ABSTRACT
In a desert location outside of San Bernardino, California, Amazon has one of its latest facilities – a giant warehouse (or ‘fulfilment centre’) that has the ground space equivalent to 28 football fields. At the time of writing there are some 50 of these spread across the world in eight strategic countries. To say that Amazon has diversified beyond its original humble bookseller role would be an understatement. Amazon will nowadays sell almost anything; a look at their website for ‘today’s deals’ shows that, among a bizarre concatenation of suggestions, its algorithms have decided to give prominence to a pocket screwdriver for US$2.99 and a 30 × 50 foot nylon US flag costing US$1,484.
