This pisses me off.

Yeah, this is dumb beyond dumb.

I like having the reviews on Amazon, but you have to take them with a grain of salt. At least these people admit they haven't read the book.

Maybe, just maybe, they shouldn't let one star reviews affect the rating. For instance have a moderator for authors so they don't get screwed. I know I just gave Amazon a new job description but yes, it disgusts me.

The sad thing is how many people look at the number of stars. That's just ridiculous. :/ If it helps, there are others who aren't buying anything from Amazon since the last kerfluffle.

MJ Goodnow said:

Maybe, just maybe, they shouldn't let one star reviews affect the rating. For instance have a moderator for authors so they don't get screwed. I know I just gave Amazon a new job description but yes, it disgusts me.

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Or maybe they should find a way to delete every review that says "I didn't read this book." Trust me, I've seen some things with one star ratings that more than deserve it.

MJ Goodnow said:

Maybe, just maybe, they shouldn't let one star reviews affect the rating. For instance have a moderator for authors so they don't get screwed. I know I just gave Amazon a new job description but yes, it disgusts me.

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Remember that it works in reverse too. There are a lot of fake positive reviews on Amazon.

Yes, but shouldn't there be some type of system to review a book. A quiz maybe?

MJ Goodnow said:

Yes, but shouldn't there be some type of system to review a book. A quiz maybe?

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You could probably say that about three-quarters of the stuff posted on the Internet.

"Before you can comment on the Obama administration's health insurance plan, you have to pass this political knowledge quiz . . . "

It's not just Amazon, I saw a call-to-action on B&N the other night too.

Frankly, other than being stupid and juvenile to rate an item they haven't actually read because they disagree with the publisher's price strategy, it doesn't bother me. I have no idea why these people think AMZ or B&N actually cares WHAT the rating of an item is. Just don't buy it till the price comes down --the bean-counters will eventually notice a trend.

I do use reviews to gauge whether or not a book is for me --both the 1-stars and the 5-stars. But I know enough to READ the review. Since they are considerate enough to explain why they gave it a 1-star, it makes it really easy as a consumer to completely disregard that person's review.

I don't read reviews, but if I did, I wouldn't give them much weight.

I used to be on the Amazon Reviewer Discussion Board; in fact, I was a member of thet board for several years before AW, and through it I learned which reviews to take seriously and which to disregard. There's a reviewer ranking system in place, and that's what I look for first. I trust the top reviewers more than I trust any old reader's review; these are usually balanced reviews from people who take their writing almost as seriously as we authors do. Seriously; since reviewer ranking is based on helpful or not helpful votes, the top reviewers watch their helpful counts like hawks!

Generally, I much prefer their reviews to those in the media. However, the system is not wel know outside of their own little community, which is a pity.

With the exception of Harriet Klausner, who is number one reviewer on classic list, I watch for the reviews of these people. A couple of them have reviewed my books.

The list is here:
http://www.amazon.com/review/top-reviewers

Reviews that say "I haven't read this book but..." should be ignored, as well as reviews that say "OMG I LOVED THIS BOOK IT ROX!!!!!!!!!"

This is one issue as literature becomes more and more integrated to the net; on the net, stupid little whiny kids and ignorant adults acting like stupid little whiny kids run rampant because there's no accountability. People can and do say whatever ignorant things come into their brains from moment to moment. Just go on youtube and look at some of the comments there.

Wow, that is just plain mean. And, of course, it hurts the author, no one else.

Carlene
Mysterious Gift - an erotic paranormal romantic suspense novella
www.cobblestone_press.com

I'm trying not to turn this into a "I hate Nook/Kindle" debate (we must have a million of those) but I also hear more and more people getting twicked outside of the internet for the same reason. Because they can't download a book that just hit the shelf for less than $9.99.

As for Amazon, maybe we should all e-mail them and address the problem. I will myself when I have a moment.

HConn said:

A number of Amazon.com customers are going from book to book giving 1-star ratings to books that have e-book prices above $9.99. And they admit in the reviews that they haven't read the books.

Look, read a book but don't like it? Post a review. Think the price is too high? Don't pay it, and why not complain to the company.

But don't hurt the author with poor ratings just because you want the price to be lower. The author doesn't set the prices!

Hmph!

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I had this happen to my books; I reported it to Amazon, and they pulled the review. I also pointed out that the exact same "reviewer" was spamming the Amazon boards for a whole slew of books with the identical protest post and one star rating.

These are not reviews; they are a spam campaign in support of a political position which has nothing to do with the books and is an abuse of the review system.

I suggested they block all this reviewer's posts, but apparently Amazon decided to wait for each individual author to complain before taking action.

Stupid people do stupid things, These are stupid people.

Amazon does a few good things and an awful lot of stupid, bad things. Although I admit to reading the reviews posted for my books and of course like to see 5 stars, I don't take them seriously whatever the number of stars. What does interest me are the cities and towns from which they come.

Listen to this one. On the page displaying one of my books - actually a series of 24 volumes being offered for sale by various vendors (it's out of print) -- most every review is 5 starred, but that's not the point. One day I visited the page and found a new post with only 1 star. Being curious I read what the reviewer said. It went something like this: "I ordered from one of your vendors and only received one volume of the 24 volume set". The reviewer said absolutely nothing about whether or not he read and liked or dislike the book. Of course I have no idea from whom he ordered, what he paid, or what the vendors advertising message said. The fact that Amazon would post such a ridiculous message on my book page really bothered me. I called and then wrote Amazon - brought this to their attention - told them I thought this was their internal problem and/or that of the vendor - they had no right posting it on my book page - and asked them to remove it at once. That was months ago. It's still there and Amazon hasn't sent me any reason why they think it should stay.

There is also a phenomenon of people reviewing things before they are released, because amazon puts the link up six months or more in advance for preorders. If it's by a famous author or band you see dozens of fans giving it a 5 star when they have not even read/heard it.

This is why I go to the three-star reviews first, if I look at Amazon reviews at all.

hammerklavier said:

There is also a phenomenon of people reviewing things before they are released, because amazon puts the link up six months or more in advance for preorders. If it's by a famous author or band you see dozens of fans giving it a 5 star when they have not even read/heard it.

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Sometimes the reviews are put up by people who've read ARCs, or books published elsewhere first... I recently saw review for a book that was published first in the UK and was only available in the US through imported copies.

You didn't see the reviews for The Lost Symbol: 'I posting a five star review to counterbalance the one star reviews.'

Then you get the CD reviews 'I haven't heard the album but artist X is crap, so this will be crap too.'

It is a protest and protests work best of they cause reactions--so I guess it is working. Amazon ratings are brainless and manipulated both up and down all the time.

I don't see why anyone pays attention to reviews in the first place. Many of the best, and certainly many of the most successful, books of all time get universally bad reviews, and many, many lousy books that flop get great reviews. Reading reviews is a waste of time and energy.

Listen to friends who have read the book.