Amazon Rank

Dampening my snickering glee at being ranked among Movements and Periods is the news that Amazon seems to be stripping the sales figures and accompanying rankings from GLBTQ books, erotica, and romance novels, particularly those with what they term “adult content.”

In short: someone in Amazon has utter shit for brains.

Authors such as Jaci Burton, Maya Banks, Larissa Ione and Stephanie Tyler have reported that since being stripped of their sales rankings, their titles are no longer found in searches on Amazon.com. MetaWriter is also compiling a list of titles that have been stripped of their sales rank.

When pressed for a reason, Amazon.com’s customer service department told YA author Mark Probst:

In consideration of our entire customer base, we exclude “adult” material from appearing in some searches and best seller lists. Since these lists are generated using sales ranks, adult materials must also be excluded from that feature.

What, I ask, the fucking fuckhell? Many an Amazon customer is infuriated, and the #amazonfail hashtag on Twitter has pretty much become the only thing worth following. What to do, what to do?

It’s time to hit ‘em where it hurts. No, not a boycott. When you want someone to pay attention, you hit ‘em in the PR.

It’s Google Bomb Time!

We did it for Bill Napoli. Now it’s Amazon’s turn. As always, fuckwittery should not go unrewarded. We propose the following entry be entered into the lexicon:

Amazon Rank

amazon rank
Function: verb
Inflected Form(s): amazon ranked

1. To censor and exclude on the basis of adult content in literature (except for Playboy, Penthouse, dogfighting and graphic novels depicting incest orgies).
2. To make changes based on inconsistent applications of standards, logic and common sense.

Etymology: from 12 April 2009 removal of sales rank figures from books on Amazon.com containing sexual, erotic, romantic, gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered or queer content, rendering them impossible to find through basic search functions at the top of Amazon.com’s website. Titles stripped of their sales rankings include “Bastard Out of Carolina,” “Lady Chatterly’s Lover,” several romance novels, GLBTQ fiction novels, YA books, and narratives about gay people.

Example of usage: “I tried to do a report on Lady Chatterly’s Lover for English Lit, but my teacher amazon ranked me and I got an F on grounds that it was obscene.”

Alternate usage: “My girlfriend wanted to preserve her virginity, and I was happy to respect that, then she amazon ranked and decided anal sex was okay.”

Making this the top result, which is also dependent upon algorithms and shit, requires help from you savvy folks.

I’ve created a page with the definition for “amazon rank.” LINK TO http://www.smartbitchestrashybooks.com/amazonrank with “Amazon Rank” as the anchor text. The link should look like this:

Amazon Rank

This is known as Google-bombing.

Second of all: Urbandictionary.com. We’re creating a definition and if it’s approved, you can vote on it to increase its prominence. Vote early, vote often to increase the definition’s power.

All you have to do is link to the page using these words: Amazon Rank. The more you do it, the higher up in rank the page will go, and the more successful it will be. One would hope.

The goal: that “Amazon Rank” points to the definition that underscores Amazon.com’s shortminded censorship and inconsistent policing of what ought to be accessible to the book buying public.

ETA: As of 6:15pm EST/2:25pm SBTB Time, we are number one in google results for Amazon Rank. Holy smoke. Behold the power of angry bookfolk, Twitter, and the interweb.

ETA: As of 7:54pm EST, Amazon has given out a host of explanations, which I’ve heard from Twitterers, along the lines of “people complained” to “we will have more information tomorrow.” I smell a giant meeting in PR at Amazon HQ bright and early tomorrow. We’ll see what the morning brings.

But in my inbox, an email from Craig Seymour whose book, All I Could Bare, a memoir of his job as a stripper, was stripped of sales rank back in February 2009, despite memoirs from prominent pornography actors remaining within the ranks. So this has been creeping up insidiously, it seems, until massive delisting occurred over the last few days. Pokes some mammoth stripper-pole sized holes in the “we responded to customer complaints” response.

Jane from DA has, of course has a template response letter to send, as well as links and a full-bodied explanation of why sales rank is important. Carolyn Kellogg from the LA Times book blog also covered the story today. We’ll see what tomorrow brings in #amazonfail.

