There’s really no reason Amazon shouldn’t be collecting sales taxes today. They’re using an arcane and antiquated loophole in the law to justify not doing so. Honestly, it’s not that hard a thing to create a database to know how much sales tax to charge a buyer, given their billing address. Yes, it is a system that will require some resources to start and less to keep going in the future, but it’s got to be far cheaper than the lawyers they keep using to fighting local laws and politicians every couple of months.

I’ve enjoyed the tax-free shopping at Amazon for a long time now, but let’s not fool ourselves: we’re supposed to report it at the end of the year and pay it with our state taxes. Very few people actually do, though, and the cost of tracking this and fining people for it is a little overwhelming for state governments to handle. In the end, it likely wouldn’t make them enough money to cover costs.

It’s time for Amazon to grow up and be a real business and collect and pay the same kinds of taxes that every other business in the country does. When I shop at other on-line retailers, they calculate sales taxes and charge me accordingly, particularly the camera stores like Adorama and B and H. Some sort of system could be worked out at Amazon, too. It will level the playing field and save a whole lot of fighting — plus, more revenues for governments that can’t help themselves from wasting it!

And, as a consumer, I know I’m still getting everything cheaper than at a brick and mortar shop. That 7% sales tax (in New Jersey’s case) still doesn’t kill the 30%-plus discount on books we get today.

Still, I’d miss the extra savings. I admit it. But I’m also one of those “grown-up” types. Reality has to set in eventually. The internet is no longer the wild wild west it once was. And this is part of its maturation process.

Also, if your sole source of income is Amazon Affiliate links, you needed to rethink your business model before Amazon started closing its affiliate program in several states.

This was interesting.

I have an Amazon Seller account. I use it to sell some comics and other books or DVDs, the money from which can be re-spent at Amazon. I usually throw a bunch of stuff up there and see if any of it sells for a few months, before Amazon delists it. I think you get 90 days.

This morning I got an email that two of my items were being blocked from the store until the new year. Why? They’re toys: a Waldorf and Statler action figure set that was an exclusive to Wizard World: Chicago a few years back, and a Simpsons figure set.

They’re really more collectibles than toys, but I guess Amazon wants to save themselves the hassle of dealing with smaller third parties mucking up Christmas for the kids.

No, it’s not an outright ban. I just didn’t qualify to stay on. I didn’t look it up to see what those qualifications are, because it doesn’t bother me. I just thought it was interesting, is all.

Turns out my first Amazon purchase was September 7, 1998.  I bought two things:

• The Fifth Element on DVD

I had gotten my DVD player a couple months earlier, so this would have been one of my earliest movie purchases.  Back then, DVDs weren’t a dime a dozen.  This one cost $20.99. Today, it’s available for $12.49. For goodness sake, the Blu Ray for this movie is less than $15.

• DVD Demystified: The Guidebook for DVD-Video and DVD-ROM

What can I say, I’m part tech geek. This $42.95 book promised to discuss the format and the processing in detail. I was very curious about it at the time.  I remember carrying this book out of the office one day, when one of the Veeps at the company I worked for (he’s very smart) looked at the book and said, “I didn’t think they were all that mystifying.”

Total price: $68.84

That’s right: There was no free shipping on orders more than $25 back then, let alone Amazon Prime.

• Haven’t done a hybrid car story here in a long time, but surely a Porsche hybrid calls for attention!

• Isaac Asimov’s “Foundation” movie to be a 3D motion capture CGI film? Sure, why not? Like the initial reports that Roland Emmerich was directing it didn’t lower our expectations far enough…

• As a college Ultimate player, it’s very sad to see the guy who created the frisbee passed away recently.

• The Worst Apple Products of All Time. Includes the phone, the gaming console, and the iPod Hi-Fi.

• The military has been monitoring various social media to get ideas for where to help in Haiti. Interesting.

• Headline writers get it wrong sometimes. John McIntyre has some hilarious recent examples. Love his copy-writing blog.

• The first cowboy to draw loses. Here’s why.

• What is TiVo planning to unveil in March?

• Dear Amazon — I’ll take a free Kindle, too. I’ll subscribe to Prime, I promise. Thanks!

• Hilarious bit of SEO: A story about Facebook logging-in techniques gets higher rankings on Google than your actual Facebook log-in page. Confusion ensues from the clueless who use Google to go everywhere. Seriously, there are still people who type Facebook into Google to go there, instead of just typing Facebook.com. Ugh

• Rumor: Hulu to move away from Flash for iPad? Oooh, Adobe would not like that.

