
Amazon Accidentally Sold $13k Camera Gear for $100 on Prime Day - elijahparker
https://petapixel.com/2019/07/17/amazon-accidentally-sold-13000-camera-gear-for-100-on-prime-day/
======
sagebird
It’s kind of interesting- the asymmetry of moral expectations and entitlement.

If you accidentally purchased a bag of M&Ms from Amazon for 500 dollars
instead of 5, they will let you undo it. On the other hand, if the matter is
reversed, Amazon is expected to be a good sport and take the loss — even if
the purchase was made in bad faith (ie- knowing Amazon mis-priced it but
purchasing it anyways.)

I’m not going to entertain any counter arguments that Amazon deserves this
because they treat workers poorly or don’t pay taxes or whatever, those
arguments are orthogonal. The same behavior would happen with a company with
better public trust and respect. And it’s not like anyone is selling those
cameras to donate money to a warehouse worker in need.

I just think it’s amazing how frail people’s morality is, how it goes out the
window when certain conditions are met.

~~~
kartan
> It’s kind of interesting- the asymmetry of moral expectations and
> entitlement.

First, there is an asymmetry in power too. Amazon can afford to double check
or triple check everything if it makes economic sense.

Secondly, companies does not have morals. If you allow big corporations to
change prices as they see fit because there is a "mistake". Companies will
exploit that to their advantage with psychopathic precision.

You will get your package at home and then you will be informed that the price
"was a mistake" and was 10% more expensive. They will print prices in adverts
and then say that it was a mistake when people gets to the shop.

Companies are not human beings, as other comments already have said, to
involve morality in this issue makes no sense whatsoever.

The real question is: is this an efficient way of improving the consumers well
being? If this rules avoid companies of abusing price changes and labeling
anything as being a "mistake" and at the same time it encourages better
quality on price setting and the "punishment" is not big enough to send all
companies to foreclosure. Then it seems a very good deal.

It makes economic sense.

~~~
bko
> First, there is an asymmetry in power too. Amazon can afford to double check
> or triple check everything if it makes economic sense.

There's an asymmetry because Amazon can "afford" to double check everything?
How? They lists millions of items. You're only in the market for a few.
They're good at inventory management, but the scale is crazy which is why this
mispricing is happening. Besides, I don't see why them "being able to afford"
checking has to do with someone exploiting a mispricing, from a moral sense.
Are you punishing them for not doing so and creating a financial incentive to
be more prudent? Seems like a stretch.

> You will get your package at home and then you will be informed that the
> price "was a mistake" and was 10% more expensive. They will print prices in
> adverts and then say that it was a mistake when people gets to the shop.

It's ironic that many people still believe the narrative that corporations are
evil and would screw over their customers at any chance while at the same time
living through the greatest upheaval of popular consumer brands in history.
Amazon wouldn't do that not because of benevolence or legal reasons, but
because its not in their interest to upset and screw over repeat customers for
10% and the operational headache of somehow retrieving your item. Also
considering that Amazon receives billions from Prime and that would likely
drive down subscriptions. Some companies practice deceptive advertising, but
these are the companies that are primarily losing favor to new more honest
competitors due to the competition.

~~~
thrax
Repeat after me: Amazon is not a person. Why aren't you arguing against the
daily electrocution of toasters?

~~~
bko
Amazon is a corporation, essentially a legal structure meant to encompass a
group of investors. Investors range from its founder Jeff Bezos to small
investors holding Amazon shares in pension funds and 401ks. You too can buy
one share of Amazon for ~$2000 or invest in a low cost ETF that would own
Amazon. The value of the stock is driven partly by expectation of future
earnings. If Amazon were to lose future earnings relative to what investors
believe they will receive, the stock price will likely go down.

On the extreme lets say that Amazon stock goes to $0, it would reduce the
wealth of the world by about $1 trillion in stock valuation. That means that
$1 trillion disappears from people's accounts (with ~$100 billion disappearing
from Bezos' account). This would be wealth destruction no different from
simultaneously reaching into every person's wallet and removing some amount of
cash and burning it.

