WHSMith's temporarily shuts down ebook site

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

So I take it that all books including descriptions of murders and violent robbery will now also be removed? Especially ones in which the villains get away without punishment.

No, but ones that contain instructions for luring children or exist solely to describe the abuse of children, rape for entertainment, descriptions of underage relations as erotica, etc that are already actually illegal will be removed.

And laws that are making erotica and its display "opt in" rather than 'Opt out" will mean that all erotica material has to be more clearly marked/labeled.

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by avantman42

I think pdurrant has raised a valid point. BearMountainBooks said:


I've read plenty of thrillers that include detailed descriptions of how characters pick locks, or turn everyday objects into improvised weapons. They aren't how-to manuals, but they could certainly be described as containing clear instructions/tips for how to commit certain crimes.

I thought the problem books were extreme erotica books, ones that possibly contravened the Obscene Publications Acts.

But those books do not exist SOLELY for scintillation. I am not familiar with the way the law is stated in any particular country, but I know they exist and the line has something to do with whether or not the books exist to scintillate, teach, etc versus a mention in a plot line. That is not to say that some of the books you're talking about don't cross the legal line. (And I'm not saying they do either.) But as part of a mystery or thriller they are far less likely to get the attention of authorities looking to shut down material that helps people with illegal activities (luring children, seducing underaged partners, torture methods that end in death or disfigurement, etc.)

In another conversation (offline and I won't repeat all of it) there was supposedly a book found on Amazon that was showing up under Children's reading that contained inappropriate photos that *could* have been underaged children. The author apparently assumed that since an actual age wasn't given, such pictures would be considered legal.

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by Crusader

Yes, it wasn't as if Amazon were removing the same types of books and it was WH Smith that started it. Oh, and don't blame any of the self-pubbed authors for using atrociously explicit covers and not tagging their books correctly or willfully putting them into categories where they definitely don't belong. Kobo is the only guilty party here.

Just as a note--I follow a few writer forums and Amazon has been quietly removing books of a certain type for at least two months. The legality of the material puts the material in question as well as the marketing methods used (not categorizing the books correctly and they end up showing in Children's, YA and so on. Some of the covers alone should not be displayed in these areas.)

There are laws about explicit covers being in places where children can see them, which is one of the reasons certain material is kept behind counters in stores.

It is rumored that Amazon is employing some sort of scanning program to scan for illegal or marginal material and pulling such books. By marginal, there are lots of techniques employed to get around rules, but the intent may in fact be to sell material that is illegal.

I hate this topic, I really do. There is some bad stuff out there hiding behind "erotica" that should have never been allowed.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks

No, but ones that contain instructions for luring children or exist solely to describe the abuse of children, rape for entertainment, descriptions of underage relations as erotica, etc that are already actually illegal will be removed.

Actual incitement to commit a crime is a crime in the UK, and so such books would be illegal.

In the US I suspect that you are incorrect on their legality, given your constitution's first amendment.

You seem to feel that there is an obvious bright line between acceptable and unacceptable fiction. It seems to me that any such line is arbitrary and uncertain.

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Actual incitement to commit a crime is a crime in the UK, and so such books would be illegal.

In the US I suspect that you are incorrect on their legality, given your constitution's first amendment.

You seem to feel that there is an obvious bright line between acceptable and unacceptable fiction. It seems to me that any such line is arbitrary and uncertain.

They are illegal here as well--freedom of speech doesn't mean that you can arbitrary give instructions on crimes, etc. There are still some state laws on the books that are even more strict (whether they should be on the books or not in some cases is another question entirely.)

I'm not saying there is an easy line, but as a retailer if someone points out one or a number of books that are even close to the line, I can see reason for the panic. They not only don't want a lawsuit, they don't want the negative attention.

There are two legal lines they have to worry about--material that is easily accessible to children that contain images that are not supposed to be easily accessible (covers and samples) and actual books with material that is illegal. It is ... ridiculous that no one has been checking for either of these things so of course, someone will push the envelope. And now everyone will point fingers and say, "It was HIS responsibility to check..."

[carpetmojo]

I do think you're being rather unkind to that upright, shining example of unbiased, well-researched, independent, non-political, factual orientated, truthful, completely unprejudiced journalism, the "Daily Mail".

Butter wouldn't melt in its hot-type .......

Oh, and of course it's not hack-knee'd, either.

[Grace Elliot]

Sounds to me like WHSmith were just being lazy and accepting Kobo's feed - simple as.
The real problem is streaming and making sure inappropriate titles aren't put in front of children.
Not rocket science.

[jgaiser]

Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks

They are illegal here as well--freedom of speech doesn't mean that you can arbitrary give instructions on crimes, etc. There are still some state laws on the books that are even more strict (whether they should be on the books or not in some cases is another

And you can, of course, point us to the pertinent laws and/or successful prosecutions of authors of these kind of books?

