Amazon behaving badly

21.11.2008
Is the "world's biggest store" going through an awkward phase, or has it just gotten so arrogant that it no longer cares what its customers think?

First, the awkwardness. Cringester C. Z. visited Amazon's computing and Internet books page recently and found the following tome listed as the top best seller: YOU: Being Beautiful: The Owner's Manual to Inner and Outer Beauty.

No, this is not a book about Ubuntu. It's about "rediscovering your beauty... but not some superficial and vapid pursuit that belongs to the [pdf]."

When I visited the site, YOU was no longer on the computing bestseller list. But it is still listed . There's a 30-second video of the authors on the book's landing page: Dr. Mehmet Oz -- a normal-looking if not exactly telegenic person, and Dr. Mike Roizen, who, well, have you seen Beauty and the Beast? He's not the beauty.

(I'm sure he's gorgeous on the inside. But if you look like a troll on the outside, maybe you should hire an actor to hawk your beauty book. I'm just saying...)

Wait, it gets weirder. Being in the book trade himself, C. Z. was curious about how this happened, so he e-mailed a note inquiring why Amazon thinks a beauty book belongs in the computing department. He got back a response from "Ravikanth K" that, well, speaks for itself: