christmas and from now on will be very cautious what I buy. I bought an alcoholic drink for a friend's Christmas present which was the first time I had done so on line. The reason for this was I hadn't seen the product elsewhere and it was reasonably priced from a good supplier. Obviously for alcohol you need picture ID which I perfectly understand. When delivered I took my passport to the door half thinking he'll not bother looking as I definitely look over 25yrs. However, not only did he look but he started to log details from the passport onto his pad. That's when I called a halt and said my date of birth while taking passport from him. He wasn't particulary happy. Nor was I for that matter and will not buy alcohol through them again.

I checked Amazon straight after as I was going to make a complaint but found that access to do so had been made much more difficult as they now have the ring and on line person stuff which was not what I wanted.

It is definitely "Buyer beware" these days.

I meant to add that I never use Amazon and never have.

I buy books from Amazon, but only second-hand ones. I recently ordered a Richard Scarry book for my granddaughter which was about £20 new. Second-hand, from one of their independent sellers it was £5, including postage. It arrived this morning, and it looks brand new.
I like to buy from bookshops, when I can, because I don’t want to lose them from the high-street, but doing a 12 mile round trip to do so, and spending four times as much, doesn’t make sense.

It may have been here or elsewhere that I read of someone who was convinced Alexa was ‘ listening in’, because they had been talking about something they were thinking of buying, and shortly after that ads for that thing started to pop up.

GreenGran Abe Books www.abebooks.com specialise in 2nd hand books.