The whole "[corp] is not a person so [immoral act] is okay" is not productive.

~~~
throwawaylolx
>This would be wealth destruction no different from simultaneously reaching
into every person's wallet and removing some amount of cash and burning it.

Unrealised profits are very much different than physical cash.

~~~
bko
I own the stock and can sell it for $2000. If the value of the stock drops to
$0 and I can no longer get $2000 for the stock, it would be no different than
me losing $2000 cash

~~~
michaelt
If I have $0.50 cash and someone reaches into my wallet and takes it, is that
any different to if I've got a lottery ticket with an expected value of $0.50,
and the draw occurs and its value drops to $0 when it doesn't win?

Some would say that in the first case it's morally wrong to steal my cash,
whereas in the latter case I consented to the risk of my ticket losing when I
purchased it; and therefore performing a lottery draw is not an immoral act.

~~~
bko
Yes, if the Amazon model doesn't work out and you lose value, that's not
immoral. It just happened like your lottery. If the value decreases from
people stealing from Amazon then it is the same as going in your wallet and
taking the cash.

~~~
JetSpiegel
How is this "stealing", if Amazon advertised the price they sold the product
at?

------
acid__
I got in on this! I got a Sony A7R II and a 24-70 2.8 II I'd always wanted but
could never justify the purchase of. ($~3k value for $200)

A few observations:

\- Despite the extraordinary deal we got, my friends (who also made a
purchase) and I all have our joy offset by a feeling of regret that we didn't
order more. Greed!

\- Despite the fact that I couldn't justify the purchase before I owned them,
I now definitely don't want to sell the gear. A clear cut case of the
Endowment Effect in action [0]

\- A lot of people saying the orders are going to be cancelled -- seeing as I
currently have both body and lens in possession, I find that unlikely.

0\.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endowment_effect](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endowment_effect)

~~~
want2know
In the Netherlands this also happened some times on webshops.

And everytime a judge ruled people had to bring the goods back or should pay
the full amount.

The reason is that it is very clear for the buyer it is a mistake. And almost
all webshops have a legal notice about wrong or false prices.

~~~
Freak_NL
If I remember correctly, in these cases (bunk beds and televisions) the orders
were never fulfilled. The court ruled that a sales contract is not binding if
the buyer can reasonably suspect that the price shown is so absurdly low that
an error on the side of the seller is apparent.

That is, you can try to order the item, but the seller has no legal obligation
of fulfilling it if they can proof beyond reasonable doubt that a mistake was
made, and can return the money instead.

~~~
nickjj
> The court ruled that a sales contract is not binding if the buyer can
> reasonably suspect that the price shown is so absurdly low that an error on
> the side of the seller is apparent.

How can you prove something like that in court in this camera case?

For example, let's say you were just getting into photography and were window
shopping by browsing around Amazon's site.

You run into a camera that has a 4.7 average rating with 3,000+ reviews and
the example pictures that people were posting look great to you. You have no
idea about camera specs but you see it for $149, so you buy it. That doesn't
seem too unrealistic, especially not when phones cost $1,000. You could
totally think "oh, well $150 for just a camera sounds about right".

~~~
ryanmercer
>How can you prove something like that in court in this camera case?

Go look at the screenshots in the article it shows the prime savings at
checkout:

>Prime Savings -$1,204.52

That is a pretty clear indication that "wow, this is astronomically
discounted" which should reasonably clue any adult with their full mental
faculties in to "something strange is going on here".

~~~
michaelt
I have Steam sales offering me games with 90% off, Groupon offering me 88% off
a gym membership, and a local perpetually-going-out-of-business menswear shop
offering me 90% off everything. Amazon themselves advertise used books priced
from £0.01!

Admittedly, many camera enthusiasts probably knew the market rate for this
sort of equipment - but the fact something has a 90% discount doesn't
automatically prove it's mispriced.

~~~
ryanmercer
Software which is infinitely reproducible for (effectively) free once it is
made, is a lot different than high end lenses and very complicated cameras
with costly electronics and worked optical glass.

------
kls
Sounds to me like someone at Amazon is good at marketing. Let a few things go
for an insane deal, knowing it will hit the front page of every blog. Then
reap the rush of next years prime day with people scouring the site for
pricing "errors". Pretty cheap and effective marketing.

Kind of like a raffle but without having to get all the lawyers involved to
make sure you comply with raffle laws.