ETA 9:13 pm EST: Oh Noes! It was a glitch! One that’s been in operation since February, according to Craig Seymour, and one that clearly should be blamed for a whole mess of other problems.

Categorized:

General Bitching...

Comments are Closed

  1. meno says:

    Hola bitches!

    Linked.  I love a good kerfuffle.

  2. David says:

    Googlebombed this on my own blog too and spread the word to my bookloving (and censorship hating) friends…  ;p

  3. Lori says:

    Now the question becomes: Which Focus on the Family-type monstrosity has been pressuring Amazon behind the scenes to enact this sly change?

    I’m keeping my fingers crossed that it’s NOM. That’s the National Organization for Marriage. I totally disagree with their whole reason for existing, which is purely to prevent gays from being able to be legally married. Their main project is 2M4M. Yes, you read that correctly. In their world that stands for 2 million for marriage.

    They’ve already been mocked thoroughly for both their naming issues and their very expensive & very bad TV ad. (Seriously, are they the only people left on earth who have never seen LOLCats or a Craig’s List personals ad?)
     
    If this turns out to be one more case where the internet turned their efforts into FAIL that will make my day.

  4. Marshall says:

    The piling on of conspiracy theories surrounding this is making me ill. Why get out the pitchforks and torches when you have no facts? This is being blown way, way out of proportion.

    No censorship has transpired.

    Listen, I work at Amazon and there are a few things you should know:

    1. The whole system is automated. Big computers running everything.
    2. They sell adult material, like soft porn DVDs. In order to keep this stuff from popping up in front of children, the suppress the sales rank, which feeds the algorithm that decides what to display first, second, etc. This is no different than Google. Google is smarter in that they give you the option to see unfiltered results if you like.
    3. Some low-level person in the company probably tinkered with the algorithm based upon some input or complaints, and totally fucked up the code. There’s NO evidence this was an executive mandate. If there was, I’ll quit.
    As reported on Twitter, the suppression of search rankings was inconsistent. If this had been intentional it would have been more effective.
    4. Do you really think Amazon is that stupid to piss of a huge community of consumers?
    5. Amazon’s corporate culture is very supportive of the GLBT community, both internally and externally.

    So stop with the witch trials already. You have choices in where to shop but don’t scream bloody murder and sign petitions until you understand the fucking facts.

  5. Zoe Archer says:

    Can’t seem to get the “it’s just a glitch!” website to load.

    Me, either.  I need to know!

    Also—the same does not apply at B&N, where a search for “Homosexuality” from the front page gives you this:

    http://books.barnesandnoble.com/search/results.aspx?WRD=homosexuality

    The first book apparently states that there is no biblical evidence condemning homosexuality.  The second book sounds deplorable.  Then we get fiction, memoir, and a children’s book about same sex male penguins raising a chick.

    So, it’s limited to Amazon, I believe.

  6. Beka says:

    Yeah, a GLITCH.

    I wish I could read that, but I get a connection timeout every time I click the link.  *sulk*

    But this is total bullshit, and it pisses me off.

  7. Anaquana says:

    I can’t get into publishersweekly.com at all.

    Also, I can only see the last two comments posted here. *scratches head*

  8. Beka says:

    The piling on of conspiracy theories surrounding this is making me ill. Why get out the pitchforks and torches when you have no facts? This is being blown way, way out of proportion.

    No censorship has transpired.

    I hate to sound ignorant, because maybe someone tinkering with the algorithm would do this, but how do you explain the fact that as far as I can see it is almost exclusively GLBT or “alternative lifestyle” (ie BDSM) books getting their rankings dropped?  Or the fact that you have an author whose ranking was dropped in FEBRUARY?

    Or, the biggest give away to me that it wasn’t someone tinkering with the algorithm, THE EMAIL THAT MARK PROBST RECEIVED FROM AMAZON saying that it was an effort to “exclude ‘adult’ material from appearing in some searches and best seller lists”?

