CrunchGear

What BS!!! Couldn’t get the page to come up, finally comes up and it’s gone. How were the systems bought? Who were these people who magically were able to connect?

The darn thing sold out before 11:02PST and it was frustrating to just get to that point.
Very dissapointing of Amazon not to think this one through a little better, I don’t think I’ll be renewing my Prime Membership.

Ohh by the way… anyone want a Mongoose bike?

I too suffered the same fate. I wasted valuable time that I could have spent eating squash.

I refreshed continuously, and was able to click to purchase, and prompted to complete an anti-fraud question (1 plus 1 equals?) and only then was I told they were sold out. Crestfallen.

People are filing complaints, so it seems.

BBB CASE#: 22096979, for example.

Should be interesting…

Oh me, oh my….

Pete,

I had the same issue. It seems to me that if you got to that step it should have been “holding” one for you. They definitely should have staggered them to make it more fair.

Ya same here, so disappointing. I could not even load the page. Who the heck bought 1000 units in 30 seconds?

I filed a complaint as well. BBB case # 22096984.

both myself and my brother were attempting this page on two different computers, I had both ie open and firefox open and both went down around 1:58 pm, I thought maybe my house clock was wrong when I finally got on the page around 2:01 I was asked what 4+1 was on both browsers, only to be told they were sold out…i’m with everyone here, it was impossible that they sold out that quickly, I think this was a drive to amazons website…the largest online retailer in the world and their site goes down…mysterious

the same problem with nintendo wii and sony ps3 - the site crashes…

This whole promotion was crap. I refreshed the page every 10 seconds from 10:57 to 11:00am PST and then the entire amazon.com site went down. When I finally got the page to come up everything was already soldout.

I have already bought Christmas gifts from Amazon.com and I’m returning them to buy at another retailer. This whole promotion sucked.

I sent a complaint into Amazon.com’s customer service department about the issue. A site of their size should have tested and been prepared for such a spike. Not only was the customer vote page down, but the entire site. I will follow-up with the Better Business Bureau complaint as well. I’ve always been happy with Amazon.com but this was ridiculous and very poor planning.

My wife and I were both reloading like crazy and I couldn’t get crap after 10:58. But she got a sold out notice at 10:59. Which of course spiked my blood pressure a little. Let’s just say I’d feel a lot better if someone would post that they actually got one.

BBB #22096986

I played this deal as well, using IE and Netscape, Netscape quickly refreshed at 2:00PM EST to the page with no Xbox 360 offering shown. In IE the page loaded till 2:04PM EST only to show that the Xbox 360 and been sold out.

I had been refreshing every 15 seconds before the time of the deal, but to no use.

You know I wonder if Amazon really actually have 1,000 Xbox 360 cores, because the way their “how to” guide of the deal works, it should of been who ever can login and answer the question first would get the deal, not which 1,000 users were randomly selected to win.

Angry customers have started a discussion on the Customer Vote Page. Be sure to throw in your two cents:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/discussionboard/discussion.html/102-0517620-0586535?ie=UTF8&cdForum=FxG25YX6U23CQ1&cdPage=36&cdItems=10&asin=&store=generic&cdSort=ByDateCreated&cdThread=Tx2OZ1YMRNMVV79&displayType=CVote&cdSortDir=Ascending&newContentID=MxX3395DI79ZFN#MxX3395DI79ZFN

I actually got in on this deal, Going to be a present for my brother….Im sorry for all you who didnt get in on the deal but like…….there shouldnt really be any reason to file at the BBB for this? They actually had the promotion… I ACTUALLY Got one….

To all that did not get the xbox 360 for $100, I know how ya feel, I refreshed continuously until 10:59 and then all shit went to hell. The page did not even load until 11:02 and after that I was told it was all sold out, but this is all in good fun. We should be grateful amazon even offered a $100 360. Just wait a couple more years and maybe you can purchase it at that price. Until then, stop complaining!

case # 22096988

If you are one of the estimated thousands upon thousands of people upset by the way Amazon handled this promotion, let your voice be heard by filing a complaint with the Better Business Bureau! Here is the direct link to start the complaint process. Remember, the customer is always right!!

http://seatac.ebindr.com/complaint/new/?bid=0007039385

I had downloaded the Atomic Clock timer from the NIST, hoping to get an X-Box 360 for $100. At 12:59 CST, I clicked the mouse. . . . . . . 7 minutes later I found out that I was a big loser of the X box sale. What a crock of BS.