~~~
the_reformation
Even when literally losing thousands of dollars to honor a price advertised to
customers, HN manages to spin's Amazon's actions as somehow duplicitous.

~~~
girvo
Oh no, Amazon's profit margin!

Being less flip: it's a massive corporation, which by default don't really
care about consumers happiness directly, just that which is necessary for us
to part with our many. I find it hard to have sympathy for said corporation --
especially considering the power that they now wield over modern western
society.

And it wouldn't be the first time a corporation is duplicitous, that's for
sure. I don't personally think this was done on purpose, but I wouldn't be
surprised if it was.

~~~
harshaw
Having just spent time overnight dealing with customer pain I can assure that
we do care about customer happiness and talk about it every day.

------
danso
> _Others also reported that they successfully price matched gear at retailers
> such as Best Buy and Walmart._

Wow, this is incredible if true. Not just as a sign of how much these
traditional retailers will stick to their promises, but also how the
ostensible safeguards of brick-and-mortar/human-touch can still be subverted
by algorithmic error. I've never worked at retail but if I saw such a drastic
reduction I'd call my manager.

~~~
sharkweek
I'm not sure how far and wide the show Nathan For You reaches, but there's a
fantastic episode where he proposes a local electronics store mark TVs down to
$1 in order to buy up new inventory from Best Buy for his own store using
their price match policy.

Rather than trying to explain it poorly, I highly recommend everyone watch
this clip from the show:

[http://www.cc.com/video-clips/i6q9t5/nathan-for-you-the-
pric...](http://www.cc.com/video-clips/i6q9t5/nathan-for-you-the-price-match-
plan)

~~~
conductr
Never tried it but I’ve considered just editing the DOM to make Amazon page
show the price I want.

~~~
astura
When I've price matched before the associate pulled up the website on her
computer to prevent this.

------
nicwolff
A previous similar incident became a legendary in-joke over at MetaFilter 18
years ago:

 _Astounding. I can 't take a moral argument seriously from any of you who
jumped at the opportunity to take advantage of an honest mistake. I don't want
to hear ever again about greedy corporations or crooked politicians. You
people just showed that you're willing to turn a blind eye when it is to your
benefit. How does that make you any different from those you rail against?_ –
_posted by marknau at 6:45 PM on November 20, 2001 [4 favorites +] [!]_

 _We have cameras._ – _posted by NortonDC at 6:48 PM on November 20, 2001 [164
favorites +] [!]_

[https://www.metafilter.com/12512/#178067](https://www.metafilter.com/12512/#178067)

~~~
blakesterz
Wow, I remember that one!

I was just thinking recently it's hard to believe Mefi turned 20 years old
this summer, and then I realized MY site turns 20 years old this fall... I
know people feel old when their kids get old, but damn, having a website turn
twenty just makes me feel old.

~~~
DonHopkins
Ten more years and you won't be able to trust it any more.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Weinberg#%22Don't_trust_a...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Weinberg#%22Don't_trust_anyone_over_30%22)

~~~
firethief
See also:
[https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/5/1/eaau4586.full](https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/5/1/eaau4586.full)

------
ed
In California, at least, Amazon does not need to honor erroneous prices. Per
CA Civ Code § 7103 (2018):
[https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displayText.x...](https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displayText.xhtml?division=4.&part=5.5.&lawCode=CIV)

    
    
      7103. Improper pricing on the shelf or on the item due to unintentional error shall not constitute a violation of this division.

~~~
AJ007
My guess is they could request the item back, and if they really wanted to,
put a negative balance on your account effectively banning you from Amazon
without a return. Whether or not they would sue you or win and collect is a
different story.

All of this is assuming this was not an intentional PR test by Amazon for
Prime day. One would presume that that is possible.