    If you’ll quit if it was an actual conscious decision, you’d better pack your desk and hand in your notice.  If it was a glitch in the algorithm, they would’ve said so, instead of giving some BS excuse about how they’re excluding “adult” content (in an email to an author who had the ranking dropped from one of his books, which was of a GLBT topic but NOT explicit).

  9. GrowlyCub says:

    “some low level person”  Really, Marshall? 

    Amazon lets low level people implement code that impacts such a large number of books/keywords?  Doesn’t make me think very highly of them, if they do.

    I’m buying from Bamm.com and have for years.

  10. Mab says:

    Marshall – I take your point – up to a point.  But sex toys and much strong heterosexual material like Playboy publications weren’t affected by the rankings change.  Gay themed material seems disproportionately affected, which indicates that someone was playing with the algorithms to an agenda They may well have done so without authority – in which case I guess they’re out of a job and a career.

  11. freedomgirl says:

    Marshall,

    It’s very simple.  We are making a fuss because if we didn’t, Amazon would never have an incentive to fix the ‘glitch’, as you call it, because no one would care.  And then the authors who make their money writing books would lose some of their livelihood, and the people who want to read them would have less access.  Even if it is completely, totally benign, we still need to make a big stink so that our community is not erased from one of the biggest purveyors of media products in the world.

  12. Carrie Lofty says:

    The “glitch” article was just about four paragraphs long. The first said, “There’s a glitch,” while the rest restated what’s been said here about Mark Prost and a quote from Erastes. That’s it.

  13. alvrodul says:

    Now, this sounds like censorship to me. Even though nobody at Amazon wants to admit it.

    Not that it is likely to affect my shopping at Amazon, since I, when I go there, tend to know the titles and authors that I want to buy.

    It does, of course, mean that possible extra items may not be added to my shopping list. But then, when I buy erotica, I don’t go to Amazon anyway.

    At Fictionwise, they don’t hide away the books with erotic content _because_ of that content. And that is currently my favorite bookstore. My only current complaint with Fictionwise (and to be fair, this isn’t Fictionwise’s fault at all, really) is that they won’t sell me certain titles because I don’t live in the US (three, so far, this year). One of those may be available elsewhere, but I haven’t seen the other two where they may be available to me. And no, I haven’t bothered to buy any of them.

    That is the sort of thing that may inspire me to look for pirated editions, even though I truly prefer to pay for my books. The logic is simple: If I pay for a book I like, the author may write more like it.

  14. L.E. says:

    Marshall,

    It would be a lot easier to understand the facts if we had some from Amazon officially.  My email requesting information has not yet been answered—understandable given the sheer numbers of emails Amazon is likely receiving right now.  But if the ‘glitch’ explanation is actually true, why can’t Amazon post a brief message on the home page to that effect—and it doesn’t have to go ‘really, we aren’t being discriminatory even though all evidence suggests we are’—it could merely state something like ‘A technical difficulty has resulted in sales rankings being dropped from some searches.  We are aware of the problem and are working to resolve it.’  Seems like that would give Amazon.Com a little more credibility through this situation.

  15. Alvrodul says:

    Had a quickie look at one author that damned well _should_ have been affected by the ban and hasn’t: John Ringo. His books aren’t classified as Romance, but they definitely have “adult content”. And not just Vanilla sex, either. *gags*

  16. Hydecat says:

    Even if this is just an instance of shoddy programming, Amazon still needed the wake-up call. Test servers exist for a reason—people are fallible and so is their programming.

    I’m willing to forgive Amazon if they aren’t guilty, but passing out vague statements doesn’t help their case, it just makes it look like they’re trying to think of a cover-up instead of an honest answer.

  17. PBCliberal says:

    Major props. Google search on “amazon rank” and amazon rank both deliver your definition in the number one position!.

    Click and behold the awesome sight, at least at the moment!!

  18. RevMelinda says:

    Whatever the reason this has happened, it’s pretty dreadful and needs attention pronto.  I’m incredibly late to the party but went ahead and googlebombed too. Thanks for organizing this and I trust there will be some positive action soon.

