" True that.
Posted on 01/31/2019 9:42:03 AM PST by grey_whiskers
See the link. All references to the Kindle Books have been removed; the notice from Amazon to the publisher is interesting too. Someone at Amazon *appears* to,have wiped the publisher clean off their databases.
They do not deserve to get taked down because they were on the right side in the sad puppies mess though, and their transgression above opened the door to that happening.
Amazon sucks.
Yup -
Tl;dr
Castalia is the publishing house of Vox Day who is reviled by the leftists and want to see him destroyed. He is partially behind the gamer gate movements and sad puppies activism (the latter exposing that the Hugo awards were given not on the merits of the work but on the political bonafides of the authors)
This was a parody work which was taken down almost immediately after originally being put up on Amazon then, after review by Amazon, was restored as a fair work. Parody works being legal in the US so long as there’s not an attempt to represent AS the work involved.
Now, almost 2 years after the incident, someone at Amazon not only reflagged the book again but wiped the entire publishers library from Amazon and will withhold all pending funds. Including many successful and highly ranked and reviewed books.
For a book that was already declared fair use and not infringing.
Now buy the kindle version to which this article refers to
Well yeah - that’s how Roger Stone got the swat team at his door - because his transgressions let them do it.
Welcome to Nazi America.
Thanks. That’s certainly more informative than the original post (although pretty much anything would be more informative than the original post.)
I disagree with your characterization of it. It was more like intentional trolling, than try to ride any coattails. Think of it as a Sad/Rabid Puppy in book form.
Not sure what type of Sci-Fi you like, but there is some great non-SJW stories being written by self-published authors, even on Amazon.
They didn’t like one book mocking Scalzi’s book. They were under pressure to remove Moira Greyland Peat’s “The Last Closet”. Using the first issue as an excuse, they did all of the above, removing ALL books by ALL authors of that publishing house.
Just checking to see if you still think there is no problem with Tech monopolies censoring people in the public square.
Not if the people in question are dishonestly stealing others' intellectual property and trying to scam unsuspecting consumers, in violation of their contract with said tech monopoly.
Do you think that's a problem?
You’re not following this very closely.
But the issue here is that they could do this without notice, and without "due process" and for frivolous made up reasons.
I'm not concerned with Amazon's reasons, or Facebook's reasons, or Google's reasons, or Twitter's reasons, i'm concerned with their ability to censor public speech for any reason.
KDP is a commercial arrangement governed by a contract.
If Amazon violated the terms of the agreement Castalia can sue or arbitrate.
Or do you think anyone should be able to use the Kindle publishing platform Amazon developed with no conditions?
And after all the trouble you went to to provide this information packed post.
To those who reflexively defend any corporation against the individual in the name of the mythical free market (which is actually a massively regulated market favorable to large corporations that can bribe legislators):
Vox Day has been among the most hated persons in the SJW milieu since GamerGate and Sad Puppies. The Amazon technical staff is full of activist, militant SJWs. Do the math.
Assuming for the sake of argument that Castalia House has in fact somehow violated terms of service, I will assert this:
SELECTIVE enforcement of laws, regulations, and policies are being used to destroy conservatives in the public arena.
If you have no problem with SELECTIVE enforcement, then you are not a conservative; when they come for you, I will have no sympathy.
Amazon backed down after less than a day.
https://voxday.blogspot.com/2019/01/reinstated.html#comment-form
“From Amazon:
Thank you for your email concerning the status of your account.
The most recent message we sent to you regarding ASIN B06XFQ24QC was incorrect.
Based on your appeal, we are reinstating your account and you will receive any applicable royalties.”
= = = = = = = = = = = =
Comments from that thread:
I suspect that, once a more senior suit realized the implications of this f***ery, he realized that this was the sort of thing that could get the IRS, CFPB, and SEC all looking VERY closely at Amazon.
Amazon suddenly had a (very tiny, admittedly) pile of money that they couldn’t account for. Someone at the IRS would likely say “Ex nihilo, nihil fit,” and proceed on the assumption that there was MORE money out there that they couldn’t account for. LOTS more. Like, maybe enough to get him promoted from GS-15 to a supergrade.
SEC would be interested in potential Sarbanes-Oxley violations.
CFPB would LOVE to rack up fines on a major credit card issuer.
AND
What I suspect is that a corporate lawyer took a single look at the facts at hand. Especially the explicit statement that it was a copyright violation which is the ONE reason (according to their TOS) that would have allowed us to go to court instead of arbitration, and then we’d probably have been talking one or two orders of magnitude bigger sums. And as a cherry on top, the claim was trivially demonstrated as false because the email they referred to said something entirely different. But still, since it was THEIR claim, false or not, it would have been court.
I very much doubt that after that one look, fighting was on the table anymore. What they were probably trying to figure out is what to say, so that it would lead to as little liability as possible. I note that they were very explicit about having been mistaken about copyright violation. This response clearly came from someone who knew a thing or two.
Amazon has restored the account and apologized.
http://voxday.blogspot.com/2019/01/reinstated.html?m=1
Ha! Couple of comments from Vox’s blog: “If it bleeds, we can kill it,” (reference to Predator) and “Much like [Trump], part of Vox’s service is revealing the weaknesses of these Goliaths we think untouchable.”
Ha!
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