1. Amazon began in the garage of founder Jeff Bezos' home in Bellevue, Wash.
2. Bezos originally wanted to name the company "Cadabra" as in "Abracadabra."
3. Another potential company name Bezos liked was "Relentless."
4. When the website first went live it only sold books.
5. The first book sold was Fluid Concepts and Creative Analogies by Douglas Hofstadte.
6. According to the new book by author Jeff Stone, in Amazon's early days a bell would ring in the office every time someone made a purchase.
7. There was also a huge programming error in the early days that would let customers trick Amazon into sending them money.
8. In 1997, Barnes & Noble sued Amazon alleging that its 1990s slogan, "Earth's Largest Bookstore," was false.
9. As the company grew exponentially, early employees were expected to work no fewer than 60 hours per week.
10. Amazon's practice of hiring so many seasonal workers originated after the insane holiday season of 1998.
11. Today Amazon has more than 117,000 employees worldwide and shows no signs of stopping its rapid expansion.
12. Amazon's fulfillment center in Phoenix, Ariz., is made up of 1.2 million square feet.
13. To help ease the burden on its warehouse workers, Amazon now uses robots to assist in retrieving items.
14. In developmental stages the Kindle was named "Fiona" after a character in The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson.
15. Amazon holds a patent on 1-Click buying, and licenses it to Apple.
16. Bezos is said to be a very tough boss, one who doesn't shy away from exploding at employees.
17. Many former Amazon employees have gone on to found incredibly successful businesses.
18. Amazon once listed a book about flies for $23,698,655.93.
19. The company lost $4.8 million in August 2013, when its website went down for 40 minutes.
20. Despite being the CEO, Bezos only makes $81,840 per year.
An earlier version was unclear and implied the book in No. 18 was sold, and not just listed. Also, in No. 19, it also said Amazon lost $120,000 per second, instead of minute.