In the past, I have urged you to be brave, and get involved in your community, both online and offline. Then a couple of days ago I posted a tweet on Twitter, after I had read this in our local……

What will happen is companies with Hawaii affiliates will kick them out of their programs. They will still keep their advantage by excluding Hawaii based business from working with them.

This would lessen the tax revenue that HB1405 was supposed to capture, since Hawaii based businesses will have less revenue from their affiliate relationships.

Passing SB1678 – will level the playing field for Bruce. Since this bill is setup to participate and add pressure on the federal government to pass a law that would require all companies to collect taxes on online transactions. With this bill it would not matter if a business has any relationship with a Hawaii resident. It would be across the board.

http://www.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/20090622/NEWS01/906220341/Hawaii+lawmakers+send+governor+bills+to+tax+Internet+transactions

I really do believe Amazon would disable affiliate account revenue for anyone with a Hawaii mailing address. It’s a heavy-handed message – but some of our legislators don’t respond well to subtlety.

The lure of affiliate revenue inspires online scammers and black hat affiliate marketers – that much is certain. The results don’t always justify the means.

As an example, using scripts or malware to add or replace the affiliate code in an Amazon link is something I’d consider shady behavior.

While I hope HB 1405 gets torpedoed and replaced with a better alternative, I’m not ready to endorse affiliate marketing in all its shapes and forms.

Perhaps we need a code of ethics for affiliate marketers.

Your post just ensured my next family vacation to hawaii will not be booked through HAWAII ALOHA TRAVEL

Hate to say it but we don’t have much time only 2 weeks left. I appreciate the informative comments from everyone.

Note that I think your type of business should also pay lower taxes so you can provide more competitive prices and win back tourists who have opted for less expensive destinations. If we want to raise tax revenue we need to make Hawaii a better place to do business for _all_ our businesses.

@Bill Sodeman – Affiliate marketing has a lot of slime in it to be sure but there are far more (IMO) positive uses. It is a business model made possible by the internet and does in fact create jobs and incomes for people who want to be more self-reliant than having a j-o-b.

To me, this is an example of the responsibility that comes in tandem with all of the freedom of information and communication that comes with the internet. As citizens we can no longer claim ignorance as to what the legislature does; we can and should learn about the issues, discuss them, and influence their outcomes. Thanks Ryan.

Bruce I am all for a level playing field, that is why I think Bill SB1678 is a much better alternative to HB1405. Bill SB1678 is better known as the Streamline Sale & Use Tax.

Please do a google search on it to learn more. It allows Hawaii to collect it’s sales & use tax in a much more efficient way because it joins a majority of the other states in adopting a national Internet sales & use tax. This would make it easy for all merchants to file & pay state sales tax.