Early Days of Amazon Digital Media: The Flybar
Inspired by Greg Linden’s excellent Early Amazon series and a random YouTube video I stumbled upon today, I’m going to start a series of posts about my days as one of the early members of Amazon’s Digital Media group. (Don’t get too excited — this series will probably only be one post long.)
Working at an online retailer definitely had its share of perks. For example, the “Free Book Room”. Ever wonder where all of the books that editors review for Amazon go after they’ve been reviewed? Well, I assume that the editors keep the good ones. But, the long tail of Amazon ends up free for the taking by Amazon employees. And that’s how my bookshelf ended up full of classics like Why Your Toothbrush May Be Killing You Slowly. (I should really get my Associates account set up for these links.)
As exciting as it sounds, free books were only the tip of the iceberg. The day my office “acquired” a Flybar was one of my happiest at Amazon. We had fun jumping around on it all day, or at least from 5pm - 9am (when the lawyers on the floor below us weren’t at work). I’m proud to have been the impetus behind the mandatory helmet rule. Needless to say, I will not be quitting my day job (if I had one) to compete in the X Games.
Not everyone can fly the bar like the man in this video…
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