Hey Bezos! Fix Your eejit Pro-kindle Anti-Author Book Reviews!

March 17, 2010 5:15pm by Barry Ritholtz

As mentioned Monday, I found The Big Short discussion on 60 Minutes quite interesting. I went over to Amazon to check out the book — and was stunned at the very low review ratings for a book that had yet to be released.

At the time, there were but 7 reviews. I clicked through a few a One Star ratings, and saw some jackass had written the following:

“Watched the interview on 60 minutes last night could not wait to order the book this morning on my kindle. Your loss.”

My response to the dolt reviewer:

“The book isn’t even out yet — and because the publisher has yet to release the kindle edition, you give the book a 1 star rating? An author spends 2 years researching and writing — important enough of a subject that 60 Minutes does a piece on it. What sort of creep dismisses 2 years of someone’s work because their infantile demands could not be satisfied THIS SECOND?

There are now 77 reviews, and 41 are one star reviews for kindle related issues. Most of these brain damaged eejits who won’t understand this, but Amazon sure as hell should:

Authors do not control when the Kindle version comes out any more than they do when the paperback is released. Publishers typically release a kindle version sometime AFTER the hardcover. My book, Bailout Nation, was released May 26, 2009, and the kindle edition came out sometime in the Fall . . . the paperback is due June 28, 2010.

As an author, you have precisely ZERO control over these dates.

Considering the 1 star ratings/complaints about the Kindle edition were posted BEFORE THE BOOK was even released, they are utterly absurd. Amazon needs to step up and delete these non-reviews of books. At the very least, they should not count in the book’s star ratings. (And as commentors have suggested, they should require a purchase prior to any reviews).

That’s the equivalent of giving a movie a bad review because the popcorn concession in the lobby was out of butter.

These pro-kindle, anti-author reviews are completely unfair to the writer. A review is supposed to be about the book, not the publishers format release schedule.

If Amazon wants to be a fair vendor of books, they need to delete these idiotic, pro-kindle, fan boy reviews. Is Amazon a fair arbiter of this, or has their mad kindle lust blinded them to what is right?

Hey Jeff Bezos ! Please show me my trust in Amazon is not misplaced! Fix these damned reviews

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