• Shocking: Higher song prices lead to fewer downloads. Does the music industry have any feet left to shoot itself in?

• I think I might still be drooling over the Canon T2i. And it’s only the entry level camera. This is nuts.

* Oscars: Just finished watching “Up” the other night. Had to watch it in two parts, a week apart. That’s just how my life rolls. And you know what? It’s the only Oscar-nomination film from 2009 that I’ve seen. I used to be culturally hip, you know.

I’m torn on who will win. Not who I “want” to win, but who I “think” will win. There’s two schools of thoughts here: a war movie like “Hurt Locker” is bound to activate the Hollywood insurgents into voting. But “Avatar” is seen as the movie which can save movies. So there’s a solid business reason to give that movie, even with its trite premise and cliche-addled scripts (from what I’ve read about it), the award, anyway. Hollywood must keep pushing 3-D down our throats, so “Avatar” must win. It’s pocketbooks versus politics at the Oscars this year.

* I don’t buy that 3D is going to be the next big thing. I just don’t see it happening, even if it did take over CES this year.

* “Up” is a heart-breaking movie. It’ll break your heart three times before the twenty minute mark, and then twice more near the end. Yet, you’ll love it and root for all the right people. It’s the heaviest PIxar movie to date, though.

And it looks very very cool on Blu Ray.

* “American Idol” has been a lot of fun this year so far, and Hollywood Week is starting next week. The thing that continues to astound me about “Idol” each year is how many singing single mothers they can find to put on stage… It’s sad, but “Idol” is turning into the Olympics: 3 minutes of show biz surrounded by ten minutes of documentaries explaining how wretched this contestant’s life has been.

* The iPad looks cool. It’s not going to pass the Finance Committee’s desk without a veto, so I won’t likely be getting one. But I do think it’s the ultimate comic book reader. The exciting thing is how it’ll look in a year. When the second generation model comes out, perhaps even with a price drop, it’ll be interesting to see how many apps are out there, how much content you can put on it, etc. But I’m excited for it.

* Adobe Flash sucks. Period. It’s the Comic Sans of web technologies and it can’t go away fast enough.

* ALF is on Twitter. Must reading, daily.

* Grammys: I listened to even less music than I watched movies in the theater. On the other hand, I’ve been out of music touch for a while now, so there’s nothing new there. I enjoy podcasts too much to stop to listen to much music.

Don’t get me wrong: The Canon 7D is the sexiest piece of camera equipment ever known to man. I’d rather have it than a new car. But the $1700 price tag will likely forever keep me away from it. And $1700 is hardly “a little something.”

Let’s see if I can sum this up quickly:

Net income increased 68% to $199 million in the third quarter, or $0.45 per diluted share, compared with net income of $118 million, or $0.27 per diluted share, in third quarter 2008.

That’s good.  There’s some adjustments made due to weaknesses of currency conversion, but the whole press release is good news for AMZ, my retailer of choice for as many things in my life as possible.  The Kindle must be doing very well for them.

I’m guessing the Lakers won, then?

Three cases of this have popped up this week, so far:

* People are complaining that they can’t upgrade from the 3G to the 3GS without paying extra.  I guess lots of people don’t understand the concept of a “subsidized” price and that they’re really spreading out the cost of the phone over the course of two years.  They’re not buying the phone any more cheaply than they did when it cost $599 on Day One.  Yes, AT&T may very well be evil, but this isn’t proof of it.  You’re just dumb if you don’t understand what a “subsidized price” is.  It’s a loan, basically, that AT&T gives you and you pay back every month for two years.  AT&T offers you the option of buying out your contract if you want to leave it early.

Here’s the best and biggest whiner of the bunch.  Thankfully, the commenters call him on it.  In his defense, he does have a legitimate complaint about confusion and AT&T not being able to communicate clearly.  Everything else?  Indefensible.

*Or, why not drop AT&T and spend $60 a month on a MiFi that you have to carry around everywhere with you to create a WiFi hot spot to use your iPhone in.  It only gets 4 hours of battery life, but it’s better than finishing up a contract with AT&T, right?

* People were disappointed that there was no “surprise Steve Jobs appearance” at the keynote today.  How in the wide wide world of sports would it have been a surprise, with so many people assuming/guessing it was going to happen?

Heck, given the way Apple Rumors go, it’s almost a bigger “surprise” that he DIDN’T show.

Words have lost their meaning, I fear.

* Even better, check out this link to a Gizmodo article titled “Everything You Need to Know About Snow Leopard.”

I laughed out loud when I saw it had to be UPDATED.  Guess it started off as “most everything you need to know,” eh?