An Amazon review can be the difference between your book selling on Amazon, and your book languishing on Amazon’s deep discount list. So, it’s kind of a big deal that Amazon has started deleting reviews it believes are written “on behalf of a person or company with a financial interest in the product or a directly competing product. This includes authors,” the New York Times reports.
Amazon did not announce the mass deletion, nor has it consistently applied its rules for deletion which has authors up in arms. But some members of the review community appreciate the crackdown. Singling out a reviewer named Harriet Klausner who has contributed more than 25,000 reviews, one reader who uses the reviews on Amazon to decide what to buy complained: “Everyone in this group will tell you that we’ve all been duped into buying books based on her reviews.”
Hmmm… The internet is already riddled with questionable identities and truths that I feel like this is a waste of time and resources on Amazon’s part. That said, being jaded is never a reason not to right a wrong. So… I guess it’s a good thing that they are trying to make their reviews more credible. That said, whose to say a person that has a financial stake in a book — or an author — doesn’t genuinely like her own the book they took the time to write and submit a review about?
people who write 