~~~
windexh8er
As I understand this if it lands on your doorstep and wasn't reclaimed by
UPS/FedEx/USPS prior to that there's nothing they can do. They can ask you to
send it back, but you don't have to. If they made the transaction and it's in
your hands they can't put you in the red for the difference.

~~~
BinaryIdiot
Correct. Now, I highly doubt they'd do it, but Amazon could take some action
such as banning you from their services until you return the item. At which
point do you want to own the item more than using Amazon? Could be a tough
choice for some.

Though I still don't think they'd do that.

------
WalterBright
Amazon would be within their rights to refuse to honor such purchases. I also
don't think it's ethical to take advantage of such mistakes. What if it was
you who accidentally listed your house for $60,000 rather than $600,000? What
if you accidentally included an extra 0 on the check you wrote?

~~~
guelo
In my ethical framework it is more than fine to take advantage of a mistake by
one of the largest companies in the world. They'll take advantage of you if
given the chance.

~~~
tomcam
At what size company would your ethics require you to reverse course and treat
them the way you would like to be treated if you had made the mistake?

~~~
ridaj
Whose mistakes is it ok to take advantage from? It's hard to draw a bright
line to split the continuum that goes from, say, the neighborhood nonprofit
shop that employs homeless and disabled people from the community, all the way
to a ruthless global mega corporation such as Amazon, but that doesn't mean
that one's ethics are crooked if it draws a distinction between cases where
it's OK and cases where it's wrong.

------
huangc10
They will cancel majority of the purchases. However, if you were smart, you'd
have chosen 1 day shipping and have received the item.

Me? I was not smart and did not select 1 day shipping so it looks like my
order will most likely be canceled once Amazon deals with this...

~~~
wsxcde
Nah, the blowback they'd get from not honoring the purchasing would be
terrible. More generally, Amazon are one of the few companies who understand
that short term losses can lead to long-term goodwill and profit.

So anyway, my prediction is that they will do nothing about your purchase.

~~~
what_ever
Eh, no one is going to stop using Amazon if Amazon didn't honor 2k camera for
$94.

~~~
inferiorhuman
_Eh, no one is going to stop using Amazon if Amazon didn 't honor 2k camera
for $94. _

Probably, but people might be disinclined to pay attention to prime day next
year. It's definitely lost a lot of its luster now that Amazon mostly hawks
their own cheap crap that nobody's that interested in.

Me? I could see this easily being an accident that someone decided to let
ride. Maybe they cancel a few orders, but I doubt they'd cancel most or all of
them.

~~~
what_ever
Well most of the people found these deals are the ones who will understand it.

------
sosuke
I like the comment suggesting articles like that being banned. That lens has
been one of my dreams for years now for birding. Though 800mm is kinda
ridiculous and probably impossible to hand hold.

I did nearly get lucky like this some years back when Walmart $100 gift cards
were on sale for $10. All my orders were cancelled. It seems like several of
these Amazon orders have been delivered.

~~~
benjohnson
>>Though 800mm is kinda ridiculous and probably impossible to hand hold

If you have a bit of DIY spirit - You can get a decent 4" Newtonian telescope,
porro prism and an intermediate lens and adapter to play around with and see
if you like it for much cheaper - roughly $1200

Bonus: For $45 you can get a solar filter and take snazzy photos of partial
eclipses.

~~~
sosuke
Yes! I looked into some mirror lens options too trying to get the price down
more. It turns out that doing a zoom/crop on the computer afterwards gives me
the same or better results apparently. I haven't thought about a telescope
though that would be sweet for pictures of nests.

------
dfeojm-zlib
IANAL. Any U.S.-based lawyers out here?

I believe a listed price is an "invitation to treat" which means a retailer
can charge whatever they like regardless of listed price (whether in a
physical or online store), but at what point can't an online retailer
cancel/back-out of a transaction? Let's say the merchant and buyer are both
California-based for simplicity. Would it be legally similar to "theft by
discovery" (e.g., taking money falling out from an overturned armored truck)
for accepting goods sold at an excessive, erroneous discount? Or would it
require proving intent on part of the buyer that the price was a serious
mistake they deliberately acted in bad-faith to exploit?

Let's say the (over-simplified) phases of a transaction are:

1\. Agreed - Buyer clicks "Buy".

2\. Paid - Payment is posted.

3\. Shipped out - The product leaves the custody of the merchant.

