Grant Morrison once tried to make the case that Hitler must've learned how to do what he did from the English, but it's generally agreed he didn't succeed.
Gee, thanks, Patrick. I was going to try to get some work done tonight. Instead I'm tumbling down a Fry and Laurie rabbit-hole of YouTubery.
@cah #162: Nah, he compared Amazon to the Library of Congress. Also, one of the first things you do when you're going to tinker with something like this is you mosey down to customer service and say hey, you know, we're going to tinker with something like this. Anybody hollers about something like that going wrong, you ping us, okay? So that would be absolutely no excuse, or rather, further evidence that Amazon had been Stupid Stupid Stupid.
@Jacob Davies, not to minimize your excellent points (I for one am always for Taking a Deep Breath, which doesn't explain why I also like Shooting My Mouth Off, but), but: please do not yourself minimize the entirely justifiable outrage.
This situation isn't just Amazonfail Easter Weekend 2009, though a perusal of the Twitter channels might certainly make it seem so. This particular phenomenon in isolated instances has been noted as early as February of this year; when the author(s) in question contacted Amazon, they were informed this was now policy: to hide "adult" material from certain searches.
Already we've got a cluster of fail: whether you agree with the policy or not (which itself was noted as being operational in August of last year), two months ago Amazon had several notices that their definition of "adult" wasn't working the way it ought to have done.
That they went ahead and did whatever they did over the holiday weekend merely compounds the failure already in place. Certainly we all have to wait and see what happened and how and why, but Amazon the System has already clearly and demonstrably failed and badly.
--If anything, claiming Amazon as a quasi-democratic entity further justifies the outrage. What you see us seeing as our public commons has been polluted. Certainly, they ought to have been far more careful with their quasi-public trust.
But that would put a whole new utopian spin on Too Big to Fail, and not even I am that pollyannish.
@Jacob Davies, #117: This isn't a democracy. This is a customer service issue.
I meant to say "unlascivious," of course. It was a software glitch! Stupid squiggly red lines.
@CharlesP, #32: granted, and I don't think anyone castigating Amazon as teh EVIL thinks they've always secretly been a hotbed of Dominionist activity. But complaints re: nonsalacious and unlacivious queer material being removed as "adult" have been flying since at least February (and the backrooming of "morally objectionable" material with no opt-in or opt-out option has been noted since August of last year). Whether it's system-gaming or a weirdly specific software glitch or massive bureaucracy fail, Amazon's had plenty of internet-scale time already to note an issue and its possible repercussions and attempt to deal with it or at least respond to it before it shitstormed out of control. No matter the cause, Amazon was stupid; and systemic stupid at this scale becomes pretty indistinguishable from evil.
I hereby register my own personal sense of underwhelm.
From Crooked Timber:
We at CT have a more parochial reason for cheering this outcome. Paul has generously agreed to take a part in a CT seminar on the work of Charles Stross, which should be published in the next month or so. Without giving too much away, there are some Nobel-related insights in his contribution.
tnh@5: Why do they think he's on their side?
I'd say, "Just because they hate the right people doesn't mean they like you," which is as close as I can get to making the corollary as mellifluous as the original, but I don't think they care whether or not he's on their side. They genuinely believe no politician can make it any better; every slick one of 'em's out for somebody what ain't them, and in the choice between voting for vague hope and spite, well, spite's warmer on a cold night.
Hail to hero EMTs everywhere, and best wishes etc. The heart being a tough old muscle, after all, and hard to burn. —To natter distractingly about hospitals and such: we recently had a brief, informal tour of the birthing suites at the hospital we intend to use, and the lovely wood floors and the Jacuzzi tub and the fact that labor and delivery and recovery all happen right there in the same place with no unnecessary change of venue is very nice, yes yes, but when they asked if we had any questions the first words out of the Spouse's mouth were, "How's the wifi?"
Should be fully covered by the due date. If not, we'll want an east-facing room, it seems. Best chance of picking up the signal from a lobby one floor down. Lousy views there, but who goes for the view?
Your long list of accomplishments to date has pushed the Velvet Underground shot even further down the screen. For a bleak black moment I thought it had been made redundant.
The sheer number of cynics who've told me upon viewing this that, y'know, this internet thing might be worthwhile after all.
Majestic whimsy. Now there's a goal.
I get to tell you what to do.
It doesn’t matter that it doesn’t make sense. Didn’t you hear me? I have been given license to tell you what to do. So do it already.
It is told to us by a long and unbroken isnaad of men of good character, known for their memories and their precision, that holy shit.
Yeah, my heart’s about a size and a half larger, now. —Fuck tha Western canon!
A brief perusal of other posts out there on the subject finds DanCnKC@99 to be little more than a reflexive drive-by of the memes already calcifying into a Nancy Grace-worthy storyline.
Christ Almighty, the company one ends up kept with.
Nor is any allowance made for the fact that certain statements and certain actions might stem from the numbness that automatically swamps you when you realize (dimly, through a glass darkly) that you've done something irredeemable, irremediable, irretrievable, unforgivable. Saying you don't feel quite so bad because she tried to kill herself once before is heartless and cruel and stupid and an utterly human (and ultimately doomed) thing to do, to try and keep yourself from inkling what it is you've done. —Perhaps I am naïve to a fault, but the benefit of the doubt should always be weighed, even here, and bullying is bullying, no matter how much moral righteousness you have on your side. The arc of the universe bends towards justice, not vengeance, and certainly not lynch mobs.
| Year | Number of comments posted |
|---|---|
| 2009 | 9 |
| 2008 | 8 |
| 2007 | 11 |
| 2006 | 23 |
| 2005 | 39 |
| 2004 | 46 |
| 2003 | 39 |
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