An article in the Economist quotes a consultant that thinks 6 out of 10
of America's biggest web retailers are customizing prices in some way.
Firms like [24]7 and RichRelevance are offering price customization software to internet retailers. The software is looking at stored cookies to see where the person has been looking, where they may live, how quickly they click through to a site's payment page, etc. It then uses this information to see whether or not discounts might be needed to entice a person to buy.
Therefore not everyone may be offered the same prices for the same goods/services. Is this fair? In my opinion the internet should allow for easy price-comparison. But now it seems that may not be the case since this type of software is not allowing anonymous browsing.
1 comment:
So much for "price customization"- it's more like "price discrimination" to the disadvantage of the consumer. As with everything on the internet, there are Pros and Cons. Mental note to self- clear out your cookies on a regular basis!
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