Slashdot Mirror
Amazon Culls "Offensive" Books From Search System
Miracle Jones writes "Amazon has instituted an overnight policy that removes books that may be deemed offensive from their search system, despite the sales rank of the book and also irrespective of any complaints. Bloggers such as Ed Champion are calling for a 'link and book boycott,' asking people to remove links to Amazon from their web pages and stop buying books from them until the policy is reversed. Will this be bad business for Amazon, or will their new policies keep them out of trouble as they continue to grow and replace bookstores?"
It's a corporate website that can do anything within the law. FTA;
Evidently, Amazon's starting to stick their "adult" shit in a virtual back room behind a virtual curtain, and his book got fingered in the first wave.
But the books are still available even. It's just that Amazon decided to cordon off adult material into a different section, like many brick and mortar stores. This article should have never been on Slashdot in the first place.
There was a time when we'd trust our collective knowledge to impartial institutions like libraries.
The gestalt of society is now firmly in the hands of corporate interest. Books from Amazon(tm). Friends from Facebook(tm). Meeting for Starbucks(tm). One brand identity after another. As soon as the books offend the brand identity they are stricken from the record.
One day the world will be Disneyland. Forced rictus smile sterility.
And we let it happen.
"Why did they cancel my favorite Sci-Fi show? I downloaded ALL the episodes!"
Amazon has no obligation to advertise (or even sell) books that the company considers detrimental to their business. It may be that they will eventually limit themselves to politically correct generic choices that offend no one - but again it's up to them to decide.
This will only create more business opportunities for other people to sell what Amazon doesn't. The barrier of entry into book selling online is very low. Everyone who whines and screams right now should be registering domains and dusting their LAMPs off.
One item that I find very offensive is that Amazon is classifying GLBT material as adult, while not designating similar heterosexual titles as such.
They are a private company and are free to classify items how they wish. Similarly, I can choose where to spend my money. I'll spend my money with a company that celebrates diversity. Not one that is so blatantly prejudicial.
Citations:
http://community.livejournal.com/meta_writer/11992.html (contains growing list of books)
http://markprobst.livejournal.com/15293.html (screen caps and more info)
I wish there was a fscking blue pill
They are everything Amazon is not, privately owned, good to their employees, socially responsible even when it doesn't show up in the press. They even have some brick and mortar locations (Portland OR, and Chicago). And the toll free phone number to contact then is on the front of the web page instead of being something you can only find in a 3rd party blog around Christmas time.
Are they perfect? No. Are they small enough to care what even one or two percent of their customers think? YES. When corporations get too big they get arrogant, it is in your interests to not let companies you like feel as if they can ignore you. Punish bad behavior with vocal and public criticism.
And to all those who say they are just creating an adult section, ask your self why children's books that try to discuss homosexuality delicately are delisted, but racy explicit romances is not.
Insert pithy comment here.
I removed all Amazon affiliate links from my sites some time ago for unrelated reasons: extremely low CTR (even on highly relevant articles), "funny" reporting on their stats system that didn't jive with my internally monitored figures, and crappy support.
Those reasons might inflame nerds and business people, but even semi-censoring sex is something guaranteed to inflame vast swaths of society.
As always, the best way to effect change is through directed complaints to the company and more importantly, to Amazon's advertisers and partners.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
The source of this article is not exactly a main line news source. Can anyone corroborate this?
Erotica books were removed from page rankings. This particularly impacts gay-themed books since they're labeled more often as erotica, even when they have real plots. "Brokeback Mountain" get's no ranking while "Clan of the Cave Bear," with its throbbing members entering vaginas, gets a ranking. Meanwhile "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" sits happily with a ranking. Amazon is censoring sex, the fucking pansies, while considering hate-speech OK for the wider audience.
When Facebook started to delete pictures of breastfeeding moms as "offensive" there was the same outcry - and a few months later no one really cares anymore.
I bet Amazon is playing the same card. They know very well that people will complain but they also know that people forget faster than a fly.
I also have to point out people have no right to tell any store what they can and can't sell
Of course they do. It's called the free market. It goes like this:
1) Amazon decides to categorize what they sell in a manner that a certain group of people finds objectionable.
2) The offended group responds by withholding their business from Amazon.
3) If the losses Amazon suffers from this are above a certain threshold, they will reverse the policy; if not, they won't.
Every interest group in America uses this approach all the time. It was probably an interest group that caused the policy decision at Amazon in the first place. It's Amazon's fiduciary responsibility to maximize its income, so it will appease whichever group spends more money.
