CYBERLAW
When A Piece of Blue Sky, a book critical of the Church of Scientology, suddenly disappeared from Amazon.com's online catalog early this year, newsgroups such as alt.religion.scientology buzzed with conspiracy theories.
Then, in June, Amazon.co.uk, the online bookseller's British division, expunged a controversial book, The Committee, which implicates David Trimble, head of the Ulster Unionist Party, in atrocities against Catholics.
Amazon's decision to remove two books from its online list demonstrates the perils of balancing a billion-dollar book business with a stated commitment to offer as many titles as possible. In both cases, Amazon.com chose to protect its investment rather than the books, restricting the sale of a printed work without any court ordering it to do so.
In the case of The Committee, Trimble's solicitors claimed that Amazon.co.uk was liable for the book's alleged defamation of the Northern Irish leader, who won a 1998 Nobel Peace Prize. Amazon.co.uk's attorneys chose not to test the issue in court, and the bookseller blocked further sales of the book from its UK site. (Amazon.com still carries the book, so UK customers can purchase it there.)
The controversy over A Piece of Blue Sky, like most matters involving the Church of Scientology, is far more byzantine. The book's removal was sparked by legal threats from Margaret Hodkin, a subject in author Jon Atack's harsh exposé of the church. An English court had ruled in favor of Hodkin in a libel action against Atack in 1995, and her lawyers now demanded that Amazon.com remove the title from its catalog.
On the advice of counsel, Amazon.com eliminated A Piece of Blue Sky from its log in February. The move didn't become public until May, when alt.religion.scientology watchdogs accused Amazon.com of caving in to church pressure.
The Church of Scientology has been aggressively going after online content it deems objectionable. In June, a group affiliated with the church pressured AT&T to reveal the identity of a critic using the company's WorldNet service to post Scientology secrets in alleged violation of copyrights.
Amazon.com general manager Carl Gish, the executive responsible for what the site sells, denies the company succumbed to church pressure. But he concedes, "We overreacted. It was the wrong decision. Because we don't have the constraints of a physical bookstore, we're held to a higher standard - as we should be."
Less than four months after Atack's book was removed (and hours after the online news media picked up the story), A Piece of Blue Sky was back for sale at Amazon.com. The book's sales immediately skyrocketed, with the title briefly making Amazon.com's top 100 best-sellers list. Now, the University of California Press is considering publishing a new hardcover edition.
Despite the book's reinstatement, Amazon's snap decision to ban two books in the face of legal threats seemingly contradicts the high-minded free-speech ideals the company often spouts. But perhaps the billion-dollar bookseller that has yet to turn a profit has learned to live with contradiction.
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