More on Amazon’s Phony Reviews
After posting last week’s critique of Amazon’s reviewing policies, I learned something I’d like to share with you: Many of Amazon’s favorable consumer reviews of their non-book products are actually written by people hired by ad agencies. This should surprise no one, but it makes their new policy of banning reviews written by friends of authors pretty laughable.
I also learned that goodreads.com needs to clean up its act. Alhough, curiously, goodreads invites reviews by friends of authors, they like Amazon take no responsibility for reviews that cross the line and defame or insult authors. They don’t even provide an occasionally helpful but usually ineffective abuse button!
–Joyce Johnson