Is Amazon taking over the world? Critics say the Internet's popular "everything store" is turning into a schoolyard bully.

• Author: Majerol, Veronica
• Position: ECONOMICS

If you were itching to buy a copy of The LEGO Movie last spring, or J.K. Rowling's new novel, The Silkworm, Amazon didn't make it easy for you.

In fact, Amazon all but asked you not to buy them. Embroiled in a dispute with Warner Home Video and Hachette Book Group, Amazon blocked customers from placing advance orders on Warner movies and Hachette books, raised prices on some items, pulled others from the virtual shelves altogether, and created shipping delays of up to a month. Why? Warner and Hachette refused to sell their products more cheaply on Amazon and to give Amazon a higher share of profits.

Disagreements between suppliers and the stores that sell their products are common, of course, but Amazon's hardball tactics have some critics arguing that the world's largest online retailer has grown too powerful.

"Writers and publishers are slaves to Amazon," says Jaime Clarke, who urged fans to buy his novel Vernon Downs from Roundabout Press rather than Amazon. "It's pretty obvious that they're bullies."

Founded in 1994 by Jeff Bezos (and originally registered under the name Relentless.com), Amazon began as an Internet bookseller operating out of Bezos's garage in Seattle. Today, it sells 230 million products--everything from cameras and Coca-Cola to lady bugs and Halloween costumes for dogs--and has 100,000 employees and dozens of warehouses around the world. It invented the Kindle, making e-books cheap and convenient; and its subscribers can stream millions of movies, TV shows, and songs. All this has put Amazon on its way to fulfilling Bezos's vision of becoming the "everything store."

"They generally just have a better price, and it gets shipped to my house within that week--it's just so convenient," says Coby Porlier, 18, a frequent Amazon shopper who lives in rural Pennsylvania. "There aren't many stores around us."

Amazon vs. Mom-and-Pop

Others, however, are concerned about Amazon's size and the power it brings. Amazon has always cared about offering low prices, even if it hurts profits in the short term, so that it can keep growing in the long term. It's a business model that's gotten millions of customers hooked.

But it's also hurt competitors, and the fear is that if there's no competition, Amazon will then be able to raise prices as high as it wants.

Independent bookstores have been particularly hard-hit by Amazon's deep discounts. According to the American Booksellers Association, there are about 2,000 independent bookstores...