4 ms·

How is is reasonable that people who don't work for Amazon be expected to speak like Amazon's marketing department?

willis936 6y ago
Or else. It’s bully behavior and should be setting off alarms at the FTC. Stunts like this should scare Amazon middle managers.
altitudinous 6y ago
They didn't demand it, they requested it. The recipient can say No, and they probably have.
Joe8Bit 6y ago
Reasonable or not, it's a super widespread practice for marketing and PR departments to 'insist' on certain language when their products are referred to. A super notorious example of this is Apple insisting/asking that their devices are referred to without any determiner like 'the' or 'an' e.g. 'We think THE iPhone is really important' to 'We think iPhone is really important'
- 867-5309 6y ago
  a bit like when referring to a deity: 'I love god' vs 'I love The God'
  - bonoboTP 6y ago
    In many non English languages it's common to say "the God" for the Abrahamic god.
    - Joker_vD 6y ago
      That is, in those languages that have definite article(s).
- willis936 6y ago
  This one really annoys me because they’re asking people to talk like idiots so that people can stop and think for a second, “Is this person an idiot?” to generate more interest in their product.
  - mola 6y ago
    No, that's not what they are after. They are after psychological influence. The removal of "The" cements the brand in people minds as the only one of its kind. iPhone is just an iota away from the generic term phone. These things seem miniscule, but when they are part of a large scale strategy they have a real effect.
    - willis936 6y ago
      The reality distortion field died with Jobs. That might be what they say, but it’s clearly a faulty logic. It would be an embarrassing case of self-congratulatory behavior if it’s truly the case that the marketing department thinks dropping “the” somehow transforms a proper noun into a regular noun.
dmix 6y ago
This is putting a lot of credit into the random marketing person’s grand evil plan, when in reality their job is busywork PR emails to outlets hoping they fix articles to make it sound better for the products in question. Companies like this hires tens of thousands and some people do dumb jobs. PR is mostly a pushing/prodding game with no guaranteed ROI, so they resort to weak attempts like this. It sounds distasteful with a light shown on it but it really isn’t too different to how most of the meat is made in the blogging industry as a whole. With these high output blogs mostly just repurposing corporate press release kits. I’m sure Vice only wrote the original blog post because some Amazon person emailed them a presser about this residential program, and Vice did their usual snarky article about it.
- mola 6y ago
  The fact that an entire industry is distateful doesn't make it ok. This sort of article, which shines this light, might make these companies think twice before "asking" to control the narrative.
fastball 6y ago
Referring to an Amazon Echo as a "microphone" is reductionist to the point where it could actually confuse readers as to what is being discussed. A smart speaker has a microphone, but it is not "a microphone". It would be like Tesla taking issue with someone calling their car "an electric motor". Sure it has those things, but that's not what it is. Totally reasonable change imo.
- ludamad 6y ago
  It's reasonable in a vacuum but "having an Amazon microphone in your home" is not the same as "having an echo device in your home." There is a clear intent
  - fastball 6y ago
    Yes, the clear intent is by the author of this article to use inaccurate language in order to scare-tactic readers into thinking Amazon just wants to spy on you. Amazon sells literal microphones in addition to the Echo. That sentence could be referring to literal microphones under the AmazonBasics brand for all I know.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- pwinnski 6y ago
  If the entire article repeatedly referred to the device as a microphone rather than by name, sure, that would be reductionist, and also silly. Fortunately, that's not what happened here, and the device is referred to consistently by brand name in the article. "While it’s natural to be chiefly concerned about privacy when your apartment comes with an Amazon microphone pre-installed, we should also be critical about where the data extracted from us ends up." In that one sentence, the actual one from the actual article, the word microphone is accurate and makes far more sense than anything else.

Or else. It’s bully behavior and should be setting off alarms at the FTC. Stunts like this should scare Amazon middle managers.

altitudinous 6y ago

They didn't demand it, they requested it. The recipient can say No, and they probably have.

Joe8Bit 6y ago

Reasonable or not, it's a super widespread practice for marketing and PR departments to 'insist' on certain language when their products are referred to. A super notorious example of this is Apple insisting/asking that their devices are referred to without any determiner like 'the' or 'an' e.g. 'We think THE iPhone is really important' to 'We think iPhone is really important'

867-5309 6y ago
a bit like when referring to a deity: 'I love god' vs 'I love The God'
- bonoboTP 6y ago
  In many non English languages it's common to say "the God" for the Abrahamic god.
  - Joker_vD 6y ago
    That is, in those languages that have definite article(s).
willis936 6y ago
This one really annoys me because they’re asking people to talk like idiots so that people can stop and think for a second, “Is this person an idiot?” to generate more interest in their product.
- mola 6y ago
  No, that's not what they are after. They are after psychological influence. The removal of "The" cements the brand in people minds as the only one of its kind. iPhone is just an iota away from the generic term phone. These things seem miniscule, but when they are part of a large scale strategy they have a real effect.
  - willis936 6y ago
    The reality distortion field died with Jobs. That might be what they say, but it’s clearly a faulty logic. It would be an embarrassing case of self-congratulatory behavior if it’s truly the case that the marketing department thinks dropping “the” somehow transforms a proper noun into a regular noun.

dmix 6y ago

This is putting a lot of credit into the random marketing person’s grand evil plan, when in reality their job is busywork PR emails to outlets hoping they fix articles to make it sound better for the products in question. Companies like this hires tens of thousands and some people do dumb jobs. PR is mostly a pushing/prodding game with no guaranteed ROI, so they resort to weak attempts like this. It sounds distasteful with a light shown on it but it really isn’t too different to how most of the meat is made in the blogging industry as a whole. With these high output blogs mostly just repurposing corporate press release kits. I’m sure Vice only wrote the original blog post because some Amazon person emailed them a presser about this residential program, and Vice did their usual snarky article about it.

mola 6y ago
The fact that an entire industry is distateful doesn't make it ok. This sort of article, which shines this light, might make these companies think twice before "asking" to control the narrative.

fastball 6y ago

Referring to an Amazon Echo as a "microphone" is reductionist to the point where it could actually confuse readers as to what is being discussed. A smart speaker has a microphone, but it is not "a microphone". It would be like Tesla taking issue with someone calling their car "an electric motor". Sure it has those things, but that's not what it is. Totally reasonable change imo.

ludamad 6y ago
It's reasonable in a vacuum but "having an Amazon microphone in your home" is not the same as "having an echo device in your home." There is a clear intent
- fastball 6y ago
  Yes, the clear intent is by the author of this article to use inaccurate language in order to scare-tactic readers into thinking Amazon just wants to spy on you. Amazon sells literal microphones in addition to the Echo. That sentence could be referring to literal microphones under the AmazonBasics brand for all I know.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
pwinnski 6y ago
If the entire article repeatedly referred to the device as a microphone rather than by name, sure, that would be reductionist, and also silly. Fortunately, that's not what happened here, and the device is referred to consistently by brand name in the article. "While it’s natural to be chiefly concerned about privacy when your apartment comes with an Amazon microphone pre-installed, we should also be critical about where the data extracted from us ends up." In that one sentence, the actual one from the actual article, the word microphone is accurate and makes far more sense than anything else.