Well, here we go again. This time its Amazon’s turn in the barrel. First Motrin got burned by silence. (See the Motrin article in this blog), then SmartWool (see the SmartWool Experiment), and now Amazon.

Over the Easter weekend, Amazon suddenly removed gay and lesbian books from its listings and search results. Authors such as great American writers James Baldwin and Gore Vidal could not be found. 

How long did it take for social media to discover this? About two minutes. Tweets exploded, blogs picked it up, and Facebook was all over it.

Over the weekend, no response from Amazon. Not the CTO, not the CEO, nobody. Finally, on Monday Amazon’s director of corporate communications Patty Smith said that it was a “glitch” and unintended. There is also some evidence that a hacker may have penetrated the system and caused the problem. 

I really don’t care. To me, that is beside the point. Amazon makes billions on the Internet, its home field.  And why didn’t it catch this problem immediately and correct it?  Call it a glitch in the first two hours, apologize, and follow it up first thing Monday morning with another statement. 

What price did Amazon pay? Hard to say just yet. Here is the short-term collateral damage.

1. Amazon is now perceived as a slow moving dinosaur, one that plays in the sandbox but does it awkwardly. Sells stuff. Good at email reminders about what is new, what you bought, and what you might like. But slow to adapt.  

2. Created suspicion in all of society that Amazon may have other issues. Why did it allow great American authors to disappear from its search and listing platforms? 

3. Alienated the gay and lesbian community, many of whom are new media savvy. Many of these people will not return to Amazon.

4. The long tail. This will not be forgotten. It will be brought up as an example of an Internet pioneer’s insensitivity and ignorance to new media. Studied in classrooms. Brought up in blogs. Used as examples in corporate presentations. For years. 

New media is 24/7. Online conversations are going on in the middle of the night, in the middle of the day, and, yes, on Easter Sunday. Amazon, you are selling things on Easter Sunday. You seem to be fine with that. But while you were selling, others were paying attention to what you promised to sell and weren’t.  

Consumers are smart. And when they catch a big mistake they publish. And if it takes off virally, millions read, chat, tweet, and post further about it. 

Brands must prepare for these scenarios. Catch and correct early. And then stay on it until the volume level subsides.

Silence is no longer the quiet killer.