Amazon Apologizes When One Isn't Needed

Sometimes CEOs get very bad advice, and Amazon's CEO Jeff Bezos' apology about pulling two e-books off its shelves, and off Kindle devices, is a prime example.

Bezos blogged that his company did a very bad thing: "Our 'solution' to the problem was stupid, thoughtless, and painfully out of line with our principles. It is wholly self-inflicted, and we deserve the criticism we've received. We will use the scar tissue from this painful mistake to help make better decisions going forward, ones that match our mission."

Oh, Jeff, say it ain't so. You really aren't apologizing for protecting author George Orwell's copy rights are you?

What pain was caused? How many users sent back the Kindle, where were the public protests and who was hurt by your good intentions to protect an author's rights? OK, maybe you should have let Kindle users know beforehand you were pulling the e-versions that somehow got up on Amazon's e-book store for sale, but then again, not being polite is not a crime.

Maybe you should have blogged that Amazon's doing an in-depth review to make sure all e-books are authorized and not only refunded sales but offered a free book to those users who, for some insane reason, were mad that they bought something they weren't entitled to buy or read on the Kindle and had to return it.

But even that isn't really necessary. The big picture is that Amazon did the right thing but could have been a bit smoother in how it did it.

So whatever marketing or PR consultant gave you this advice needs some enlightening. Such a public apology on something Amazon did right is not necessary.

Amazon has been a good egg as an e-tailer since it came on the Web. It's got nothing to apologize for, except, maybe, not lowering the price on Kindle so that more people can afford to enjoy the technology.

But that's blog fodder for another day.

Photo courtesy of Amazon.com and www.flickr.com via creativecommons.org.