This thread just got me to finally cancel mine. I had to click 4 times to get through the cancellation flow and was presented with three distinct screens that moved around the 'end membership' button and try to get you to click on buttons that keep you on as a member. This is probably the darkest pattern cancellation flow I've gone through in recent memory.

> This is probably the darkest pattern cancellation flow I've gone through in recent memory.

Can't be worse than e.g. NyTimes, Zipcar, Stamps.com (many others I'm sure) that force you to call a human to cancel

Yes, that's true

One thing you can do is if you plan to buy on amazon, you can input the order and then before you pay, send a copy of the order to the actual company and ask if they can give a discount if you place the order directly through the company. Most will do the deal outside of amazon because they save money on the amazon fees.

Interesting how this demonstrates that showrooming can affect online retailers too. Popular retail websites that introduce consumers to products can lose out on the sale if a discount is available by buying directly from a merchant, just as physical stores can be bypassed if a discount is available from an online seller.

Most people probably won't take the initiative to make an enquiry with the merchant for an Amazon marketplace order, and it'd be too inconvenient to do this consistently for small purchases, but maybe part of the motivation for promoting merchants tied exclusively to Amazon is an awareness of the threat that online showrooming might pose to some of their business in the future.

They always try to sign me up for Prime for Students although I am not a student. There is no button to say "I am not in school. Really!"

They do that for me because I have still have a university address on record associated with a .edu email from 20 years ago. Presumably deleting it would eliminate the nag.

I don't even have that.

Ha, the same thing happens to me. No idea why they think I'm a student, like you I don't have an edu email address on my account.

> I cancelled mine a few months ago. Tomorrow is my last day. They've been harassing me on their site constantly with popups and notifications on every single page since I cancelled. It's gotten to the point where the harassment has firmly cemented my distaste for their user experience and I actively search for alternative sites first now.

I've switched to sharing Prime with my fiancee through "Amazon Household," and they're even nagging me as I let my now-redundant Prime membership lapse.