[PhoenixS]

This isn't the first time this has happened. And there are at least 9 titles in the Top 40 Free right now that have botted their way there as well.

The books have been reported, and likely Amazon will move to take the paragraphs-repeated books down. The ones in the Free list are mostly by the same two publishers I've been reporting now for months. The books are not obvious scams -- just mediocre, scraped content books that are packaged semi-professionally -- enough to make them look legit on first glance. I keep hoping that Amazon is building a case against the publishers/accounts, but it's been going on long enough now (with one of the publishers having been around nearly a year now) that a lot of money is hitting their scammy pockets.

And that's what's most irksome. Some of these accounts slide for months. And even if Amazon does act quickly -- which I think is likely -- to take down the books in M&S list, it still means a day or more of visibility lost for honest authors working legitimately to eek out their own visibility. And when the Top 20 or Top 50 in the Free list is made up MOST DAYS of 20-30% scam titles, that's a HUGE loss of visibility to 20 or 30 legitimate titles, many of which are getting just ONE SHOT every 90 days to gain visibility, while these scummy scammers are repubbing and rebotting the same books up the list every few weeks.

Amazon doing take-downs AFTER the fact -- and, in some cases, not at all -- isn't the answer when it punishes legit authors so profoundly.

What I don't understand is who in their right mind would buy this crap? Who could possibly be suckered into this?

It's doubtful anyone's *buying* them. They're in KU. Bots are *borrowing* and *reading*.

Would people returning the books affect the sales rank or not? Because I'd be returning something like that and it makes me wonder how their sales ranking manages to stay high.

If real customers buy and return, no, it won't affect the rank. Much the same that if a real customer borrows a book and never reads it, the rank isn't affected.

 

[PhoenixS]

What, on God's earth, is a click farm?

(Hi Vince!)

http://www.zdnet.com/article/exclusive-inside-a-million-dollar-amazon-kindle-catfishing-scam/

 

[lauramg_1406]

I thought that amazon scanned books before they allowed them to be uploaded? Surely they should be able to catch these books before they get uploaded?

 

[Lydniz]

I thought that amazon scanned books before they allowed them to be uploaded? Surely they should be able to catch these books before they get uploaded?

Unfortunately not. Anyone is quite at liberty to upload any old pile of crap they like. And I do.

 

[Cindy Borgne]

Amazon doing take-downs AFTER the fact -- and, in some cases, not at all -- isn't the answer when it punishes legit authors so profoundly.

So sad that Amazon isn't doing more to stop this.

One author suggested to me that entering captcha the first time you open a book could help? Maybe? Yet, again I know people complain about captcha.

 

[PhoenixS]

One other thing worth noting (and maybe someone already has; I certainly did when I reported) is that each of these books has a very large file size. I'm betting they're all stuffed to the 3000 KENPC limit for payout. So when their bots (or live click-farmers) read, each full read is worth somewhere between $13 and $15. Not that I think Amazon will pay out on the books it's now been alerted to. But plenty of others out there...

 

[JustWriting]

I was trying to figure out what the scammer gets out of this because the chances are that with something as blatant as this, Amazon will kill their account before any payment is made.

The only thing I could come up with that made a lick of sense was:

1) Blackhat Conman sells a service which guarantees to get a book (any book) into the charts based on borrows and possibly also guarantees a number of page-reads. For this he charges a fixed amount. Let's say $300 per book

2) Gullible would-be scammer is happy to pay the $300 because he sees how much money he will make via page-reads. And sure enough his KDP dashboard looks like a goldmine. He is so pleased he goes back and places more orders with the Blackhat conman.

3) Some time later, Amazon brings down the hammer on Gullible would-be scammer, and closes his account before he actually gets a payment .

Blackhat Conman is okay because he already has his money. He doesn't rely on Amazon to pay him.

There might be other explanations but I'm struggling to think of one unless of course Amazon doesn't close down accounts like this quickly enough, and Gullible would-be scammer does actually get the cash - which would be too insane to contemplate.

 

[mythsnake]

I used the report quality issue link at the bottom of the page (it's in the gray box above the footer).

 

[Word Fan]

I thought that amazon scanned books before they allowed them to be uploaded? Surely they should be able to catch these books before they get uploaded?

No. Apple does that for iBooks. It sometimes takes 2 weeks for you to get approval for your book to go up there. Usually less, but it can take that long because Apple supposedly has people who actually look over every book before they allow it.

There are some die-hard Apple haters here, but Apple does some things really well.

 

[PhoenixS]

**************

 

[BellaJames]

Looks like those scambooks have been/are now being removed.

I can still see them from 50-100 on movers and shakers and the HNR chart

 

[SB James]

It seems that almost as soon as they get taken down, they are republished under another pen name. Like Whack-A-Mole! 

 

[sela]

Apparently, Amazon is unable to actually follow through and is removing individual titles but not dealing with the accounts who create these scam books. Here's a screenshot of the movers and shakers with several scam books "no longer available" but others by the same author still for sale.

Come on Amazon... I mean, if we can find these with no effort, why can't Amazon employees find and remove them? This is kicking legitimate authors out of the movers and shakers ranks and affecting visibility of books that are actually moving and shaking.

 

[Cheyanne]

I just spent a ton of time reporting all the ones that weren't yet taken down. It's so frustrating wondering how many of these scammers get away with it and how much more our payments would be without Amazon dishing out money to them.

Seems REALLY easy to prevent this -- actually review the books before they're available for sale. I wouldn't mind a bit if it took a few days (even a week) for my books to be vetted by Amazon before being able to put on sale. That'd raise the $$ for all of us who are selling genuine books. As it is now, it just makes me so angry I'm considering going back to selling wide.

 

[PearlEarringLady]

Apparently, Amazon is unable to actually follow through and is removing individual titles but not dealing with the accounts who create these scam books. Here's a screenshot of the movers and shakers with several scam books "no longer available" but others by the same author still for sale.

I would guess that it's a different department. Taking down books that have been reported multiple times for quality control issues is probably a low-level, automated process. It will likely only be looked at by a human if the author complains, which in this case is unlikely. Closing an account is a much more serious matter, and (I would hope) would only be done after thorough investigation from a human. Not that it will slow these scammers down. They seem to be able to open new accounts at will.

 

[thesmallprint]

Time perhaps for a proper global Indies alliance to help combat this and other scams. If everyone got together and paid a small sum to maintain a membership site and employ a bank of virtual assistants to constantly monitor and report scams, it would not only help, but might embarrass Amazon into action.

 

[PhoenixS]

You know, there are 45 (!) books in today's KDD. The scam books were approaching the #100 ranks fast. The cynic in me could snarkily assume Amazon only cared when they needed to clear the way for their promoted books to rank properly.

Nah...right?

 

[Alan Petersen]

What, on God's earth, is a click farm?

 

[sela]

You know, there are 45 (!) books in today's KDD. The scam books were approaching the #100 ranks fast. The cynic in me could snarkily assume Amazon only cared when they needed to clear the way for their promoted books to rank properly.

Nah...right?

Nah, that doesn't sound right.

 

[77071]

I'm sure there's more going on behind the scenes than I completely understand, but at this point from the outside, Amazon just looks incompetent. Oh yes, here are some totally legitimate "books" (that everyone can see are NOT) hogging the top spots on our store! Yes, come right in scammers, we WELCOME YOU.

Well, as others have said, they're probably trying to weed this stuff out. And maybe they won't pay the all big fat bonuses for bringing in those "reads."