When all the crap came down
about books being pulled from Amazon and other distributors, I started trying
to figure out what was going on and contacted several of my geek friends. As
near as we can determine the various ebook distributors are using software that
scans uploaded ebooks for various terms that may indicate abusive or offensive
material.
What are these words? No one
knows and no one can get answers. I know this because my geek colleagues and I
have tried to get those answers.
Why can’t we get answers?
Because the sysadmin or a committee will set the parameters for the search
terms and this is based on their terms of service and personal opinions of what
constitutes offensive material.
Subjective much?
What does that mean? It means that any ebook containing
words like “rape”, or phrases that may indicate nonconsent or dubious consent,
or incestuous relationships, bondage, domination, submission, sadism,
masochism, or any number of other words and phrases as determined by nebulous
authorities will be pulled by the computer.
Yes, you read that right –
some nameless, faceless individual guided by extremely ambiguous terms of
service and guidelines, and their personal opinion inputs arbitrary words and
phrases as search criteria, then turns the computer loose to pull ebooks
because they have been determined to be pornography, abusive, offensive or just
something a few zealots have determined is “undesirable”.
Yes, the implication is
correct. Adults are being told
what they can and can’t read, even in the face of the US Constitution and the
US Supreme Court rulings regarding pornography. See the thumbnails of the cases cited here :
Keep in mind, that no one
has an argument with the ruling that adults have the right to restrict what
children will be able to access, but I’m talking about what ADULTS can access
and purchase.
Then there is the issue of interference
with a person’s livelihood since writing is, in fact, a job.
As long as we’re discussing
subjective criteria for undesirable, offensive material, then I’d like an answer
to this question: Why is the Fifty
Shades of Grey Trilogy still for sale?
Amazon is, without
qualification/argument, the largest book distributor in the world. Where goes
Amazon, so go the rest of the lemmings.
So, as an author what can you do?
As a reader, what can you do?
Authors:
Email your Amazon contact
and request SPECIFIC REASONS why they have removed your book(s). Do not settle
for anything less than a very detailed explanation. In many cases, when a human takes a look at the books, they
are reinstated because there was really nothing wrong in the first place. That doesn’t help you with your lost
sales during the period when the book was blocked, but at least it’ll be back up and available for sale.
UK authors: Until your new obscenity laws are
challenged through your courts, you are pretty much SOL, but I would suggest
that you do the same. Email and demand a detailed explanation of why your
book(s) was/were removed/blocked.
Readers:
Now, here is where the real
power lies – money. Our wallets have incredible power. I personally purchase
close to 1000 (one thousand – and you did read that right) books PER YEAR. I
have the receipts to prove it. And
my numbers sometimes don’t even come close to some other folks’ numbers. The
point is, I’m not the only one who buys up in the high hundreds of books per
year. Do the math and then think about that incredible amount of revenue.
Now you understand just
where the power lies, right? So how do we use it?
We sit down and email Amazon
AND we write to Jeff Bezos AND we pick up the phone and call Amazon’s global
headquarters:
Jeffrey Bezos, CEO
Amazon Incorporated
Headquarters
410 Terry Avenue North
Seattle, Washington USA 98109
Phone: +1-206-266-1000
If you call, you want to
speak to the VP in charge of customer relations.
When you write or call, do
NOT get emotional. Talk
money. Tell them how much you
spend on books per year. Tell them
about the other products you order from Amazon. Tell them that you have no
problem with switching over to some other ereader because there are free apps
out there for the other readers available on the market, and there is file
converter software like Calibre that can convert the proprietary files. Make no
bones about the fact that you will go elsewhere to purchase the other products
Amazon sells. Make the point that
Amazon is NOT the only game in town and you will take your business elsewhere.
Not only that, you will encourage your friends on Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and
any other social networking media you use to do the same. And, oh, by the way,
some of those friends out there are probably Amazon stockholders. Jus’ sayin’…
Amazon will act like it
really doesn’t make a difference to them, that they are sorry to see you go
(remember, to them you are just one small fish in a big sea). The thing is, if
enough people protest and boycott, Amazon will get the message and learn the
same lesson just like PayPal did.
Remember: When talking to big corporations, leave
the emotion at the door or in your closet. TALK NUMBERS. This is the only language they speak.
Speaking of numbers…Think
about this: Amazon Prime charges
$79.00/year for membership. Yes, you do get a good bang for your buck. BUT… if 10 Prime members cancel their
membership, that’s lost revenue of $790.00 per year, if 1000 members cancel
that’s $79,000/year. If 100,000
members cancel because they will not sit still for this crap that is 7.9
MILLION per year in lost revenue.
Now, those numbers are not chump change to stockholders. And 100,000
possible dropped Prime memberships is not an impossible number thanks to the
prevalence of various social media out there. Some of us use several social
networking sites.
One last thing, if they tell
you that they are filtering results (which is what they tried to pull with me),
insist that they give you instructions on how to turn off any filters. I’m
still waiting on a reply to that question.
If you don’t act, one
morning you’ll wake up and the zealots, corporations and lazy parents will have
determined what you can and can’t read.
Is that really what you want?
EDITED TO ADD FOLLOW-UP COMMENT: There does seem to be a pattern after all. Attention authors: Watch those titles. Words like CAPTIVE, RAPE, DAUGHTER, DADDY, various animals, TAKEN, etc. will probably get your book flagged. Just remember, be sure to contact the distributor and demand a detailed explanation of why your book(s) was/were taken down.
EDITED TO ADD FOLLOW-UP COMMENT: There does seem to be a pattern after all. Attention authors: Watch those titles. Words like CAPTIVE, RAPE, DAUGHTER, DADDY, various animals, TAKEN, etc. will probably get your book flagged. Just remember, be sure to contact the distributor and demand a detailed explanation of why your book(s) was/were taken down.
