Smart Bitches, Trashy Books

Does it also work as a blog title?  That way I can hit ‘em several ways at the same time.

Awesome “alternate usage” line!  I just linked my blog - I hope many many follow suit.

Michelle (@antinmitchfield)

This is such mindblowing crap.

off to link…

I linked at my blog.

Will repeated links provide the same result?

Amazon Rank

Let´s find out!

I’ll bookmark this on del.icio.us as amazon.com and amazonfail. Thanks!

I just linked from my blog. All of my Ellora’s Cave books have been stripped of their rank as well.

Anna J. Evans

I linked to the definition page on my LJ and will be encouraging people on my FList to do the same.

Made a post about this in my blog, also plan on bookmarking it in Delicious.

Bad move, Amazon!

Just like to add that Foucault’s The History of Sexuality has also been stripped of its sales ranking.

I’m a good friend of Candy’s here in the OR and had actually called her right around the time you IMed her about Google Bombing this. I’ve got the link up on both my blogs, and I thought I’d also drop you a line to say: you’re made of Win.

I totally *heart* you right now!
My books have been amazon ranked, too. But I can still search for and buy vibrating anal sex toys there, so all is not lost.

Off to link it both of my blogs

Can anybody give a quick run down for the best way to aid in the Google bomb?

Done!!! Thanks guys :)

Your alternative definition is almost perfect. May I suggest just one tiny improvement?

My girlfriend wanted to preserve her virginity, and I was happy to respect that, then she amazon ranked and decided saddlebacking was okay.”

Oh look, Backdoor Friends, a gay erotica anthology published through CreateSpace still has it’s ranking http://www.amazon.com/Backdoor-Friends-Complete-Collection-Stories/dp/1440461589/ref=sr_1_18?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1239567947&sr=1-18

I may or may not be a bit miffed about this new Amazon stupidity. I may or may not still be in the process of hitting every online group I am with. :)

You can add me to the list.
My Samhain historical romances can be searched for and found, but put my Ellora’s Cave erotic, “Sunfire,” into the search engine and it doesn’t come up. The only way you can find it is by hitting one of the Samhain books, then hitting my author name and it’s listed there.
Not in the search engine any more. That’s the important thing, these books cannot be searched for any more.
I’m boycotting Amazon until they get this sorted out. And I’m putting your link on my website and taking out all the Amazon links I can find.

I should add that “Sunfire” is an m/f erotic romance.

I’d be happy to repost any other interesting examples of anti-Amazon cyberactivism like this on my ForeignPolicy blog on technology and politics - so do not hesitate to leave comments there with examples. thanks
http://neteffect.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2009/04/12/amazonfail_and_the_politics_of_anti_corporate_cyber_activism

Done.  Grrr.

My spam verification: car54 Srsly. LOL

I linked on my blog, Live Journal and at Blogher.com
http://kbgbabbles.blogspot.com/2009/04/amazon-why-have-you-forsaken-erotic.html

While Amazon may be made of fail, you, SB Sarah, are made of win.

Off to post this everywhere I can.

Linked on my blog:) They pulled A Little Harmless Sex, I guess because of the word Sex. Left all my other books, but ALHS has never had a sales rank at Kindle even though I get paid for copies sold.

I just put this website on my LJ:

http://www.smartbitchestrashybooks.com/amazonrank

I repeat,

http://www.smartbitchestrashybooks.com/amazonrank

I hope this´ll teach them… with everyone´s effort

I’ve linked at my blog as well.

Stephen Fry’s autobiography Moab Is My Washpot has lost its paperback rank but not its hardback rank.

Main difference I can spot, aside from thickness of cover? One’s list of categories includes “Gay & Lesbian > Biographies & Memoirs > Gay” and “Gay & Lesbian > Literature & Fiction > Fiction > Gay”, and one does not. Three guesses which is which, and you don’t need the first two.

Done and done.

I hope this doesn’t show up twice, so much traffic here…my first entry errored…

Done!  Linked it on my blog.  Grrr.

I’ve linked at my LJ, JF, and my story journal.  Folks on my FList are following suit, and a few people over at SF_Drama have also mentioned it.

Follow-up news from SF_Drama, apparently you can still get PORN and DILDOS from Amazon, but “Heather Has Two Mommies” is considered adult material.

Epic fail on the part of Amazon.  I’m boycotting for sure now.