4\. Received - Customer receives the product.

~~~
paranoidrobot
I'm also not a lawyer, but they have the ability to correct the error right up
until it's delivered to you - every online retailer has something like that in
their T&Cs. There's been plenty of cases where retailers have cancelled order
and refunded any moneys paid and customers have had no recourse to enforce the
contract.

After you've got the goods in your hands - well, there's likely a lot less
they can do about it.

Some resources for the US here: [https://smallbusiness.chron.com/company-
advertising-price-wr...](https://smallbusiness.chron.com/company-advertising-
price-wrong-responsible-mistake-73117.html)

Changing the price after the fact, or demanding you return it - well... That
could end up with them in a whole lot of hot water themselves.

------
madrox
I remember something similar happened at Best Buy 15 years ago with a high end
nvidia card. I bought one, but Best Buy obviously chose not to fulfill on the
glitch. I wasn't surprised or disappointed. I _was_ surprised at how many
people felt entitled to it, though. The number of calls to boycott Best Buy
over it seemed insane.

I wonder how many people will feel entitled to Amazon honoring this glitch.

~~~
m463
I thought there were advertising laws that required stores to honor their
flyers, but I don't know how that translated to the online world.

The idea was, print a "price glitch", people come into stores, "so sorry that
was a mistake", people still buy stuff... Then laws were enacted.

~~~
madrox
I don't know either, but I know I didn't get my video card and got refunded.

------
ericmuyser
I doubt they will cancel the orders. Amazon lives by customer service. They
seem to just write off their mistakes directly from revenue. I learned this
when I was scammed for a $5000 and Amazon let the scammer keep, refunded me
and closed the issue in one fell swoop.

~~~
rwc
Amazon is less customer-friendly than ever before. They refused to adjust a TV
I purchased 7 days ago to the Prime Day pricing which was $400 off. The only
solution according to them was to purchase another TV at the Prime pricing and
return the original. That's unfriendly to the customer, it's unfriendly to the
planet, and it's unfriendly to Amazon's bottom line. An all-around disaster.

~~~
zrobotics
Not trying to pick a fight, I'm genuinely curious- why should Amazon be
expected to do that? Even with their attitude for good customer service, if
you purchased an item a week ago why should they give you money now because it
is on sale? Prime day isn't exactly a secret, I would say the fair argument
here is that you wanted a TV in a hurry and weren't interested in waiting for
the sale. Otherwise, should they also refund me 60% of the 2k I spent 2 years
ago on my last desktop PC?

~~~
rwc
It's standard practice in retail that price adjustments are made if a price
cut happens within the return period of the purchase.

~~~
zrobotics
This starts to make sense to me after reading the sister comments. Within the
return period, environmentally it does make sense (CO2 costs of shipping a
large TV aren't negligible). I may not be savvy enough, if I see an item I
bought on sale I don't think "I should return this and buy the same item" but
it does make perfect sense to do so.

If i see an item I bought on sale I think "damn, I missed out", but a rational
consumer (economics sense) would think "I should return this and buy another".
I just approached the question from my typical viewpoint, which is "you buy
it, you own it" and not expecting any additional customer support.

That, and social anxiety means I would be far more comfortable paying the
extra $400 than bugging an associate for a refund.

------
ironSkillet
My favorite ecommerce glitch was a guitar center coupon for $50 off being
usable an unlimited number of times. I didn't push my luck and only applied it
a few times. Surprisingly they honored it and I got a bunch of miscellaneous
guitar accessories for free.

