Pirates of (the) Amazon

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Someone in China pirated an author buddy’s ebook and published it on Amazon. This is not an isolated incident, it happens all the time. After some communication with Amazon, the pirate copy was removed, but not before it had sold several copies.

I’m disappointed in Amazon.

I’m glad to use their platform to sell my books, but I don’t for a moment believe Amazon provides this service from the goodness of its heart. It makes money from my books. Amazon is the provider, I’m the client.

Shouldn’t a corporation protect its clients from fraud?

Surely there could be an automated program which red-flags a suspect product before publication. Hm, look, this exact same book is already on our website, at a different price. And look, this client does not have the same account. Better look into this before we publish it.

An example of how little Amazon cares about publishing illegal works is evident from the fact they will pay the pirate, as if they are the author and copyright holder of this work. Yep, as long as Amazon gets its share, and dutifully pays the publisher their share, what does it care if the real author is out of pocket?

My friend’s book was stolen and someone else profited from it. This is her book, her hard work, yet she’ll get nothing from those sales. She was told if she wants the royalties from this pirated ebook, she has to contact the pirate and get the money from them.

Yeah. As if that’s going to happen.

Fighting piracy on torrent websites is difficult. Sometimes the item will be removed after contacting the webmaster, sometimes not. But blatant piracy permitted by a major online book retailer? Outrageous!

Come on Amazon. Do something. Don’t let pirates take advantage of your services and of honest authors for the sake of a few bucks.

 

 

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