Kyle, congratulations, really.

I filed a complaint with the BBB because of the business practice that took place (or didn’t happen for that matter), not for losing the opportunity for the promotion. The playing field was not level or fair and those that were not able to participate were offered the product but at the regular price when the site finally rebooted. Those individuals in large metropolitian areas and certain geographies were able to access the site over others based on their ISP and network routing. The lack of preparation and planning between marketing and IT resulted in a virtual bait-and-switch for thousands of consumers. Just start googling or reading the discussion groups and you’ll see that there is a huge segment of Amazon.com customers upset with the business practice. Amazon.com should have planned for the traffic spike and really had some good data to gauge this by the number of votes cast for the system in the week prior. While Amazon.com may have made a 1,000 (if there were really 1,000 units…I just have to take their word for it) customers happy, they certainly disgruntled thousands more in the process. If the BBB feels the complaints are unmerited, they will dismiss the complaints. I want the BBB to act as a third-party to investigate the actions that led to this behemoth of a snafu, and if merited, compel Amazon.com to offer a satisfactory resolution for those customers.

Ah, the official response from Amazon.com:

Hello from Amazon.com.

Please accept my sincere apology for the inconvenience that has
Caused.

We are very sorry to hear that you had difficulty using our site.
From our end, we have not had any server problems recently–it is
possible that the problem is with your provider, or somewhere in
between. If the problem was caused by high network traffic, you may
have more success by trying again at a different time.

We are pleased to utilize top of the line servers, internal routers
and network connections. Although we often wish we could affect this
problem, many issues regarding speed are actually a result of complex
routing patterns over the Internet itself. Even the best Internet
services can’t get around this fundamental problem.

Thank you for writing about purchasing “x box” as part of our Amazon
Customers Vote promotion. Unfortunately, this item is no longer
available at the promotional price. I’m sorry you were not able to
purchase the item at the price you desired before we sold out. It
may still be available for purchase from Amazon.com at the regular
price or from third-party sellers on our web site.

These discounted items are only available in limited quantities
immediately after the winners of Amazon Customers Vote go on sale
each week. You can vote, make purchases, and find more information
at our Amazon Customers Vote page:

http://www.amazon.com/customers-vote

Each week, we post information on how many units of each product are
available at the promotional price and when they can be purchased.
As soon as we sell out, we make every effort to put this information
on our Web site immediately.

If you have any further questions regarding this issue, please use
the direct link below to e- mail our appropriate department and
select a subject for your e-mail as “Other questions & comments”, so
that we can investigate further:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/contact-us/general-questions.html

Please copy and paste the URL into your web browser to reach the
specific page.

Rest assured that when we receive the email from you using the form
above, we will investigate and take any actions available to us to
resolve the problem.

However, if you require immediate assistance, here are our Customer
Service Department phone numbers:

Customer Service is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week

U.S. and Canada: 1-800-201-7575
International: 1-206-266-2992

Well continue working hard to ensure that you receive accurate
service, and to minimize the chances of anything like this occurring
again.

Thank you for your interest in Customers Vote and for doing your
holiday shopping at Amazon.com.

Please note: this e-mail was sent from an address that cannot accept
incoming e-mail.

To contact us about an unrelated issue, please visit the Help
section of our web site.

Best regards,

Swaminathan.T
Amazon.com Customer Service
http://www.amazon.com

What exactly are you people complaining about? You had your chance and you didn’t get it. Do you people file BBB cases when you don’t win the lottery? Hilarious.

So I was at the gas station right? Decided I was feeling lucky and bought a lottery ticket. I asked the gas station attendant what numbers should I pick, AND SHE GAVE ME THE WRONG NUMBERS! Oh yeah I filed a case with the BBB!/end whining and bitching… I’d hate to see what some of you post tomorrow after black Friday when stores are sold out of items. I swear

I filed a complaint - mostly because I want to know why some people saw web site crashes while others did not. Was it isolated geographical failures? And if that is so, how is it fair that because Amazon’s systems failed, we were not able to participate in this?

More than anything, I want to understand what happened (and I bet Amazon does too before they try this stunt again).

Rob

Yea, Its just like the Brick and Mortar stores that likst their available quantity of items. On black friday every year I dont see all of you going to the BBB and filing complaints on Wal-Mart or Best Buy. It just doesnt make sense. This is like a Door Buster item at any store. Except this is on the internet. Maybe its not Amazon who are messed up, maybe all of you just dont understand that its the same thing.

