Can Amazon be Wal-Mart of the web?

This article I found on New York Times website is interesting. Everyone knows that Wal Mart is the biggest general merchandise chain store in the USA. Also, Amazon has been gobbling e-commerce market share since 2006. Now, Amazon decides to surpass by saling not only media prodouts but also other merchandises on the website. In an increasingly digital age, shopping online becomes more and more popular. Accordingly, even if the world is during the period of economic recession, Amazon still makes this decision. However, the decision Amazon makes will affect many general merchandise companies, like Wal-Mart and Target. In my opinion, Amazon will face many challenges. For example, in general merchandise business, making refund by customers is frequent. However, Amazon is doing online business mostly, so it is not convenient for customers to make refund. Therefore, Amazon must find a solution to let customers make refund easily, or Amazon will lose customer. On the other hand, comparing with other famous general merchandise ocmpany, Amazon is a beginner in this field. They have to use some marketing strategies to attract customers. whatever, customers will have more choices when buying general merchandise. And it must be an intense competition between those companies.