So many people focus on the 'how' or the 'what' behind what this person did to get on that list, they forget or gloss over the 'why' - and what it means for authors who work their butts off but don't have near the savvy or wealth to do what they did, and to me that makes what they did to get there even worse.
Imagine, you're solidly middle class, or perhaps poor, and you study and you work hard and you score perfect on your SATs. But, you cannot penetrate the Ivy League because children of wealthy donors have been paid into these institutions.
Many will say, hey, that's capitalism - that's how the system works, don't hate the player, hate the game. But, that's clearly terrible. Think about the differences we're talking about here. Quite plausibly, the kid that did everything right, academically-speaking, but didn't have the knowledge and/or ability to buy their way into a prestigious school winds up with a completely different career and potentially a completely different life, and not for the better, than they would've had if those wealthy kids hadn't supplanted them with cash instead of actual academic merit.
Sure, you could say that a kid who winds up at State Tech could plausibly wind up with a 'better' life than the kid of a mogul who paid for them to graduate Yale, yes, it could play out that way, but that's not really the point. Public perception and perception among those who could make or break your career and potentially make all the difference in your life is such that attending the Ivy League versus attending State Tech is seen as a difference in one's academic 'quality' or acumen for lack of better terms. Buying your way in is taking advantage of this perception, knowing the huge potential, and what it could mean for you in the bigger picture.
Same thing here with this author or others who attempt to pull off this trick. If you are buying your own books knowing that doing so gets you high enough on the list that you'll have your name and book published in view of many prospective customers who are largely unaware of how these lists work and take them as actual signifiers of quality, or symbolizing what's actually - LEGITIMATELY - popular, you are purposefully buying visibility while knowing what general public perception of being on that list is, and the knock-on effect which can make all the difference in one's career.
Which means by buying your way there, you are doing it fully acknowledging you could be knocking someone off of that list who may not be already as successful as you, and to whom that level of visibility likely would have made all the difference in their career, and worse knowing you could potentially be knocking someone off that list who'd actually earned their spot, and earned their shot at a real career through their own sweat equity.
That is just completely gross, no matter how you spin it. It is doubly so when we're talking about someone, who quite frankly, is and could be doing just fine thank you very much in terms of their writing career without resorting to this kind of slimy tactic while also refusing to own up to what they were doing at the same time. And, then the way they tried to spin it in their newsletter? Honestly, this whole thing - given who it is - has me pretty disappointed, and yet I admit given the ins and outs of this industry, not all that surprised.
