a most wtf amazon rec

so, as a result of the recent jigging around on amazon (they've un-rated most books that touch on LGBT "themes" so they're much harder to find, while keeping tucker max and the het dood's guide to bangin or whatever) the first result when you search under "homosexuality" is...

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51h9VS4rBQL._SS500_.jpg

what the fuck

there's a lot of really well articulated outrage from a lot of really really pissed off people in the comments, and a growing boycott. this is maybe already being talked about somewhere on ilx, i don't know, but yeah its fucking miserable and evil

not just this book but the whole de-ranking debacle

http://jezebel.com/5209088/why-is-amazon-removing-the-sales-rankings-from-gay-lesbian-books

i'm not buying it. amazon is blowing the PR on this big time, but pissing off the gay demographic doesn't make any sense for a bookstore. the giant bookstore chain i work for has a strict "DO ANYTHING YOU CAN TO COURT GAY CUSTOMERS, THEY SPEND A SHITLOAD OF MONEY" policy and it's been in place for a while.

Cover photo clearly promoting homosexuality.

I wondered what would happen on amazon.co.uk, and the first result for "homsexuality" is this:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/412VY7TKYBL._SS500_.jpg

The second is the first book mentioned.

guys just buy yr lit from better world books. shipping's always free within the u.s. and they give money to literacy programs. also, their "gay & lesbian" section is linked from the homepage.

http://www.betterworldbooks.com/

http://consumerist.com/5210678/former-employee-says-amazonfail-caused-by-the-french-well-by-one-of-them-at-least

I used the "mark as inappropriate" button on Amazon last week. (search for anal sex in the movies section--I thought a couple of those that display hardcore porn pictures were highly inappropriate). It's no longer there. I think the troll dude did it and Amazon doesn't want to admit it.

http://media.skynews.com/media/images/generated/2013/3/2/224253/default/v2/rape-1-522x293.jpg
http://news.sky.com/story/1059060/keep-calm-and-rape-t-shirts-a-mistake

"a mistake"

But a statement on the Solid Gold Bomb website insisted the offensive slogans had been "automatically generated using a scripted computer process running against hundreds of thousands of dictionary words".

"Needless to say, receiving death threats is certainly uncalled for as there was no intention of wrongdoing in any manner," the statement said.

"We're sorry for the ill-feeling this has caused! We're doing our best here to fix the problem.

"Any offensive items that are remaining are certainly in the deletion queue and will be removed as soon as the processing is complete."

jesus. i mean, that's all bullshit, right?

well I guess it's a p similar idea to this idakoos.com -> bizarre auto-generated t-shirts

which has a defined albeit batshit database of word combinations

taking these guys at their word about the generative process leaves it being merely extremely lazy and showing zero foresight as to what might happen

one of the commenters was like "BUT HOW DOES THIS GET TO THE POINT OF TAKING PRODUCT PHOTOS WITHOUT ANYONE NOTICING???" and I was smh so hard I fell outta my chair

these kind of snowcloning companies are weird but as the idakoos thing shows the results can be strangely compelling—I guess it must be a viable business model or there wouldn't be so many of them, right?

at any rate, there is probably an important lesson to be learned here. "exclude rape jokes from the domain of your novelty t-shirt generator"? idk

one of the commenters was like "BUT HOW DOES THIS GET TO THE POINT OF TAKING PRODUCT PHOTOS WITHOUT ANYONE NOTICING???" and I was smh so hard I fell outta my chair

― fiscal cliff racer (bernard snowy), Saturday, March 2, 2013 12:45 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Hahahahahahaaaa.