AI agents are here. Will internet gatekeepers let them in the door? Amazon banned Meta’s Muse assistant, while Shopify welcomed it in, the first sign of battle lines being drawn in the way we spend money online.
As they sharpen, expect a rough sorting. On one side will be retailers like Amazon, which want to keep control of human eyeballs that can be sold to advertisers and pitched on add-on purchases. On the other will be e-commerce enablers like Shopify, whose primary relationship is with merchants, and which makes money from licensing storefront software, fulfillment services, and financing.
Less obvious is how companies that care a lot about customer loyalty but don’t depend on impulse purchases, like airlines, will treat bots. (My efforts to rebook a Delta flight via Muse this weekend ran into a bot-blocker.)