So, the question is, “why is Amazon doing this?” This is not a public service company. One answer may be to help sell books. As we have seen, searches “inside the book” do lead to copies for sale on Amazon. Still, this seems like overkill for this purpose. Why also provide internet searches, which can take you away from the Amazon site? Is Amazon thinking of going into the search business? This is far afield of their original mission, though Amazon has been known to be expansive. Can they make money in the search business, with Google a dominating powerhouse and corporate monsters Yahoo and Microsoft preparing to give chase? That would seem like a difficult venture. And, at the moment, they are using Google’s search results. Are they planning to go into competition with their supplier?

To be honest, I have no idea why they are doing it. I don’t know if this is simply a device to sell more books or whether there’s a much grander scheme. But for me, it doesn’t really matter. Amazon has added a useful tool, and I intend to make use of it where needed with nothing but gratitude, even if I can’t divine their motives. That’s not to say it will replace Google on my favorites list. For internet searches alone, I prefer the simple, straightforward results of Google. However, if I also want to look for references within books, this is definitely the way to go.

Now, for what you have all been waiting for: the link to Amazon’s “Beta” A9 search. Go to http://a9com. If this link does not work, then copy and paste or type this address into your browser’s window.