I'm OUTRAGED!
Yes, that's right! Completed P.O.'d. Because of this I am writing this blog post. I believe that YOU ALL NEED TO BE AWARE!
I'm sure you're all aware of the danger of Book Pirating. It's out there! Everyone knows it.
But now there is a new type of shark in the water...
Brace yourselves my beloveds, for THIS is a DOOZY!
In recent days I've come across two new types of author/book and reviewer con. I truly believe that this one is even worse then plain old pirating. I might have to explain this one to you from the beginning. I'll try to be short.
For several moths now, I had been receiving Book Review Requests--randomly and without warning. Just out of the blue, I'd get these odd and out of place Review Requests. The most peculiar part about it was that I was getting them sent to my personal email address.
Now, here is the part that kept bugging me. I work as part of The Review Board and am constantly doing book reviews. However any books that I review are assigned to me by the moderator of TRB. So whenever I'd get these incidental requests, I'd (1) redirect them to The Review Board or (2) ignore them altogether. Here are the biggest issues:
- With the amount of things that I do (and I do A LOT) there was absolutely no way that I could keep track of all of these random requests.
- I kept wondering, HOW in SAM HELL are these people getting my personal email address.
I'd chit chatted about it back and forth with my Bestie, and she said, "Keep an eye out. You never know where people can get your email address from." I concluded that she was right and did as she suggested.
So, I sat and I waited.
Weeks passed...
Sure enough someone sent out a bulk email to several people, one of which was me. I initially ignored the email and moseyed along with my day. As luck would have it, during the remainder of the day that very same person sent out another bulk email address apologizing for some things and said that she'd never done that before and was a member of a website which listed every one of our email address. Here is a portion of the email just as I'd received it.
"I thought I was emailing people who read and review books in their spare time, people who liked to except unsolicited emails asking for book reviews.
You are all listed on this site:
Now let's be clear... BY NO MEANS am I blaming the person who sent out the emails!
However, after I read that instantly my curiosity was peeked so I clicked the link. And guess what I found out people? Go ahead, guess. I'll wait....
When I clicked on the link and read through the website, I discovered that these people, IF you can call them that, were charging authors for "membership" in exchange for a "list of reviewers". Furthermore, the claimed that they were paying these reviewers commissions for reading and reviewing.
In a word....
WHAAAAAT?!?!?!?
My beloveds, what they are REALLY doing is STEALING YOUR MONEY! The are getting these email addresses from websites, Facebook and whatever other means, and then BLATANTLY LYING to their members! We are not getting any such commissions and they are stealing your money!
Once again, the website is www.jaydpromo.com.
Please spread the word! Tell a friend! Tell a friend of a friend! Contact the actual site moderators and demand an explanation. DO WHATEVER YOU HAVE TO DO TO TAKE THEM DOWN!!
Here is the second situation...
A friend of mine who is new to the publishing game got a hold of me yesterday. She told me that her FREE book was being listed on ePub PDF Books, FOR SALE!! That's right, you read correctly! They took a FREEBIE and listed it on their site FOR SALE!!
Here is where this differs from the typical type of pirating:
- They take a FREE book. Be it a book that was once on promotion, or one that is always free, and list it for sale on their site.
- They attempt to SELL a book that cost them nothing.
- They DO NOT pay the authors royalties or commissions on these sales.
- An Author WILL NOT know that their book has been listed here unless they search for it.
- Unlike OTHER pirating sites (and I'm not saying that the other ones are okay either), they do not give your book away for free, but attempt to make money off of your hard work without your knowledge or consent.
APPALLED?
UMM, YES!
Friends, please, please please spread the word. Tell everyone. Join me in the fight to STOP THIS! Search their site, look for your book, contact them and demand for them to remove your book.
THIS IS AN ALL OUT OUTRAGE!
SHARE, SHARE, SHARE!
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