Experts scrutinize 2009's most notable IT apologies

Network World - We asked Peter Goolpacy and the team at Perfect Apology to rate the quality of the apologies issued by top tech companies and executives this year for their assorted mistakes and misdeeds. The following contains their reviews of the apologies and their ratings of the apologies on a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the best.

(Here are links to our original article on the "Year in IT Industry Apologies," which includes the complete apologies' text, and a slideshow featuring abbreviated versions of the apologies.)

Special report: Looking back at 2009, ahead to 2010

Amazon Kindle apology. Perfect Apology (PA) rating: 8.5

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos' apology for deleting illegally sold books from customers' Kindle devices, without any warning, was pretty impressive. Of course, his second apology to those whose copyrights the company abused by illegally selling these books is still pending -- no doubt for several reasons tied to ongoing litigations. The initial apology issued by Bezos was reinforced by additional apologies on the main Amazon web site -- together they satisfied many of the key ingredients we recommend throughout our site: acknowledging the stupidity of the error, taking full responsibility for the mistake, establishing new procedures to prevent unauthorized deletions in the future, and a refund to those who purchased the copies. Perhaps the most impressive part of this apology was the decision to change Amazon's deletion policy "so that in the future we will not remove books from customers' devices in these circumstances." Presumably, they continue to reserve the right to remove books from Kindles under different circumstances.There are two problems with the apology. First, Bezos could easily have conveyed a clearer appreciation of the harm done beyond simply acknowledging Amazon's stupidity -- the unauthorized deletions raise important issues tied to corporate control over personal property and privacy rights that must have seriously damaged the trust many Kindle users have in the company. Taking the books back was not the real problem (most users understood the importance of returning the 99 cent books) -- what really hurt was Amazon's decision to do this without any warning. The irony that one of the books in question was Orwell's 1984 was not missed by many.

Second, the apology certainly satisfied the important prerequisite of expressing regret and taking responsibility, but excessive self criticism (e.g., stupid, thoughtless, painful, self-inflicted, etc.) produces diminishing returns if not followed by some form of restitution -- in this case an immediate and "reasonable" refund. The question is whether the 99 cent refund was considered reasonable by most of the customers directly affected by the deletion. Once purchased (especially for only 99 cents) a book like Orwell's 1984 is far more valuable to the owner than the original 99 cents, so losing it was much more costly to them. Amazon's refund could have included a credit to defer at least some of the $9.99 cost to repurchase a legal copy of the book. This would have represented a more significant cost to Amazon and a clearer measure of responsibility and regret. However, judging by the responses on the Amazon blog, Bezos' apology seemed to hit the right note -- the replies were very positive.