~~~
benjohnson
Back in the 1998 there was one website that let you enter negative values into
the quantities to zero out the cost of other items. I notified them quickly
and they let my order though as a way of saying 'thanks'.

~~~
ikeboy
Did this once for credit card rewards redemption along with another glitch
allowing one to set the amount of rewards that would be deducted and made out
with 20k in gift cards. Lasted a few weeks then died.

------
readhn
I'll go on and say something, perhaps, controversial.

This "price mistake" was not a mistake at all. This was intentional move by
amazon to attract publicity.

Once these news spread, people will remember. And next year they will have a
few extra million people browsing amazon "looking for that super deal".

This "price mistake" is simply part of the advertising/marketing stratagy by
amazon to create extra excitement about prime day.

People will be coming back for years ... looking for that 100$ super lens.
This is money well spent.

WELL DONE AMAZON MARKETING GURUS!!!

------
jamessb
There was a similar incident in 2001:

> Amazon messes up a 'Buy this camera and get that bag free" promotion to be
> "Buy this bag and get that camera free." As a result you can get a $350
> Minolta Maxxum SLR for $40.

[https://www.metafilter.com/12512/#178067](https://www.metafilter.com/12512/#178067)

------
dustinmoris
Does anyone know if someone tried to order a ridiculous amount of the 13k Sony
zoom lens? If I would have noticed this pricing error still in time to place
an order I wouldn't have wasted a minute to think what I want, I would have
ordered 100-1000 lenses worth 13000 for 95 each and later sold them on eBay
for 10k each and bought myself a Tesla or something...

Why don't I read an actually interesting story about this pricing error, who
cares that some people got a single item discounted... That's as interesting
as someone winning $300 in the lottery. Happens all the time, not worth a
story otherwise...

------
lanrh1836
Given the algorithmic pricing on a lot of things (everything?) sold on Amazon
there’s probably money to be made building some bot that checks for pricing
mistakes and buys when one is found.

~~~
travmatt
I believe this was common on eBay. People also looked for common misspellings
of items, misspellings that would lead items to get fewer ids and usually end
underpriced relative to similar items.

~~~
zrobotics
I don't have this automated, but this is definitely still a thing, at least
for used test equipment. I'm not clever enough to automate it fully, since
often constructing the search terms is fairly difficult, but I definitely have
scored some incredible deals ($40 for a perfectly fine HP spectrum analyzer a
month ago). The only automation is some simple greasemonkey scripts, but there
are definitely deals to be had on mis-categorized items. Likely this works
best on specialized equipment that the average bulk auction buyer doesn't
recognize, I would suspect that most industrial/scientific equipment would
apply. This certainly won't apply to consumer items like a laptop though, the
item has to be esoteric enough that a non-expert has difficulty even
determining what it is.

~~~
travmatt
Most I believe use all words within a given Levenshtein distance.

------
docker_up
This is an unintentional by-product of shipping so quickly. As Amazon moves to
quicker and quicker shipping policies, it means that errors like this can't be
reversed in time.

I would imagine that Amazon could threaten to close the customer's account if
they refused to return the camera equipment but that might be a bit extreme
and might be very bad press.

~~~
lysp
You'd think they'd add a fail-safe into their systems just in case for these
circumstances.

eg.

* If SalePrice < (0.25 x CostPrice) - Delay Order

* If (CostPrice - SalesPrice) > $500 - Delay Order

~~~
sagebird
Obligatory Boeing edition:

* If trim adjust > 2.5deg { deactivate mcas }

------
foota
Hm, seems this post would have been more actionable a couple days ago :-)

~~~
huangc10
The deal (price mistake?) was only available for like 1 hr around 10 or 11 pm
PST Monday night...but enough time for hundreds of mistaken orders.

------
sagebird
Some think this is a marketing gimmick. I don’t:

1\. They would not be able to resist making the price a cute number, like
Prime day’s date, eg $7.16

2\. They would later claim intentionality to not seem incompetent.

3\. If they stuck to a product category, they would pick a category of
mainstream or sympathetic appeal. Eg: pool toys for summer fun, back to school
items, gaming pc or kids clothes.

4\. They would bake in stop loss prevention. IE putting a per account quantity
cap in place, and a global quantity cap.

I’m kind of surprised at many people thinking it was intentional— it’s a good
use of imagination but going a bit deeper the execution does not fit with any
imaginary world I can envision.

------
hello_tyler
Amazon can eat that loss without batting an eye. If it's resellers, etc, I'm
not sure how the situation would be remedied. I think cancelling the orders
would be fair, because some small camera shop can't be expected to eat the
same losses as the #2 multinational retailer. While I wish I had gotten one of
those cameras, as 10kUSD would completely change my life, I can understand
both sides I think...

If it was Amazon it would be the best PR for the next prime day you could
think of. People will be scouring the site for these kind of deals next year.

------
one2zero
What nobody is touching on here is that there are UPP/MAP restrictions on many
items from different manufacturers. You'll see notice this in action when you
see a price that's obfuscated behind some magical "add to cart" wall.

Regardless of the PR value here (which is worth more than this stunt IMO) I'm
going to bet there are going to be more than a few MFRs whipping out their
contracts for some type of damages here based on those ULP/MAP guidelines. The
cost here is going to be much more than the gross loss on the items
individually.

------
bogwog
What if this was done on purpose to increase hype for the next Prime Day?
They'll probably cancel the orders anyways, and there will some people who
will visit Amazon on prime day hoping to score a ridiculous deal, only to
settle on buying some random shit.