I cannot tell you how disappointed and disgusted I am with Amazon.  Was Jeff Bezos born again or something?  This is just so stupid.  Why make people hunt for titles?  I linked this and the two Dear Author threads to my blog where I posted my email to Amazon.  In 2008 I spent over $2,000.00 on Amazon, mostly on books.  Obviously, I am and have been a very good customer of theirs for years.  I’ve started looking for alternatives.  The possibility of my buying a Kindle has gone from small to ‘Not in this lifetime’.  What a stupid, self-destructive move.

This reminds me of how eBay managed to turn a hugely successful site to a train wreck I avoid like the plague.  Hubris is a funny thing.  It destroys the largest companies and most successful people in ways their competitors/enemies could never dream of.

NinjaKitten, same thing for John Barrowman’s autobiography - paperback subjects only mentions drama and broadway, it’s there. The hardback has subject headings about gay and lesbian, it’s not.

I’ve sent an e-mail to Amazon and posted in my LJ complete with amazon rank link. I saw that Neil Gaiman (http://twitter.com/neilhimself) linked too, so that should help even more.

Done. I hate losing respect for a company I shop from (frequently). It already shows up as #10 when you google search amazon rank. (although not the definition, but this posting- hmmm….)

currently at 11 - let’s get this on to the first page!

Done.  And I just emptied my cart of the nearly $250.00 worth of merch I was going to be buying in the next few days.  Pity that.

I also posted a thread at the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Awards forums.  I had kept this fairly quiet, but I had entered, half as a lark, but didn’t progress past the quarterfinals.  Now I’m glad I didn’t advance and I made certain I said that in my post.

Asshats.

Opened up my abandoned blog to bomb (won’t work as well, but at least it means I can spam bomb). Some seem to be bombing the wrong page - this page has hit #1 (which is awesome) instead of the definition page. XD

@Reacher Fan: I suspect this is nothing to do with the beliefs of Jeff Bezos or anyone else at Amazon. Having seen enough of these things my assumption is that someone, or more likely a small, but organized group of people complained about having GLBT content shown to them on the from page or suggested to them via the “If you liked X you might also like Y” thing.

There are some people who don’t cope well with the existence of anything of which they do not approve. People whoare like that who do not approve of Teh Gay have had a very rough time of it lately. I suspect we’ll see a lot more of this in the coming weeks and months.  The only way to make it stop it to push back, hard.

Which is my way of saying—-Go Bitches!

FAIL. Already posted on my LJ, and I’ll be adding a thread on a message board I frequent.

Or rather, #1 on page 2 - sorry, didn’t know I was on page 2! :o

Wow what FAYL. Posted about it in my blog; spreading the word!

Now #10 with a lovely (Pornography) tag. sigh

Should we burn books we don’t approve of too?  This is a super dumb move.

Okay, I posted the link multiple places, including Facebook. Man, I hope it helps.

I’m going to go read an m/m romance now that I downloaded from a site that was not Amazon.

Number #2 result! Great job!

Posted the link in 4 places.

Done…I likened Bezos to The Brain and the person who suggested this crap to Pinky. Felt bad after doing it, as at least Pinky’s funny…Bigotry—it just won’t go the f*** away, will it?

I’m on it.  The link goes on my Links page and at the bottom of every page on my site.  And Twitter.

Hit #3. Yeah!

I linked on my LJ, and I also wanted to let you know that it’s already on the first page of the google results, but not the top yet.

http://corinnethewise.livejournal.com/91775.html

Hope this helps!

Wanna have fun google bombing?

There’s a thread about this over at the amazon forums under “romance.”

I wonder if my evil tendencies are heightened while under the influence of chocolate bunnies and peanut butter eggs?

Now number 2!!!!!!!!!!

It’s at #2 now. Damn, y’all move quickly.

Linked from my blog.  I’m also off to tip several much bigger blogs to hope they cover it.  Boo-urns, Amazon!

Word:  attack59 - you said a mouthful!

Great idea! I’ll post it now.

Also, please sign this petition, which will be sent to Amazon. http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/stop-amazons-discriminating-censorship

Okay, this was bad enough when I though it was only fiction books. But nonfiction?! Books from lesbian parenting/pregnancies and self-help books to biographies (like one for Harvey Milk) are losing their rankings. WTF Amazon?!?

I think we’ve hit #1.

It just came up as the first search result for me.

Done and done.

Also, since someone above posted a link to a petition, I thought I’d note that the following one has been going for a few hours and has about 1750 signatories so far so it’s a little more entrenched.

Not that I’d discourage anyone from signing both!

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/in-protest-at-amazons-new-adult-policy

Linked from my blog as well.
What I don’t get is, if they sell it why not rank it? How does removing the ranking protect kids from adult content?

