I have spent recent days reflecting upon the myriad of ethical standpoints that one can take when faced with Amazon Marketplace. You can buy second-hand books through them, and it works a bit like an agency for all the book dealers around. You browse on Amazon, you pay Amazon, and then Amazon tell the little old guys in Hay-on-Wye and on Charing Cross Road and, increasingly, in warehouses outside Milton Keynes where to send your paperbacks. Some of these warehouse-type places are actually operated by Amazon themselves, and generally sell old editions or damaged copies. Technically, not second-hand. For these sellers, you are able to use the Amazon order tracking system to see where your books are lingering the UK postal system.

Obviously, it’s a difficult call to make. Even the independent sellers who are selling genuine second-hand will be giving Amazon a commission for listing on Marketplace. And is it going against one’s ethics to buy a ‘new’ copy, albeit not on general sale due to cover damage or watermarks or something? By buying these copies, are we saying to publishers “it’s okay if you don’t treat these FRESHLY MURDERED TREES with respect, since there will always be a few misguided souls ready to purchase them”, or is it a case of giving the runt of the litter a good home, when it would otherwise sit, unloved, in its cold and lonely Milton Keynes warehouse forever more? What if the only place we can find a copy of S by John Updike at a reasonable price is through these dubious channels?

I’ve been testing the system, and in doing so, testing myself. In one transaction I bought a second-hand copies of S by Updike and a Simon Schama American history book, damaged copy of The Last Mad Surge Of Youth by Mark Hodkinson (all through sellers operated by Amazon), and then two collections of second-hand Ali Smith short stories, The Whole Story and other stories and Free Love and other stories, through independent sellers. The Schama and the Hodkinson still haven’t arrived though. Hmmm.

I think I’ll continue using Amazon Marketplace, simply because the range of titles available is unmatched, even by Ebay, but I’m going to try to stick with those independent sellers using it simple as another sales point. They might be little rural bookshops with limited winter trade, and would not be using Amazon were it not financially worthwhile. Perhaps when I phone Amazon to find out where the hell my Schama and Hodkinson books have got to, I’ll find their order tracking system useful, but I get the impression the Amazon-operated sellers are simply clearing their unwanted stock. The whole point in buying second-hand only it to try to prevent excess stock being printed in the first place.