16 March 1999. Initiative is welcomed by School Standards Minister Estelle Morris MP

Following hot on the heels of the Chancellor's Budget pledge to provide an extra £2000 for schools in the UK to use to buy books, leading Internet retailer Amazon.co.uk has today announced a commitment to top up this amount by £200 per school.

If schools choose to buy their book supplies online from Amazon.co.uk using this new Budget allocation, the company will allow them to order an extra £200 worth of books, free of charge. This £200 commitment is available to every school that qualifies for the Government's £2000 Budget allocation.

School Standards Minister Estelle Morris MP commented on the announcement, "This is an imaginative response in the National Year of Reading to the Budget boost for books. The extra £2000 we are offering will provide an extra 10 million books for schools. I hope Amazon.co.uk's pledge will help schools to get even more books for their libraries."

"It's fitting that in this The National Year of Reading we should be looking to support and boost the provision of books and resources to the education sector," commented Dr Simon Murdoch, managing director of Amazon.co.uk. "Teachers will find that the speed and convenience of searching through a selection of more than 1.5 million titles on Amazon.co.uk saves them considerable time during planning. And with everyday discounts of up to 40%, schools will get even more for their money from Amazon.co.uk."

Schools wanting to find out more information about the scheme should email Amazon.co.uk at schools@amazon.co.uk or visit the website at www.amazon.co.uk/schools/.

Notes to Editors

Amazon.co.uk's commitment to schools is subject to certain terms and conditions. For more information, please email schools@amazon.co.uk or visit the website at www.amazon.co.uk.

About Amazon.co.uk

Amazon.co.uk is a subsidiary of Amazon.com, Inc. Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN), the Internet's No. 1 book and No. 1 music retailer, opened its virtual doors on the World Wide Web in July 1995 and quickly became Earth's Biggest Bookstore. Today, the Amazon.com store has expanded to offer more than 4.7 million books, music CDs, audiobooks, videos, DVDs, computer games and other titles, plus easy-to-use search-and-locate features, secure credit card payment, personalised recommendations, streamlined ordering through 1-Click(TM) technology, and direct shipping. Amazon.com operates two international bookstore Web sites: www.amazon.co.uk in the United Kingdom and www.amazon.de in Germany. Amazon.com also operates PlanetAll (www.planetall.com), a Web-based address book, calendar, and reminder service, and the Internet Movie Database (www.imdb.com), the Web's comprehensive and authoritative source of information on more than 150,000 movies and entertainment programs and 500,000 cast and crew members dating from the birth of film in 1892 to the present.

This announcement contains forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties that include, among others, Amazon.com's limited operating history, anticipated losses, unpredictability of future revenues, potential fluctuations in quarterly operating results, seasonality, competition, risks associated with system development and operation risks, management of potential growth, and risks of new business areas, international expansion, business combinations, and strategic alliances. More information about factors that potentially could affect Amazon.com's financial results is included in Amazon.com's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including its Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 1997, as amended by the Form 8-K filed September 11, 1998, and quarterly reports on Form 10-Q for the quarters ended March 31, 1998, June 30, 1998 and September 30, 1998.

Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.de, PlanetAll.com, IMDB.com, Earth's Biggest Bookstore, and 1-Click are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc. or its affiliates. All other names mentioned herein may be trademarks of their respective owners.

Contacts

For more information about Amazon.co.uk, please contact:

• Fiona Murphy or
  Rebecca Woods on 0208 237 4000.