Posted to KindleBoards.com:
http://www.kindleboards.com/index.php/topic,6770.msg138182.html#msg138182

There was already a topic on it.

I posted a tread on the Amazon Erotic Romance forum as well.  The links to this site and Dear Author are all there.  I wonder if mods will pull the posts with the links.  :-)

thrilled to see it pop up at #1 on my search just now - when I posted on my blog it wasn’t even on 1st page.

ROCK ON BITCHES! :)

It’s still only #3 for me! :/
Y’all using quotations or has my google broken from excessive refreshing? (quoted does come up as #1 for me)

Erm. I just searched myself at Amazon, and all of my books are listed on the search page, with rankings on their specific pages. ?!?!

And since each of my titles includes the word “Erotic”...I’m a bit confused, as apparently they would be deranked and/or unsearchable.

I also searched Jaci Burton and Lora Leigh, and it appears that all of their books are also showing up.

So I’m either missing something…or something’s changed at Amazon.

How does removing the ranking protect kids from adult content?

They seem to be assuming that salacious content is being presented on the front page or via the recommendations feature. De-ranking makes the titles so hard to search that it’s probably fair to say that no one is going to see them by accident.

spam word: question59—Yeah, I have about 59 questions for the person who thought this de-ranking plan was a good idea.

First result for “Amazon Rank” now!

@ colette: Brokeback Mountain and Heather Has Two Mommies are coming up as well. And they have sales figures on their pages (although no #70 in this category, just number sold). Perhaps they’ve reversed the policy?

@earthgirl…good to know I’m not crazy. :-)

Hi! You don’t know me, but I’ve been reading for awhile (and sent a few people here for book IDs). I love the googlebomb, but I thought I’d point out ( if you hadn’t noticed) that the smartbitchestrashybooks URL is filtered out by google’s safesearch - which means that most people searching from jobs and public libraries won’t see the googlebomb, which is a shame and dilutes the power of it.

(I noticed this way back when you googlebombed Napoli and I, on a filtered computer, couldn’t tell what people were talking about; and it’s still happening.)

Would it be worth trying to do a backup googlebomb towards a site that doesn’t have any adult terms in the URL?

Amazon is not an Amazon, a fury free dame with bow on a horse, no, Amazon´s a Square, like they used to say in the sixties.
Does it also count if I post the link right here? I already posted it at two blogs.
Well, here goes:
http://www.smartbitchestrashybooks.com/amazonrank/

Tsk, Moab is my Washpot from Stephen Fry deranked, and he´s one of my heroes. And the sad part is, that book is…drumroll…a biography! And yes, mr. Fry´s gay.  and.so.what.? she asked them pointedly.

Posted x3.

I’m going to make sure any links that are programmed to automatically direct to Amazon (goodreads etc) directs to B&N or some place else.

Sweet Dames and Gents,

better use this link for the petition, since it already has 2.108
petition votes (better gather them in one petition, I´d say)

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/in-protest-at-amazons-new-adult-policy

I posted it on my Facebook wall. Lots of my friends and family will not be thrilled by this bit of news.

did they do this on Easter figuring no one would be online to notice it happening?

I linked it to my LJ and Facebook. Hope it helps, good work ladies!

ROCK ON! Sharing the love and the linkage on my mainsite and other sites.

I love the internets. :)

Amazon might be a bunch of fucktarts, but they don’t stand a chance against the collective might of…well, the Internet. (“Oh, fuck, the Internet is here” indeed.)

Signed Sierra Dafoe’s petition and sen it on.

googled Amazon Rank and was first website I found…that´s good, yes?

And yes, Amazon IS Rank! Yuck, the stench from here…

And it’s made the LA Times Jacket Copy blog complete with a link back to the Smart Bitches!

And they also explain why versions of some books we’ve heard were removed may still be showing up on the rankings—depends on the edition and/or publisher.

did they do this on Easter figuring no one would be online to notice it happening?

@ev: My best guess it that they just didn’t think it through. Someone complained, so they labeled a bunch of things “adult” and didn’t really take into consideration all the implications of the way their system would handle that.  In fact, based on my time working for a major software company my guess is that the person who made the decision doesn’t have a clue how the software works and how things tie together. 

Generally stupidity is more common than conspiracy.

Heather Has Two Mommies does not have a sales rank as of now.

Stephen Fry’s and John Barrowman’s autobiographies have lost their ranking on the editions that have ‘gay’ in the categories or subjects they’ve been assigned, but have not lost the ranking on the editions that do NOT have the word in the categories or subjects.

