I wrote Amazon with a comment about their iPad Kindle application:

Subject: Kindle for iPad 2.2

Between iBooks and your Kindle ecosystem, you’re clearly the best, with the largest selection of both books and supported platforms. You’re primarily focused on books as your bread and butter so I have little fear that you’ll get bored of it and wander away.

So I want to choose you as my sole paid e‑book vendor.

But I can’t.

I hate full justification. Not only does it offend my aesthetic sensibilities, it’s simply more difficult to read.

It would seem that offering the option of simple left justification shouldn’t be a complex matter. I hope it’s not because that’s all you have to do to get me as an e‑book customer. Until then, you’ll find that I will not pay for any Kindle e‑books.

Rick.

I received a reply later the same day:

Subject: Your Amazon.com Kindle Inquiry

Hello Rick,

Thanks for writing about adding the option of left justification as a feature for a our Kindle for iPad app.

Strong customer feedback like yours helps us continue to improve the service we provide, and we’re glad you took time to write to us. I’ve sent your comments to the Kindle team.

Thanks for your interest in Amazon Kindle.

Best regards,
David M
Amazon.com

Your feedback is helping us build Earth’s Most Customer-Centric Company.

Now that’s a good reply. Obviously, David can’t change the iPad Kindle app and send me a copy so I can enjoy left-justified reading. He can’t even issue a directive to make it a priority for the development team. All he can do is reply and confirm receipt of my message. The way he said it however, makes me feel that my expressing my preference does make a difference, which is unusual. Most other organizations would have replied with an automated message. Even a reply from a human is usually worded in such a way that despite what it actually says, you understand it to mean, “Yea, got your message. We’ll add it to all the other messages we receive and ignore.”

Amazon is not perfect, but it’s clear to me that they do really try, and these days, that means a lot.