I'm an atheist who used my mod points. Yes, I would be outraged if they did the same to religious books. I may not believe what you believe, but I will never side with those who would silence your faith.
Some time ago, some friends invited us to a baptism at their church. We went in order to be polite. They had a place for the toddlers and little kids to go and play, and hear bible stories. Which didn't bother me, until I realized that in this context these weren't stories - they were true lessons. The children would likely be asked to repeat back and affirm what they had learned about Jesus or God or what have you. I don't know that I have ever felt so protective towards my son. I had to get him out of there *right now*. I don't think about religion much, so I had never realized how passionately I feel. And in that moment I understood how many religious people must feel. I may not respect their religion, but I do respect people as human beings with a fundamental right to believe what they want - and yes, to teach it to their kids.
So don't run around making stereotypes of those who don't believe what you do. I have seen religious Americans on TV about the depravity of atheists, about how perhaps they should not even be recognized as full citizens. Then I have seen atheists turn around and say exactly the same thing about believers. Don't stand for that stupid, stupid ignorance and hate. We are still friends with that family. That is one of the greatest things about our society.
By the way, I think your opt-in/opt-out solution (yes, YouTube does that, as does Google) is perfect.
That tells me this is a bunch of bullshit and no need to read any further.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
Do a search on 'homosexuality' on the main page of Amazon now. If that's a genuine search result, Amazon has issues above and beyond just delisting books.
"A Parent's Guide to Preventing Homosexuality " as the #1 result? Now that's what I'd call a really offensive book.
I'm a dreamer, the world is my playpen. But hey, I'm a serious person, I can't dream all the time.
Of course I thought very hard about why I had such a strong reaction. The main reason? I am very close to my son. His faith would create a barrier between us. I have very strong moral convictions. I want to pass my values on to him, and I look forward to discussing such things with him when he's older. Doctrinaire religion would cut communication off at the knees.
Of course he is his own person. When he is capable of making his own decisions, he will be free to believe what he wants to believe and listen to what he wants to listen to. My long-term job as a parent is not to tell him what to believe (or, at this age, to let others do that either) but to enable him to make those choices. (I very much doubt you are a parent, or you wouldn't make ridiculous suggestions about "censorship" of a 3 year-old.)
One of the other problems in this situation is that if he was taught to believe the bible story, I would feel obliged to respond. But I don't want to intervene against religion either. He doesn't need to know at all at this age. Besides, beliefs are secondary. It is values I wish to teach, not religion (pro or anti). How would it make our friends or their son feel if my boy told theirs that there is no God?
I think most people here would be much more upset.
Sure, I think sex themes and porn aren't a big deal and many people would be happier if they weren't so prudish about it (my wife and I certainly appreciate porn). I'm also in the religion is a bunch of superstitious nonsense group but unlike adult content few people would even suspect that religious content was being cordoned off so it would be a greater barrier to the free access to ideas.
Of course ultimately I think this is really about customer service and transparency more than censorship. It's not evil or wrong for Bezos to choose not to sell whatever he finds objectionable but I feel there is a certain implicit trust that most of us place in amazon that it's not secretly sculpting what books it lets you see and keeping the "bad" ones hidden. If I think amazon isn't keeping that trust I'll find a bookstore to use that does. If amazon made sure to publisize what sort of books it would be hiding then it's not as big of a deal.
Of course I expect this will turn out to be nothing big.
If you liked this thought maybe you would find my blog nice too:
Don't like Amazon? Go to your local bookstores! Oh wait, there aren't any any more! That's right. Everybody and their mother wanted to save an extra quarter so the local bookstores are all gone. Bummer, huh? Too bad people are really, really stupid en masse.
I was surfing through Amazon to confirm the story, and sure enough, all the copies of Brokeback Mountain and Lady Chatterley's lover...
Woah, hold up a sec. Brokeback Mountain? The movie that has 60+ nominations and 3 Oscars to its name? THAT Brokeback Mountain?
Good luck on your distribution contracts with Hollywood in the future there Amazon. Er, you might want to put that (bridge) fire out before you get fined.
Family friendly means you don't want someone else's values rammed down your throat.
Mein Kampf? The Protocols of the Elders of Zion? That's OK then?
What it started out to be is irrelevant. Important is what it is now: A publicly-traded company. Thus, any love for books or decency takes the back seat to the one rule, which would supersede even God himself: Increase shareholder value for the next quarter. It doesn't matter if you ruin entire industries doing it, shareholder value absolutely, positively has to increase.
USE HOT GRITS WITH STATUE OF NATALIE PORTMAN (NAKED AND PETRIFIED)