I still think there is plenty of legal wiggle room to sound like a carbon-based lifeform. I am not really sure what legal case this would open them up to, but

I still think there is plenty of legal wiggle room to sound like a carbon-based lifeform. I am not really sure what legal case this would open them up to, but we have to assume they've consulted with their attorneys prior to writing the statement. There is also an opportunity cost to going all legal, which is the attrition of brand perception and customer relations. Apple managed to pull both off during Antennagate. Maybe Amazon cut the cord to US-East as a diversion and hoped that and the Apple keynote would distract from this screw-up. :P EDIT: Which is not to even touch on the subject of assuaging the fear that consumers might suddenly lose all access to their entire library in the cloud. There is a lot at stake here, and Amazon have done nothing to dispel this apprehension arisen in light of this event. It's not just a customer catastrophe, it's an e-book/Kindle catastrophe.