See on Scoop.it – Writing and reading fiction
Change.org has a petition against Amazon, requesting that they stop removing book reviews without warning, explanation or appeal. Authors (especially Indie authors) have lost reviews and they can’t get them back. We work too hard to get any reviews in the first place to have them ripped away by an indiscriminate bot with an erroneous algorithym. If you agree, please sign the petition against this overreaction and overcorrection. I’m more concerned about freedom of speech, lost book sales and time stolen from reviewers than bad book reviews.
For more on this issue, read JA Korath’s blog at http://jakonrath.blogspot.ca.
For your consideration… ~ Chazz
See on www.change.org
Filed under: publishing
C h a z z W r i t e s . c o m 
I’ve lost a few key reviews (great ones, unfortunately). I can say for certain that nothing remotely violating Amazon’s fairly lenient policy (e.g. no profanity, no product endorsements, no personal attacks, etc.). It reeks of the Giant’s unchallenged power to do what it wishes with Jack’s beans, the golden eggs, and anything else beneath its domain.
The Big A better watch it; I know more than a few authors who are sick of their totalitarian antics.
I sympathize, Rob, though Amazon is so big (and will be for a long time) that i have a hard time imagining indies can punish them in any substantive way by walking. As restrictive as KDP Select is, for instance, it’s still better promotion than the other options as far as I can tell. I’m staying with the exclusive for 90 days deal and then in the new year, will make my books available across all the other platforms. However, everyone tells me that, while Kobo and Apple are improving, Amazon is still by far the leader. Makes it difficult to kick too hard.
Amazon is really good at what they do though, in addition to easing up on the review issue, they should be stealing Smashwords gift coupon idea for promotions, coordinate better with CreateSpace and offer Kindle support for the Canadian (Amazon.ca) store. They aren’t perfect, but they’re hard to leave because of what they get right. (I own a Sony ereader, for instance. I never use it and favor an old kindle instead, even with the tiny buttons, it’s better and easier to use.)