Really Applebee's?

I know I stated that my next blog post would be about marketing through visual social media sites, but this buzz on Applebee's was too good to pass up!
So I'm sure everyone knows the story: some server girl at Applebee's had a large party so the 18% gratuity was added to the check (as is all large parties)
Well a female pastor in the group decided to write, "I give god 10%, why do you get 18%?" (http://images.christianpost.com/full/58009/applebees-receipt-posted-to-reddit.jpg?w=262)
Which is an idiot comment because tithing on your income is completely different than tipping on a $30 check... (when no one made you go out to eat in the first place)
Anyways, a fellow employee saw the receipt, snatched a photo, and uploaded it to reddit...except she forgot to crop the signature out. So, Applebee's fired her.
She apparently deleted the photo and reposted it with the cropped out signature, but Internet enthusiasts determined who the pastor was and Applebee's Facebook feed filled with negative comments about firing the server.
Where Applebee's really messed up was with the power of social media. They repeated the same thing over and over and stated that everyone had the facts wrong. They basically ignored all negative comments and, in fact, deleted a post with over 20,000 negative comments (although they denied this).
It just got worse and worse, they actually at one point argued through Facebook with other users, and posted a statement while tagging users that made negative comments.
At this point it would have served Applebee's well to basically ignore the whole situation, rather than do a terrible job at attempting to fix it.
Applebee's should not have:
1. Responded to so many comments with the same reply
2. Tell everyone that they had the facts wrong, essentially angering them more
3. Tagged the users that made negative comments with the same status update over and over
4. Argued with negative commenters
5. They should have never ever deleted any negative comments because that looks as though you're trying to hide something

Maybe at this point Applebee's will consider taking a complete sabbatical, or hire a new social media marketing manager.