I predict this thread will blow up soon, so read it and post (respectfully please) while you can.
A certain author made a FB post decrying Dominion Rising selling enough copies to make the NYT list, but the NYT did not put them on the list. That author did not make any inappropriate suggestions, just put out the disappointing (to them) info.
Fair enough.
But then Hugh Howey (public figure, publicly shared) shares the post and adds his suggestion that those authors should put "NYT Bestselling Author" on their covers anyway, because they "earned" it.
At the risk of starting a feud with a great friend and ally among us indies, which is not my intention, I have to vehemently disagree.
You can't claim an Oscar, a Masters win, Super Bowl ring or a Nobel prize if you didn't actually get the award. That's the simple fact. The NYT never promised anyone the award based only on the historical numbers other people needed to reach it.
The NYT list is a curated list. Recently, they have been disallowing these huge multi-author box sets. I have to believe it's because it's obvious to anyone that combining all the sales into one number is like putting 20 tennis players onto the court at Wimbledon. It's a perversion of the process and the principle. That's just a guess and my own opinion, of course, but at the very least, the NYT decided the new world of digital publishing makes it too easy to simply hit a number--20+ books at 99c.
Now we have authors saying and others agreeing they should lie and claim the award anyway. Every kindergartner in the world knows that's wrong. You can say all day you should have won the thing, but lying and claiming you DID is still a lie. Shame on anyone for suggesting this is somehow justified.
Should I claim I won a Hugo or Dragon (instead of merely being a finalist) just because I think I deserved to, because of all my hard work, blah blah? Nope. The process is the process, and unless you can prove that the process is somehow illegal, you can't claim to have won it. You can claim you SHOULD HAVE, sure, but putting "NYT bestselling author" on your books is an outright lie.
Also, how long after doing this will the traditional publishers or the media or any other opponent of independent and self-publishers use it to smear all of us indies as liars and cheats? In fact, I could see Amazon (or the other vendors) pulling accounts for violating TOS for doing so. Not that Amazon has a good track record in consistently enforcing its TOS, but it's certainly possible. I could also see authors being sued by the NYT for fraudulently using the NYT tag.
Even if you disagree with me and are completely onboard with the idea that these authors should get the tag, it's still a really, really bad idea for them individually or collectively, to lie about it or support lying about it.
A certain author made a FB post decrying Dominion Rising selling enough copies to make the NYT list, but the NYT did not put them on the list. That author did not make any inappropriate suggestions, just put out the disappointing (to them) info.
Fair enough.
But then Hugh Howey (public figure, publicly shared) shares the post and adds his suggestion that those authors should put "NYT Bestselling Author" on their covers anyway, because they "earned" it.
At the risk of starting a feud with a great friend and ally among us indies, which is not my intention, I have to vehemently disagree.
You can't claim an Oscar, a Masters win, Super Bowl ring or a Nobel prize if you didn't actually get the award. That's the simple fact. The NYT never promised anyone the award based only on the historical numbers other people needed to reach it.
The NYT list is a curated list. Recently, they have been disallowing these huge multi-author box sets. I have to believe it's because it's obvious to anyone that combining all the sales into one number is like putting 20 tennis players onto the court at Wimbledon. It's a perversion of the process and the principle. That's just a guess and my own opinion, of course, but at the very least, the NYT decided the new world of digital publishing makes it too easy to simply hit a number--20+ books at 99c.
Now we have authors saying and others agreeing they should lie and claim the award anyway. Every kindergartner in the world knows that's wrong. You can say all day you should have won the thing, but lying and claiming you DID is still a lie. Shame on anyone for suggesting this is somehow justified.
Should I claim I won a Hugo or Dragon (instead of merely being a finalist) just because I think I deserved to, because of all my hard work, blah blah? Nope. The process is the process, and unless you can prove that the process is somehow illegal, you can't claim to have won it. You can claim you SHOULD HAVE, sure, but putting "NYT bestselling author" on your books is an outright lie.
Also, how long after doing this will the traditional publishers or the media or any other opponent of independent and self-publishers use it to smear all of us indies as liars and cheats? In fact, I could see Amazon (or the other vendors) pulling accounts for violating TOS for doing so. Not that Amazon has a good track record in consistently enforcing its TOS, but it's certainly possible. I could also see authors being sued by the NYT for fraudulently using the NYT tag.
Even if you disagree with me and are completely onboard with the idea that these authors should get the tag, it's still a really, really bad idea for them individually or collectively, to lie about it or support lying about it.