Don't Forget to Turn Out the Lights, Tony
![zd-defaultauthor-tom-steinert-threlkeld-10001226.jpg](https://www.zdnet.com/a/img/resize/dd859d93ac267511423af92d617467f64c01e063/2014/12/04/28707440-7b80-11e4-9a74-d4ae52e95e57/zd-defaultauthor-tom-steinert-threlkeld-10001226.jpg?auto=webp&fit=crop&frame=1&height=192&width=192)
The announcement that Amazon is buying Zappos is so sad.
What online retailing needs is more innovators, not fewer.
Jeff Bezos of Amazon (recommendation engine and free delivery over $25) and Tony Hsieh of Zappos (free delivery both ways, 365-day guarantee and social shopping) are at the top of their game. And the game.
Says here that Hsieh will move on within 18 months, after joining Amazon. He's a two-time winner, having sold LinkExchange, an advertising network he co-founded to Microsoft for $265M in 1998. And a guy clearly confident in his ability to find new veins of gold to tap in digital commerce.
But wouldn't it have been a lot better for etailing in general if we customers had witnessed and benefitted from a head-to-head competition across multiple categories of these two outfits?