Amazon UK
 

I purchased a CD from Amazon's UK site and it arrived without any celophane wrapping - as if it were a used copy. What's the deal, huh?

I don't know where you live but in most of the countries, the factory distributes the CDs without shinkwrapping them. Most of the time they are shrinkwrapped by the stores. Amazon always sells original material (you can be sure of it). I bought some CDs from them and they were not shrinkwrapped either. So no problem :-)

I bought the movie Fargo on dvd from them a few years ago and everybody and there brothers fingerprints were on it.I still recommend them,however.

I believe the shrink-wrapping may be an American phenomenon. When I was in Ireland last year, all of the CDs were unsealed. I always wondered why the imports I would buy at Virgin Megastores in the States were not sealed even when I knew they were not used. That makes me wonder about the return policies abroad. Here in the US, it's usual practice that you cannot return opened items.

This actually happened to a friend of mine who ordered X Files season 4 from a Canadian site. It came without the shrink wrapping, and had a US Customs sticker on the package. Apparently, it was randomly chosen by the US Customs for inspection. Looking for anthrax? I suppose in the wake of Sept 11th, we might see more of this.