[Laakeri]

To me, the Jeff Dean's email sounds like this paper failed to cite some research and as a result made Google look less good than Google actually is. This sounds like somewhat minor academic mistake, but at the same time a major PR mistake.

[ska]

That sounds like something easily rectified, so why push for retracting the submission?

[fantod]

I think the logic is that the paper would need to be retracted, rectified, and then resubmitted. Since the submission deadline was already passed, resubmission would be impossible.

[ska]

Submissions deadline is typically for evaluation, not camera ready. It's not unusual for textual changes to make their way in after that point, either in response to reviewer or to improve the text in a way that doesn't fundamentally change the results.