~~~
_fat_santa
The guys shows a picture of him getting the gear down at the bottom of the
article.

------
habosa
Leaving aside the question of right or wrong, I have always thought that the
pride people take when they "beat" a large corporation is one of the most
fundamentally American things there is.

How many times has someone given you a tip on what lie to tell to a customer
service agent to get what you want? How many websites are there devoted to
jumping on airline ticket pricing errors? How many times can you think of
someone telling you their insurance paid out more than their loss was worth?

In some circles this even extends into taxes. People brag about how they
minimize their tax burden even though that means the person you're bragging to
will be the one receiving less govt. services. We have a president now who
brags about not paying much in taxes, even though his current job would be
meaningless without them!

I think in a purely capitalistic society, this is all rational behavior. But
it's also the reason we have such antagonistic relationships with
corporations. Both sides look to screw each other at the slightest hint of
weakness.

This is the internet so I am sure I will be told which side is right, but
that's really not what I am getting at. I just find the dynamic so
interesting.

------
Accacin
Yeah, it's Amazon losing money.. Big deal. However it does make me wonder the
same people that jump on these kind of deals and justify it (rightly or
wrongly) would do it to a much smaller company or even a person that's selling
something.

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eigenvalue
Taking advantage of this "deal" is obviously morally untenable if you stop and
think about it. Rather than posing the hypothetical of flipping it around
between vendor and customer (i.e., "Would you be OK with it if Amazon charged
you more?"), consider the case where it was a local mom and pop camera shop
that made this mistake on its website. Then you would probably feel terrible
about exploiting this and would be fine with the company requesting the
merchandise be returned, say with a $100 store credit.

Now ask yourself why this scenario is really different from the store being
Amazon from a moral standpoint. If you're being intellectually honest with
yourself, you will conclude that it's the same reasoning that would support
the idea that it's OK to steal from people as long as they are very rich and
won't miss the money.

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akerro
This happens a lot with HDDs and SSDs. At least once per month I get a
notification about disks being really cheap. Looks like sellers make mistakes
and put wrong numbers to quantity/price boxes. Most often orders are
cancelled.

------
miguelmota
The customer is always right. Doubt Amazon will do anything about the
customers that already received their merchandise. Hard learned lesson for
Amazon and probably sucks to be the engineers dealing with the postmortem.

------
Animats
If I saw cheap photo equipment on Amazon, I'd assume it was some knockoff. It
might be good, or not. I mean, really, how much does it cost to make a camera
back? It's simpler than a smartphone.

~~~
wrboyce
I believe they were being sold from the official Sony storefront.

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sb636
A part of me wonders if this is a calculated marketing move for next years
prime day. "Hey remember last year when $13k cameras were priced for $100?
Lets see if that happens this year!"

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devoply
I recently "got" free echos from Amazon pricing error only to see the orders
get cancelled and a single echo shipped at the normal prime day pricing though
that was not what I agreed to.

~~~
casefields
I got a couple of those as well but that's in a different ballpark then this
goof up. Plus those were Amazons products.

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tudorw
The markup on this gear is probably insane, it has a limited shelf life, if I
told Amazon they could get this many column inches of good will for a few 100k
they'd jump on it :)

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IloveHN84
Unfortunately this happened in US, while in EU the price was correct

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dvdbloc
Is there even any evidence that this was an accident? From what I’ve seen,
there is no evidence that this wasn’t on purpose despite everyone stating it
was surely an accident.

------
philip1209
This bug probably cost Amazon far far far less than last year's prime day
outage.

