Jeff Bezos Apologizes for Kindle Controversy

Posted on July 27, 2009

Jeff Bezos has issued an apology for deleting Kindle users' copies of two George Orwell's books, 1984 and Animal Farm. Amazon.com had a good reason to pull the books from its own site (the third party seller didn't have the rights to them), but the company should not have reached into customers' Kindle databases remotely and removed them.

This is an apology for the way we previously handled illegally sold copies of 1984 and other novels on Kindle. 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.
With deep apology to our customers,
Jeff Bezos
Founder & CEO
Amazon.com

The backlash over the incident has been huge. So long as Amazon.com stops its practice of deleting content it has already sold (even if it refunds the money), we think it's a acceptable apology. Sony and Apple better be paying attention.