Bullshit.

webonics - It’s not Amazon’s fault you don’t have the same quality Internet connection as “those individuals in large metropolitian areas”. Did you file a BBB complaint when Target neglected to open a store in your front yard? then don’t complain when an online retailer doesn’t beat a path to your door. Do you expect Amazon to buy a bunch of bandwidth and servers just so a “traffic spike” can be accomodated and everyone can see a happy Amazon webpage?

Do you people have any idea how many browsers were refreshing Amazon’s page at 11am PST? I’m guessing millions, which is likely far more than 99% of the websites out there can handle at any one time. It’s completely conceivable that 1000 people (or 0.1% of 1M) made it through the purchasing process in seconds. I highly doubt there was a consipracy to manipulate IP routing so that a select few could nab a $100 Xbox 360. In fact, I know that my browsers were making it to the web frontends for amazon.com because I was seeing the SSL negotiation every time I hit refresh.

So don’t give me some bullshit about it not being fair. You can’t blame Amazon becaue you didn’t hit refresh at exactly the right second. Would you rather be waiting in line for a PS3, getting trampled and shot at?

-Paul

Except its a like a Door Buster sale where customers line up at the main entrance and then the store doesn’t open on time while other customers run in a side door and grab up all the product.

Seriously, no one is complaining about losing the lottery. There was no lottery! Your analogy is completely irrelevant. Besides, what does anyone care that someone else files a claim. If the BBB finds it to be illegitimate, they’ll dismiss it. At least they will investigate the matter and validate the situation.

Of the hundreds of postings that I’ve read today, no one has bitched about the depleted inventory. The complaints are about the tactical implementation of their marketing promotion and technical outage resulting that did not provide an equal opportunity for all customers. I work in an ad agency and oversee web and interactive campaigns everyday. If I ever executed a marketing tactic like the one on Amazon.com today, I would certainly be packing up my things on Monday.

The other factor that has really been overlooked is the displaced customers outside of the promotion. How many customers were in the middle of transactions and then could no longer complete the transaction. There is no telling how much lost commerce both today and long-term that was lost to this fumbled marketing promotion.

I currently have on my desk a review to add Amazon’s Elastic Computing Cloud to some of our high-traffic e-commerce clients. Clearly today’s outage was the real-world test that decided its fate for nixing on Monday.

At the end of the day, its a free economy. If anyone chooses to continue business or leave is FREE to do so. And BTW, word-of-mouth is both the best and worst advertising for any business.

I got as far as the secret question and then the site crashed and I was not able to go any further.

Even a former Amazon.com Engineer has penned a post about today’s snafu:
http://digital.reprintarticlesonline.com/Geeking_with_Greg/2006/11/24/Amazon_crashes_itself_with_promotion

I think that most people who got to the q&a part as I did are pissed that they didn’t hold the item then. Why get someone to that point at

Maybe this is just a way for Amazon to load test their servers against severe traffic spikes.

I live in large metropolitan area with a very fast and reliable ISP. I tried loading the page about 5 minutes before the promo started and the page never loaded I opened up a couple other tabs (firefox) and was able to connect to any other site including Amazon UK, with no problems. The page finally loaded for me 8 minutes after the hour. Even though I didnt expect to get the item I was pissed that the site was down for nearly 10+ minutes.

Somebody may have said this already, but the fault lies with everyone who clicked refresh every ten seconds. Amazon produced their own DDOS attack, and their greedy customers (me included) obliged them.

It’s funny. I had no expectation of winning. I’m just baffled how anyone one. I believe those who say they did win. I just can’t figure out what they did that made it possible to even gett to amazon.com.

I doubt Amazon rigged it, but I highly suspect that something went awry with their load balancing technique that allowed people with a different network path or maybe people on the same backbone to get through to the servers when no one else could.

I would llke an explanation of what happened to understand the networking implications, to reassure me about Amazon’s integrity, and to have any faith that future Amazon vote specials will work differently.

Sounds like Wal-mart had the same issue Friday morning with Black Friday web specials that they offered at 5AM. The Site crashed for nearly 4 hours.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15878137

I remember trying to win concert tickets on the radio, I’d have that number on speed dial, and still, I could never get through, always a busy signal.
One time I finally did win…
ANYWAY…you gotta look at the Amazon thing the same way, you have millions of people trying to connect at the same time, most of them are bound to get a ‘busy signal’.