Judging by the fallout from its decision to secretly remove books from people’s Kindles last week and, at first, to seemingly blame publishers for that action (see the earlier MobyLives story), all of which came on top of the announcement earlier in the week of a class-action lawsuit against the company for selling customized covers for Kindles that seemed to make the e-readers nonfunctional — well, it’s been a bad time for Amazon, one in which people began to ask themselves not do I want to buy ebooks or ebook readers anymore, but do I want to buy them from this creepy company? A company that didn’t even realize the stupefying idiocy — or give a damn about it — of removing copies of 1984, for God’s sake? After all, there are more and more alternative places to buy ebooks and ereaders. Big ones, too: As a MobyLives story reported a few days ago, Barnes & Noble just revitalized their online store ….

Now, in the latest installment, it seems the company still doesn’t get it. A week late, under cover of another big story that broke out this week (that of the arrest of Henry Louis Gates), and on the eve of the weekend — the slowest time in the news cycle, i.e. the time guaranteed to get the least attention — Jeff “Big Brother” Bezos has issued the following statement:

This is an apology for the way we previously handled illegally sold copies of 1984 and other novels on Kindle. Our “solution” to the problem was stupid, thoughtless, and painfully out of line with our principles. It is wholly self-inflicted, and we deserve the criticism we’ve received. We will use the scar tissue from this painful mistake to help make better decisions going forward, ones that match our mission.

With deep apology to our customers,

Jeff Bezos
Founder & CEO
Amazon.com

The statement also seems to be part of a diminishing “let’s-get-all-the-bad-news-over-with-at-once” move in that, also late yesterday, the company announced its quarterly results, which are the same as they are every quarter, and have been thus for years: sales were up (14% from a year ago) and yet profits were down (10% from a year ago), as this report from the Seattle Times details.

What it doesn’t detail — as none of the stories on Amazon’s financials ever do — is how the company has yet to make a profit. Ever. In its history.

Stocks fell in any event after the announcement, but now it’s hard to tell if they fell because of the bad quarterly statement, of if they fall because of the way-late “apology” statement.

But what does seem clear to some industry insiders is that this may be the moment people will be looking back to and saying, “That’s when the wheels started to come off.”