# Amazon Smile **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [November 4, 2013, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-smile/673101 "2013-11-04T22:37:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Trom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/958977/32.png) [@Trom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trom)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2013, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-smile/673101/1 "2013-11-04T22:37:45Z")
[Amazon.com](http://Amazon.com) just launched a new program that gives you the option to donate 0.5% of the purchase price of items to a charity of your choice. The price to you, the consumer, is exactly the same. All you have to do is start your shopping from [smile.amazon.com](http://smile.amazon.com) instead of [amazon.com](http://amazon.com). Pretty cool! ---
**Author:** ![IvoryTowerDenizen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ivorytowerdenizen/32/17937_2.png) [@IvoryTowerDenizen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IvoryTowerDenizen)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2013, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-smile/673101/2 "2013-11-04T22:43:25Z")
That’s very cool. ---
**Author:** ![eltro102](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@eltro102](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eltro102)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2013, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-smile/673101/3 "2013-11-04T22:50:24Z")
is there a uk/europe equivalent? [simle.amazon.co.uk](http://simle.amazon.co.uk) seems to just be the regualr website ---
**Author:** ![ZipperJJ](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zipperjj/32/211_2.png) [@ZipperJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZipperJJ)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2013, 1:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-smile/673101/4 "2013-11-05T01:59:31Z")
Great! Always looking for ways to get more money to the Humane Society. Tons and tons of charities on there. ---
**Author:** ![Trom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/958977/32.png) [@Trom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trom)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2013, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-smile/673101/5 "2013-11-05T15:56:16Z")
> [@eltro102](#): > > is there a uk/europe equivalent? [simle.amazon.co.uk](http://simle.amazon.co.uk) seems to just be the regualr website That I don’t know… ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2013, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-smile/673101/6 "2013-11-05T17:13:06Z")
> [@eltro102](#): > > is there a uk/europe equivalent? [simle.amazon.co.uk](http://simle.amazon.co.uk) seems to just be the regualr website Hmmm, I did not get the regular website with that, or indeed with **smile**.amazon.co.uk. I got a “Page could not be found” error. Anyway, I think it is a fair assumption that this scheme is US only, at least for now. ---
**Author:** ![kayT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayt/32/3633_2.png) [@kayT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayT)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2013, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-smile/673101/7 "2013-11-05T17:45:13Z")
I would love to go to Amazon to shop but unfortunately pages at Amazon will not load on my computer. I have used IE and Firefox. Sometimes the header of a page will load after 40 “refreshes” but the whole page will never load. (Oh, but I can load the pages that have my account information, and after only 1o refreshes I got to see the help page, which, of course, has no help.) And, sadly, [smile.amazon.co](http://smile.amazon.co) is the same. No load. If anyone has ideas I’d love to hear them. I have no trouble with any other sites. I have Windows 7 if it matters. No idea why Amazon hates me so. ---
**Author:** ![control-z](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/eada6e/32.png) [@control-z](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/control-z)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2013, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-smile/673101/8 "2013-11-05T18:52:12Z")
> [@kayT](#): > > I would love to go to Amazon to shop but unfortunately pages at Amazon will not load on my computer. I have used IE and Firefox. Sometimes the header of a page will load after 40 “refreshes” but the whole page will never load. (Oh, but I can load the pages that have my account information, and after only 1o refreshes I got to see the help page, which, of course, has no help.) And, sadly, [smile.amazon.co](http://smile.amazon.co) is the same. No load. If anyone has ideas I’d love to hear them. I have no trouble with any other sites. I have Windows 7 if it matters. No idea why Amazon hates me so. My first guess would be that you have some sort of malware that has messed with your HOSTS file. A HOSTS file is like a phone book that translates domain names like [amazon.com](http://amazon.com) to an IP address like 176.32.98.166. Normally that is handled by calls to a Domain Name Server (DNS), but the HOSTS file is a local overide of that call. The reason malware would be interested is the malware could have been trying to intercept your visits to popular sites to insert their own ads or content. This page is Microsoft’s instructions for resetting your HOSTS file to the default: [How to reset the Hosts file back to the default - Microsoft Support](http://support.microsoft.com/kb/972034) ---
**Author:** ![stpauler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@stpauler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stpauler)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2013, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-smile/673101/9 "2013-11-05T19:14:33Z")
Very cool and thanks for sharing. I got this: > [@](#): > > Joshua, Amazon will donate 0.5% of your AmazonSmile purchase price. We will reach out to Amnesty International USA, Inc. to ensure it is ready to accept donations from Amazon. They better get ready, I have some shopping to do! ---
**Author:** ![kayT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayt/32/3633_2.png) [@kayT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayT)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2013, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-smile/673101/10 "2013-11-05T19:32:04Z")
> [@control-z](#): > > My first guess would be that you have some sort of malware that has messed with your HOSTS file. A HOSTS file is like a phone book that translates domain names like [amazon.com](http://amazon.com) to an IP address like 176.32.98.166. Normally that is handled by calls to a Domain Name Server (DNS), but the HOSTS file is a local overide of that call. The reason malware would be interested is the malware could have been trying to intercept your visits to popular sites to insert their own ads or content. > > This page is Microsoft’s instructions for resetting your HOSTS file to the default: [How to reset the Hosts file back to the default - Microsoft Support](http://support.microsoft.com/kb/972034) Thanks for the info but I don’t think this is the problem as, as I said, some pages at Amazon do open. (Also I have never been redirected someplace else.) If the IP address had been rerouted or blocked surely I would not be able to, for example, look at my order history in Amazon, while still being unable to look at any pages of things I might actually, you know, order. Huh. You would think Amazon would be interested in this problem since they haven’t sold me anything for the past two years, but they don’t seem to be. ---
**Author:** ![control-z](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/eada6e/32.png) [@control-z](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/control-z)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2013, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-smile/673101/11 "2013-11-05T21:24:19Z")
> [@kayT](#): > > Thanks for the info but I don’t think this is the problem as, as I said, some pages at Amazon do open. (Also I have never been redirected someplace else.) If the IP address had been rerouted or blocked surely I would not be able to, for example, look at my order history in Amazon, while still being unable to look at any pages of things I might actually, you know, order. Huh. You would think Amazon would be interested in this problem since they haven’t sold me anything for the past two years, but they don’t seem to be. Resetting your HOSTS file can’t hurt and might help. If you have 2 browsers that don’t work on Amazon then the problem probably isn’t your browsers. And the problem probably isn’t Amazon, they sell to millions of people. That leaves some sort of malware on your system as a strong possibility, and HOSTS file modification is one of the most basic ways to do it. The malware isn’t necessarily trying to block you from getting to [Amazon.com](http://Amazon.com), it just wants to insert it’s own ads or other content along with the rest of the page. Not surprisingly the malware software doesn’t work that well or may have had it’s content/ad servers blocked which can lead to page load problems. All speculation, but educated speculation.