  19. Teresa says:

    For the glitch story to make sense Amazon is going to have to explain why their customer service people got the glitch confused with the company policy on adult content. The two don’t seem easily confused to me.

  20. Zoe Archer says:

    Or, the biggest give away to me that it wasn’t someone tinkering with the algorithm, THE EMAIL THAT MARK PROBST RECEIVED FROM AMAZON saying that it was an effort to “exclude ‘adult’ material from appearing in some searches and best seller lists”?

    That is an excellent point.

  21. snarkhunter says:

    I wondered how long it would take for the words “witch hunt” and “pitchforks” to show up.

  22. Sierra Dafoe says:

    Yeah. No glitch. For what Amazon customer service said not 24 hours ago: http://markprobst.livejournal.com/15293.html

    Revisionist history at its finest. Yeah.

  23. Marie says:

    Marshall,

    If it was a glitch, then why were the anti-homosexuality books left ranked and the pro-gay books de-ranked?  I’m not saying you have the answer, but if an algorithm was targeting gay books, shouldn’t it have done it to the anti-gay books with homosexuality in the title and description?

  24. Melissa S. says:

    What I don’t get is the exclusion of adult content to begin with. It’s not like there are card wielding five year olds out there. And then it’s selective. I’ve always felt like you could find anything at Amazon. The ultimate general store…apparently not! Geez! I’m just so angry. I’m going to be screaming at people for days!

    Note: I don’t have a website, so I placed a link to the Amazon Ranked on my facebook profile.

  25. @Avrodul: “Had a quickie look at one author that damned well _should_ have been affected by the ban and hasn’t: John Ringo.”

    I don’t mean to pick on you, but I’ve just seen this so many times today—“HOW COME AMAZON ISN’T BANNING X?”—and I know that people don’t really necessarily mean that Amazon should be banning John Ringo….  But I do feel obligated to say that I don’t think anything on Amazon should be censored, even if I hate the content, even if I hate the people who write it, even if I personally would rather never see it at all.

    There are a lot of books I’d rather not read.  There are not very many books that I can think of that damned well should be banned.

  26. Lynn says:

    It’s interesting to note that amazon’s search feature has no trouble bringing up a wide variety of sex toys.  In fact, search the word “rabbit” on amazon.com and see what happens.

  27. Sierra Dafoe says:

    Oh, and I’m running a contest on my blog for anyone who emails, signs the petition, or otherwise aids the cause:

    http://sierradafoe.com/blog/?p=67

    Just doin’ my bit 🙂

  28. Nialla says:

    “It’s a glitch!”

    I was waiting for that excuse. Figured it wouldn’t be until Monday morning though. And yes, it’s an excuse, because it’s just way too targeted not be something done deliberately.

    Perhaps the “adult book sales” were ranking so high they were going to bump the “regular books” off the bestseller lists and someone got antsy? Maybe they didn’t want to risk becoming known as the online version of an adult book store?

    One of the reasons I buy erotica and m/m fiction from Amazon is because I can browse there. Most of the local stores in my area focus only on the ready-made “bestsellers” and you can’t find much else. Not just erotica either, I can’t find many midlist authors in romance or SF/F on the shelf. Sure, they’ll order them, but Amazon (and their competitors) will deliver to my door.

  29. Sierra Dafoe says:

    Nialla, can you imagine what a world of hurt the were gonna be in when everyone who WASN’T on the internet Easter Sunday/Palm Sunday (orthodox) signed in tomorrow morning and found out about this? The “backpedal” today was damage control.

    Once again: NO GLITCH!
    http://markprobst.livejournal.com/15293.html

  30. Caranfin says:

    Ok, i understand the principle of the problem, and i don’t at all like the idea of this automatically “censoring” gay lit along with “erotica” or censoring erotica in the first place (let’s all grow up, please!)

    But here’s what i don’t understand – practically speaking – is this an actual problem?  I am an ocassional Amazon user (whenever i have money and am looking for something specific), but i don’t really use these sales rankings.  Does anybody?  If so… why? 

