Interesting story -- I had always assumed the Amazon ratings were "unmoderated" and merely reflected actual sales:
Why Is Amazon Removing The Sales Rankings From Gay, Lesbian Books?
According to author Mark R. Probst, Amazon.com has begun pulling the sales rank numbers from several gay and lesbian books, claiming that the books are "adult" and should be excluded from some searches and lists.
Probst noticed the disappearing rankings after searching for a few high-profile gay romance novels; believing there was some sort of glitch in the system, he continued researching and discovered that "HUNDREDS of gay and lesbian books simultaneously lost their sales rankings," including his own book, The Filly. When Probst contacted Amazon regarding the situation, he was given this response by the company:
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.
Hence, if you have further questions, kindly write back to us.
Best regards,
Ashlyn DMember ServicesAmazon.com Advantage
This sounds like a big old bowl of BS, does it not? Especially when you consider the fact that Amazon has vibrators, clitoral stimulators and anal plugs available in their search system with sales ranks attached. One wonders why these items are allowed to remain in the system with sales ranks while books including gay and lesbian content, themes, and even, as a commenter points out, autobiographies of gay and lesbian authors such as Stephen Fry, are deemed too "adult" for such things.
The LiveJournal community MetaWriter is currently keeping tabs on the books that have had their sales ranks removed: Rubyfruit Jungle, Brokeback Mountain, and even Alex Sanchez's Rainbow Boys, a YA novel, have been deemed too "adult" for Amazon's customers to view their sales rankings. Twitter is currently buzzing with the controversy.
See story here: http://jezebel.com/5209088/why-is-amazon-removing-the-sales-rankings-from-gay-lesbian-books
5 comments:
unbelievable.... how rampant homophobia is in the US... sigh
OK, why are you reading Lesbian websites???
They are pulling them because someone, and clearly someone who had the retail clout to threaten Amazon, complained. Amazon isn't going to just dream this up themselves. Prop 8? The crazy coalition for marriage types? That's where I'd start looking.
Updates from site: http://kindleworld.blogspot.com/2009/04/amazon-de-ranking-hiding-some-adult.html
UPDATE: 4/13/09 at 10:23 am. 'Weev' AKA 'veew' has claimed responsibility for the fiasco and explained how he did it (if he did), the methods and motivives matching closely the theory that tehdely (paragraph above) had last night. He claims he did it out of hatred of "reputation systems based on user input" and his disgust with the gay community, taking advantage of a milder policy in place and system programming with not enough security against malicious use of it. He now has his admirers, of course.
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