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Why I'm Upset
Apr. 13th, 2009 07:34 pmMy Sissy sent me an e-mail asking why I'm upset over the #amazonfail clusterfuck.
I will admit that part of it is a knee-jerk reaction to the seemingly discriminatory nature of the 'glitch'. I don't like the idea that books tagged as lesbian, gay, and homosexuality are removed from rankings (and in some cases it has been reported that they stopped showing up in searches altogether). Meanwhile books promoting racism, a "cure" for homosexuality, bashing of particular religions, rape, and hetero porn remain ranked and searchable. That smack of censorship. Amazon.com is not a monopoly but it is close and it is huge. When something this big starts engaging in censorship we should all be worried.
Less knee-jerky but no less visceral is my reaction to Amazon's reaction. As in they haven't really had one. Yeah, there was a brief e-mail about a 'glitch' earlier. And now people are getting a form letter response about a cataloging error. Where is the public statement, posted on the main page of amazon.com that says "we messed up"? The first tenant of doing business in the internet age is Don't Get Caught! the second, for when you do get caught, is admit you f!cked up. So Amazon tried to implement a policy that would keep people searching for Harry Potter from getting Harry Porker or some other such adult fare. This is not a bad policy in and of itself (although I can think of a dozen other ways to filter truly adult material than using the rankings). It was implemented for shit and turned into a clusterfuck and a PR nightmare. So fess up, fix it, and move on.
I am not saying that Amazon needs to offer up an apology to the gay and lesbian community. I am saying they need to offer up one to the entire amazon.com customer/client community. Anyone who has ever bought from them. Any author that has ever sold through them. Any publisher that has ever used tham as a distribution vehicle. Not every book affected by this fiasco is GLBT. According to reports even a cozy mystery was unranked!
No, Amazon fucked up. Whether it was intentional and they got caught, or it was unintentional and they have crappy controls in their programming environment, they owe their customers and their clients some sort of explanation.
As I have said before, I am an IT person. I know something like this can take days to fix. I have no problem with the fact that it is taking a while for things to get straightened out. It does not take that long to issue a statement to the press however. Or to post a special section on their main page with an explanation of the issue and what is being done about it.
Now I am going to go read (a book I bought from a brick and mortar bookstore long before this cluster started) and order a pizza for dinner.
I will admit that part of it is a knee-jerk reaction to the seemingly discriminatory nature of the 'glitch'. I don't like the idea that books tagged as lesbian, gay, and homosexuality are removed from rankings (and in some cases it has been reported that they stopped showing up in searches altogether). Meanwhile books promoting racism, a "cure" for homosexuality, bashing of particular religions, rape, and hetero porn remain ranked and searchable. That smack of censorship. Amazon.com is not a monopoly but it is close and it is huge. When something this big starts engaging in censorship we should all be worried.
Less knee-jerky but no less visceral is my reaction to Amazon's reaction. As in they haven't really had one. Yeah, there was a brief e-mail about a 'glitch' earlier. And now people are getting a form letter response about a cataloging error. Where is the public statement, posted on the main page of amazon.com that says "we messed up"? The first tenant of doing business in the internet age is Don't Get Caught! the second, for when you do get caught, is admit you f!cked up. So Amazon tried to implement a policy that would keep people searching for Harry Potter from getting Harry Porker or some other such adult fare. This is not a bad policy in and of itself (although I can think of a dozen other ways to filter truly adult material than using the rankings). It was implemented for shit and turned into a clusterfuck and a PR nightmare. So fess up, fix it, and move on.
I am not saying that Amazon needs to offer up an apology to the gay and lesbian community. I am saying they need to offer up one to the entire amazon.com customer/client community. Anyone who has ever bought from them. Any author that has ever sold through them. Any publisher that has ever used tham as a distribution vehicle. Not every book affected by this fiasco is GLBT. According to reports even a cozy mystery was unranked!
No, Amazon fucked up. Whether it was intentional and they got caught, or it was unintentional and they have crappy controls in their programming environment, they owe their customers and their clients some sort of explanation.
As I have said before, I am an IT person. I know something like this can take days to fix. I have no problem with the fact that it is taking a while for things to get straightened out. It does not take that long to issue a statement to the press however. Or to post a special section on their main page with an explanation of the issue and what is being done about it.
Now I am going to go read (a book I bought from a brick and mortar bookstore long before this cluster started) and order a pizza for dinner.