    If i heard that they weren’t selling adult stuff at all, well that would stupid, but i don’t know… i think it’s a bit of a tempest in a tea cup.  I think we’d be better off putting our energies toward stuff like anti-Prop 8 and cheering Iowa’s court decision.  Things that are a little less ephemeral.

  31. The anthology one of my novellas appears in, A RED HOT VALENTINE’S DAY, has been stripped of its ranking:

    http://www.amazon.com/Red-Hot-Valentines-Day-Avon/dp/0061689394/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1239592584&sr=1-6

  32. Kim says:

    Quick, somebody create a Wikipedia entry for “amazon rank”.

  33. snarkhunter says:

    But here’s what i don’t understand – practically speaking – is this an actual problem?  I am an ocassional Amazon user (whenever i have money and am looking for something specific), but i don’t really use these sales rankings.  Does anybody?  If so… why?

    Caranfin, go to DearAuthor here. Jane explains why this matters. She even organizes it helpfully with headers.

  34. @Caranfin “But here’s what i don’t understand – practically speaking – is this an actual problem?  I am an ocassional Amazon user (whenever i have money and am looking for something specific), but i don’t really use these sales rankings.  Does anybody?  If so… why?”

    Everyone uses the Amazon Sales Ranking, because the Amazon Rank is used to determine how items are displayed in a search.  Thus, my friend Jackie Barbosa’s debut novel, coming out from Amazon—if you go to Amazon and type in her name “Jackie Barbosa” and search “All Departments” you get no hits.  None.

    Or go to Amazon and search “All Departments” for “homosexuality” and see what gets returned first now that all of the GBLTQ titles have had their sales ranks stripped.

    Amazon Sales Rank determine what you, the consumer, are shown.  When a book is stripped of its sales rank it becomes harder to locate even if you know what you’re looking for, and if you just have general idea of the sort of book you want, it becomes impossible to find.

    That’s how it affects you.

  35. Lisa says:

    Has it been fixed? I heard Giovanni’s Room and Brokeback Mt. had been banned, but they come up just fine for me under search.

  36. rebyj says:

    I’ve had trouble getting this page to load today I guess because of all the traffic.

    Thanks Sarah/ Candy and Jane at DA for keeping this updated! Some of the things that I’ve wanted to ask, comment on are not original, many of the same points have been brought up already but here’s my 2 cents…

    If Amazon sells a book, they should rank the book.  It’s just that simple. If they do not then what determines their ranking system? It’s not sales! That’s just suspicous shady business.

    This type of censorship is something you’d expect to hear of countries that commonly censor internet content, not here in America!

    Adults shop at Amazon, you have to have a credit card to shop at Amazon. You have to be 18 to get a credit card.

    Let parents police their kids. Let parents add Amazon to their protective software programs as dangerous content. Let Amazon put protections in place such as “adult content, you must be 18 to view these results ”  or “to view results without adult content click here”

    If Amazon is so concerned about what kids may or may not view then why do they allow Kindle free first chapters of adult books?

    It is hypocritical for Amazon to say Gay / Lesbian/ Erotica/ Disablity Sex / Pro- Homosexuality Psychology text books are objectional and seeing these books in search results threaten people, but yet , like stated above, you can type in rabbit and get photographic results of masterbatory tools.

    After seeing the response Amazon has emailed to Mark Probst and others there is no way anyone can accept “a glitch” as the reason why this has happened. Amazon should respect it’s customers intelligence and provide a better reason and apology.

  37. Carrie Lofty says:

    @Lisa—The hardcover of Brokeback comes up, but it’s not tagged as gay under “Look for Similar Items by Category.” There are two voluntary “Tags Customers Associate with this Product” labels of “gay,” but that’s it. You have to click on Proulx’s name to find the paperback edition, and its sales rank has been stripped. I’m guessing that the paperback edition (147 customer reviews) was more popular than the hardback (which has 5 customer reviews and a sales rank of 590,000+). The paperback is hella tagged under “similar items” as being gay gay gay!

  38. brad...... says:

    well amazon just lost a BIG customer… i buy a lot of stuff for myself and even more for work…. they just lost thousands and i literally mean thousands just from me…

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