Word comes to us from the SeattlePI’s blog covering Amazon and online retail that a semi-official but detailed statement has come out explaining the whole #AmazonFail fiasco.
Amazon.com employees are on call 24/7, and many began working on the problem from home. It didn’t take much digging to realize that there was a data error.
Amazon managers found that an employee who happened to work in France had filled out a field incorrectly and more than 50,000 items got flipped over to be flagged as "adult," the source said. (Technically, the flag for adult content was flipped from ‘false’ to ‘true.’)
"It’s no big policy change, just some field that’s been around forever filled out incorrectly," the source said.
So much as we suspected here (and here) this weekend, it was, in fact, a poorly communicated glitch.
The question then becomes – why hasn’t Amazon communicated this information through official channels? Why hasn’t the quintessential web company employed quintessential social media procedures in communicating their message?
More importantly, given that the majority of the Internet viewing public was solidly in the anti-Amazon camp prior to this statement – does this change your opinion of the company? Are they irreparably damaged or does this make it all OK?
