Designating someone an Amazon Friend gives you an easy way to keep track of his or her Amazon activity. Depending on the privacy settings you and your friend set, you'll stay informed of each other's events such as recent reviews, additions to Wish Lists, upcoming birthdays and more. With features on the site such as Tell-a-Friend, your friends and family have quick access to interesting products you want to share with them.

Amazon Friends have special permission to see the information in Your Profile that you have shared only with your friends. You control what they see by setting viewing permissions on Your Profile page. Restricted information can include personal information, such as e-mail or birthday, and items that you recently purchased.

To add someone as an Amazon Friend: Visit Your Profile and enter an e-mail address or name in the box labeled "Invite new Amazon Friends" and click the GO button. An e-mail invitation will be sent requesting that he or she become your Amazon Friend. You can also invite a friend by visiting his or her Profile page and clicking the "Invite as Amazon Friend" link located in the Your Actions box. Once an invitation is accepted, you will be added to each other's list of Amazon Friends.

Click here to learn more about Pending Invitations to Amazon Friends.

To remove an Amazon Friend: Visit the Profile page of the person you wish to remove from your list and click the"Remove as Amazon Friend" link located in the Your Actions box.

Being an Amazon Friend is reciprocal; if someone is your Amazon Friend, then you are his/her Amazon Friend also.

The Interesting People section lets you bookmark people you've come across while browsing on Amazon, such as reviewers or authors. You can look at the profile pages of people you add to your Interesting People list from your Profile page. We'll also keep you updated on the latest activity of Intersting People in the Latest Activity feature on your Profile page.

To add someone to your Interesting People list: Go to the Profile page of the person you wish to add. Then Click the "Add to Interesting People" link located in the Your Actions box. That person will now appear in your list of Interesting People. You can search for people by visting your Profile and choosing "People" in the Search pull-down menu at the top of the page. Enter a name or e-mail address to find people on Amazon.com.

This feature displays what your Amazon Friends and Interesting People have been up to recently on Amazon.com. Tracked activities can include upcoming birthdays and anniversaries, additions to Wish Lists, new Amazon Friends, and content published on Amazon such as Reviews and Listmania lists. The activity information you see about an Amazon Friend or Interesting People is determined by the viewing permissions each individual sets for the different activities.

How Activity Information Is Displayed

Activity information is only displayed in the Latest Activity section if that activity's viewing permission is set to "Everyone" (as compared to "Friends" or "Only Me"). For example, if a person you are and Amazon Friend of, or have added to your list of Interesting People has set his or her birthday to be viewable only by Amazon Friends this information will not be visible in Latest Activity. However, when Amazon Friends visit that person's Profile page, that birthday will be visible. In other words, Latest Activity will only display information for a particular action you take if it is viewable by all customers on Amazon because you set the viewing permission to "Everyone."

To set viewing permissions: Refer to the list below to determine where to set viewing permissions for each activity type.

• Notification of your upcoming birthday or anniversary: Located in the About Me section of your Profile. Click the Edit button to access permission settings.
• Additions to your Wish List: Located on your Wish List page. Click the "Edit this information" link found on the top right-hand side of your Wish List page.
• Recent Purchases: Recent purchases only display on your Profile page, never in Latest Activity. You can control the viewing permissions of by visiting your Profile and clicking the Edit (privacy) link in the header of the Recent Purchases section.
• Public activity such as making new Amazon Friends, Interesting People, writing a review etc.: There are no viewing options for this. These activities always display in Latest Activity.

Pending invitations are requests to become someone's Amazon Friend to which the recipient has not yet responded. On the Pending Invitation page you can respond to invitations you have received and keep track of pending invitations you sent.

Pending Invitations Received

You have 3 options for responding to an invitation:

• Accept: When you accept an invitation both you and the sender immediately become Amazon Friends and appear in each others list of Amazon Friends.
• Decline: When you decline an invitation the sender's invitation is removed from your list of pending invitations. The sender is not informed their invitation has been declined and they could always re-invite you if they choose to.
• Decline and Block: This is the same as declining an invitation except that both you and the sender will no longer be able to invite each other to be Amazon Friends. The sender's name will appear in your Blocked People (see below) list where you'll always have the option of un-blocking them.

To accept, decline, or decline and block invitations, select one or more invitations by clicking the appropriate checkbox and then clicking the desired response button at the top of the section.

Pending Invitations Sent

This section displays all the invitations you sent but have not received a reply from the invitee. Once you receive a response to an invitation, it is removed from this list. The only option you have in this section is to delete the invitation. Once deleted, the invitation becomes invalid and cannot be accepted by the recipient.

To delete a sent invitation, select one or more invitations by clicking in the appropriate checkbox and then clicking the Delete Selected button.

Blocked People

When you receive an invitation, you have the option to decline and block the sender. Blocked people can no longer send you invitations, unless they know your e-mail address. Once blocked, the person's name appears in this list, where you have the option of un-blocking her/him. When unblocked, both you and the unblocked person once again have the ability to invite each other to become Amazon Friends.

To unblock someone, select one or more people by clicking in the appropriate checkbox and then clicking the Unblock Selected button.

Blocking Preferences

You can limit the Amazon Friend invitations you receive to only those people who know your e-mail address. To do this:

1. Click the "Your Amazon.com" tab at the top of the web site.
2. Click "Your Profile" (found in the blue horizontal navigation bar).
3. Scroll down to the "Your Friends" section.
4. Click "See your pending invitations."
5. At the bottom of this page under "Blocking Preference," check the box next to "Block invitations from people who don't know my e-mail address."
6. Click the yellow button "Save preferences." This will prevent people who don't know your e-mail address from inviting you to be their friend, or sending you messages through this system.