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Today is Prime Day, which is a day that didn’t exist until last year, when Amazon created it as a promotional event for its Amazon Prime service. The big idea is that Amazon Prime members can buy lots of stuff at a special discount; the really big idea is that Amazon owns several days of a slow summer news cycle.
Last year, one of the stories about Prime Day was that Amazon wasn’t prepared for all the demand the event would generate. Prime Day became bigger for Amazon than Black Friday, but it had trouble keeping up with the orders.
This year, Amazon promised, would be different.
And yet!
Some customers are reporting difficulty with checkout. We're working to resolve this issue quickly.
— Amazon (@amazon) July 12, 2016
More background here from the Washington Post (which is owned by Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, as you know).
If you were cynical, you might note that Amazon has a history of underestimating demand, which leads to stories about high demand, which presumably creates more demand.
But that would be very cynical.
Speaking of which: Where is the Pokémon Go angle here?
Got it! Pokémon Go is only available in the U.S. and a few other countries — because, the game’s developer says, it needs to stagger its international rollout in order to make sure its infrastructure can keep up with demand.
But Prime Day is available in nine other countries outside the U.S., from the U.K. to Japan.
This article originally appeared on Recode.net.
