My journalism professor used to say, "never get into a battle with someone who buys their ink by the barrel." He was referring to newspapers, but the same could be said in the firestorm of writers (and readers) versus Amazon.com, which arose over the weekend.
Many writers, editors, and publishers of erotica as well as GLBT and sex-related books, including Scanner's friend Rachel Kramer Bussel, noticed that the Amazon sales rankings of books they had written, edited, or published had disappeared as part of their new adult policy. Hundreds of titles had been affected.
When books are deranked, they no longer come up near the beginning of search results, even if they're a popular-selling title or a classic like Lady Chatterly's Lover, and hence, they are hidden from potential buyers. It appears that the books have been selected for deranking due to their sexual content, or in the case of gay titles, simply due to the tag "gay," whether or not sexual content appeared in the books themselves.
Word quickly spread via Twitter with the tag # amazonfail, and throughout Amazon online superstore itself with the tag amazonfail, which users added onto the listings for books that had been de-ranked.
Amazon's response to those who have emailed to complain is an additional fail.
Amazon is now denying having a new adult policy (though one blogger documents it here), and claims all the books that just happen to have "sex" or "gay" as tags were deranked due to "a glitch" in their system.
No one is having that explanation, and The Guardian's story on Amazon rank fail-gate noted inconsistencies like this that go to prove the claims:
The 2003 paperback edition of Fry's autobiography Moab Is My Washpot, which Amazon tags as "gay", is unranked, whereas the original hardback , filed under "memoir", has a ranking.
The New Joy of Sex, an updated version of the 70s classic, which is filed under the subject "sex/sexuality", has lost its ranking, while the original edition (subject "love/sex/marriage"), from 1974, is ranked. DH Lawrence's Lady Chatterley's Lover, meanwhile, is now unranked.
As of this morning, some titles have been relisted, but many have not. If you're as pissed about this as we are, sign this petition and register your disapproval on the internet however you usually do so. More coverage here.
Related:
Amazon's "Girl Scout Cookies"