Also, it got them free press coverage. This could have totally been
intentional.

------
nikolay
It's a marketing gimmick: lose a bit from a few products to ensure crowds
looking for the same "mistakes" on next Prime Day.

------
OrgNet
I got a $20 credit/gift card for a canceled HD purchase that was priced
wrong... maybe you will get a $200 credit in this case?

------
RocketSyntax
Ughh. That's the newest version of my pseudo broken camera and the tele lens
I've wanted forever.

------
bgrynol
Retail arbitrage at its finest!

Even the big players make mistakes that are completely avoidable with proper
oversight

Love this so much <3

------
booleanbetrayal
How much do you want to bet that Amazon sacrifices small-volume margin losses
for ridiculous press ROI?

------
hn23
To me this is a really cool marketing stunt to bring even more people to
Amazon prime.

------
distant_hat
Knowing something about Amazon, some team is going to miss a few nights of
sleep.

------
lwhi
"Amazon Prime Day gets global marketing campaign for less than $200k"

------
dusted
Aww, I wish I'd gotten in on that, could really use that sigma thing ^_^

------
henvic
I'd make an order and immediately ask Amazon if I can keep it or if it was an
error.

Why? How come can I know for sure this is an error and not, say, a marketing
strategy to show up for free on big news outlets?

Free publicity for the company and a free expensive product for me. They would
be just using me to earn some publicity space, and I would be compensated a
lot by it. Being a libertarian, I don't see any problem with this free trade.

Except, it was probably a huge mess on their pricing system. As this might be
the case, if they wanted to cancel my order, I wouldn't complain at all.

What about if it was an error that turned out to be great for them because it
drove more access to the camera area and they sold twice what they expected,
and they admit it? I'd still be interested in returning the camera because I
don't want to take advantage of an error, but I'd ask nicely if I can keep it
and make it clear I have no intention to fight or complain if they said 'no'.

------
egfx
Wow, and I thought I had it good with the HP fire sale years back.

~~~
davidkuhta
or the great Walmart "sale" of 2013 where everything was ~$9.

------
hermitdev
Didn't get on this, but reminds me of when Amazon didnt collect sales tax for
states they didn't operate in. Was able to save about $300 on a stereo
purchase because of that back in the day...

------
s09dfhks
Dam. Wish I had noticed! Been on the hunt for a 70-300

~~~
sosuke
The Canon EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS II USM was worth every penny. I've had it for
10 years now and it is still wonderful.

~~~
altcognito
If your pictures are the sunny outdoors and not indoors, a long slow lens is
almost certainly a better value than the typical 75-200 2.8.

------
growt
Thats brilliant marketing (intentional or not), because in my mind prime day
is amazon selling of their crap. The last years there was not a single item I
was interested in.

------
sarahhudson
This is great for Amazon publicity wise.

~~~
gyc
This is what I'm thinking. Take a small (for Amazon) that will be dwarfed by
people who sign up for or renew Prime memberships hoping to luck out on a
similar deal in the future.

~~~
zootam
according to random people in the slickdeals thread the loss was $16 million

~~~
readhn
Companies pay a whopping $5 million to run a 30-second ad during the Super
Bowl....

This super sale (if everyone gets what they ordered) will have much deeper
impact than a 30 second commercial.

Believe next year, millions more people wil be looking for deals on amazon on
prime day....

Well executed "price mistake" ;)

------
ryanmercer
Oof! Someone's losing their job.

------
deepsun
Good promo!

------
AporPoor
aporpoor@gmail.com

------
iam_varunnair
What?

------
tamrix
Or it's a cheap PR stunt.

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throwaway13000
It doesn't matter. They will simply cancel the order citing some TOS. (Source.
Used to work at Walmart)

------
kingkawn
Maybe an intentional amazon move to take some losses but destroy B&H’s hold on
high end photography

------
Tyrannosaur
What are the guesses as to how this happened? At the risk of sounding
conspiratorial I propose that sometimes these "accidents" are less accidental
than they claim. So much hype over this has got to be worth something.

~~~
readhn
this was no accident. their pricing mechanisms are top notch. this is a
marketing move!