Given that…
HHTM paperback (linked above) has no rank and has ‘gay & lesbian’  as a category, plus words like ‘lesbian’ and ‘homosexuality’ among its assigned subjects.

HHTM hardcover does have a sales rank, and has no words implying it’s not heteronormative in its category or subjects.

HHTM library binding has no rank, “Gay & Lesbian” in categories and ‘lebsian’ and ‘homosexuality’ in subjects.

HHTM library binding reprint is the same as normal library binding—no rank, key words listed.

HHTM special edition paperback has no rank, has keywords.

No, I don’t think they’ve reversed anything yet. :/

It wasn’t just because of Easter. I did a search on Thursday for Erastes’ Transgressions because we were featuring an excerpt on Unusual Historicals. Even thought it’s still listed as a Kindle edition, Transgressions in print did not come up in a search. Thought it was weird, but chalked it up to being an Amazon goof, not a deliberate policy. Asshats.

The search is #1 now, even without quotes, caps, etc. Nice work, bitches.

@Carrie Lofty Not just Thursday, I’ve been hearing that this has been going on from FEB - at least!

Results 1 - 10 of about 74,300,000 for Amazon Rank. (0.04 seconds)

Good

It’s also worth mentioning that not all LGBTQ-themed books have lost their rankings.

A Parent’s Guide to Preventing Homosexuality, for instance, is still ranked.

I’m thinking that makes their motives unmistakably clear.

Okay, I’m the first to admit that while computer-literate, I don’t get a lot of the nuts and bolts, like how exactly a google bomb works, etc.  That said, I guess my impression was that none of the gay/lesbian/bi/transgendered stuff was showing up unless you searched specific books, but I just did several searches of different things, including the word “erotica”, and a number of items showed up. 

Let me reiterate…I don’t get it.  Did Amazon switch back to the way it was in the wake of this response?  Is there something I’m simply missing?  I’d appreciate it if someone would fill me in.

Thanks.

And my word is anti66.  Very funny.

I’ve been hearing that this has been going on from FEB - at least!

And thus ends my attempt to be even-handed and fair by assuming that they didn’t understand all the implications of the adult label.

If this has been going on since February then they’ve had plenty of time to figure it out and correct it. Since they didn’t, I’m going back to my natural state of being cynical and angry. What were they thinking?

Done—fucking fuckwits fucking up fucking everything with their fuckwittery.  Idiocy—why can’t we outlaw general idiocy?  We can activate the cockroach-footed sphinter police for people’s love lives, but we can’t keep idiots from fucking with the arts?  *snarl*

@ Tina C—Not all the books have been stripped of their rankings, and of the books that have, not all of the editions have been stripped. So some still show up in searches. For example, search for “Unfriendly Fire”. The Kindle edition pops up, but nothing else, and a few days ago the book was on the top ten list. This thing has been applied incredibly unevenly, but the fact that it’s happening at all is still unacceptable.

My book still shows up on a search for “Messalina” but my sales rank is gone. I’ve linked your creative definition to my Full-Bodied (Book) Blog.

What utter madness…

re:malnpudl,

ha! that reeks of something aweful I hope it´s not

It’s at number one!

I’m putting a “Rank-stripped by Amazon 55 times” banner on my websites tomorrow.  With entry to your google bomb, ladies.

I’d do it tonight if I could, but I’ve got an evening’s worth of drive time coming up.

I suggest a second alternate definition:

Amazon Rank: n. The putrid smell of stupid currently emanating from Amazon…

LOL, Raven!

Watch this youtube vid by PolkaVlog:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBW8gYwSoHE

comment and rate so it will appear on Most Watched or whatever it´s called on youtube

Came home from Easter dinner with the family, and found my LiveJournal flist full of google bombings! I put my little grenade in my journal and checked Google—the SB bomb is the #1 result. Go, go, Gadget Internet!

I’ve Facebooked with the customer service email address and also signed the Facebook petition protesting this.

This makes me so angry, I want to punch someone.

I just don’t understand how a retailer like Amazon can censor what is a best seller and what is not. They sell the books but won’t let the books take the claim to fame on their lists yet take all the profit for the sales of said books. Something is just not right.

If an author writes a book and Amazon sells it and said book sells tens of thousands of copies, the author is entitled to see their book on the best seller list.

Get your stuff together Amazon. You don’t want to lose customers due to your infantile censorship. If you sell the book, the author is entitled to your best sellers list.

Done.

It’s on my blog.