There is a good carve-out where affiliate links are good. Actual review sites (eg. cnet and techradar, for all they're worth) and YouTube-based reviewers can do very well for determining what products are actually relevant, and can ultimately drive the customer to purchasing a product. Without such assurance from these people/publications, there's a chance Amazon loses out on the sale (either from choosing not to impulse purchase or using another competitor) so paying these reviewers out gives them incentive and drives purchases.

Although, from a anti-consumerism/anti-waste standpoint, encouraging impulse purchases at all is probably a net negative.