[BearMountainBooks]

No, I'm not going to go quoting a bunch of cases. It's fine with me if you don't believe me. There are also laws against disseminating material on bomb making.

Just one search you can do:

Disseminating indecent material to minors. Or Law on same to juveniles.

This is just one state law:

http://www.mass.gov/courts/courtsand...ene-matter.pdf

I'm not going to go look up who has been prosecuted or even charged, but if you search for various topics you'll see plenty of lawyer ads pop up with a list of 'Have you been accused of xyz and need representation."

I'm quite certain you can easily find cases of stores selling material to those under 18 in various states where the sellers were prosecuted.

[jgaiser]

Nobody disagrees that disseminating porn to minors is wrong.

Nobody disagrees that using *real* minors in visual porn is wrong.

Nobody disagrees that the actual abuse of minors is wrong.

But what you don't like in *written* porn isn't the same as being illegal. No *real* minors have been involved. Nobody *really* gets abused. It's all fiction and for the most part the courts in the U.S. agrees.

Hopefully WHSmith and Kobo will fix their search engines so this becomes a non-problem for those who don't want to see these stories.

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by jgaiser

Nobody disagrees that disseminating porn to minors is wrong.

Nobody disagrees that using *real* minors in visual porn is wrong.

Nobody disagrees that the actual abuse of minors is wrong.

But what you don't like in *written* porn isn't the same as being illegal. No *real* minors have been involved. Nobody *really* gets abused. It's all fiction and for the most part the courts in the U.S. agrees.

Hopefully WHSmith and Kobo will fix their search engines so this becomes a non-problem for those who don't want to see these stories.

Ah, but in at least one case (I saw the link before it was taken down) there was a book with photos. Now, the blurb did not say the photos were of minors. However, it used the words, "My teenage lover" in the blurb. So you see, some of the material could actually be illegal material. It is also potentially for sale where minors could purchase it.

I did not sample the book. I do not know the age of the people in the book. But you can see where there might be some issues.

Edited: For clarity, the blurb also specified that the book contained adult material photos.

[alicepattinson]

Originally Posted by paola

I think the problem is with the covers, that sometimes are extremely explicit - you may not want your kids to stumble upon them, and I can completely understand grown ups who don't want to have to see them, either.

Yeah this is what I agree of. Maybe the covers are just too much. For grown up, it's definitely okay but children now a days are too techy that they can even open tabs, etc. and who knows they'll open the ebooks and see these explicit covers.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks

Ah, but in at least one case (I saw the link before it was taken down) there was a book with photos. Now, the blurb did not say the photos were of minors. However, it used the words, "My teenage lover" in the blurb. So you see, some of the material could actually be illegal material. It is also potentially for sale where minors could purchase it.

I did not sample the book. I do not know the age of the people in the book. But you can see where there might be some issues.

Edited: For clarity, the blurb also specified that the book contained adult material photos.

18 and 19 year olds are still teenagers, but in most countries are considered sufficiently adult to be able to give consent to sex, and to consent to appearing in porn.

If this is your evidence that the fuss includes child porn images, it's very weak.

[latepaul]

Dear Author has a good summary of this here

It seems that a big part of this is not so much actual illegal content (there may have been some I don't know) but adult content showing up inappropriately in other searches, especially searches children may make. And this is partly the retailers search engines but it appears it's also partly because organisations like Direct2Digital are not vetting authors' use of blurbs, covers and tags. So some unscrupulous erotica authors are trying to get their book more widely seen by putting tags that cause it to show up in general searches. I bet this is due to an almost entirely automated system somewhere in the process. From the link above:

What is clear is that Direct 2 Digital uses no filters unlike Smashwords. None of the Smashwords titles were taken down but the ones from D2D were, likely because D2D had no way of filtering out the questionable content.

So in some ways I can't blame Kobo for temporarily switching off the D2D feed until they have some confidence this kind of gaming of the tags system has been resolved. Kinda sucks if you're an author of a non-erotica title that goes through them though. Or even an erotica author who plays by the rules (which I'm sure is most).

[avantman42]

What is clear is that Direct 2 Digital uses no filters unlike Smashwords. None of the Smashwords titles were taken down but the ones from D2D were, likely because D2D had no way of filtering out the questionable content.

The Smashwords site updates page disagrees. From the October 15 entry:

From what I'm told, all or most Smashwords titles are not available in the UK through the Kobo-branded store as well as through WH Smith. Most Smashwords titles continue to appear internationally through Kobo, but not all. I spoke with Kobo today and they're working to restore as many blocked titles as possible as soon as possible.

It seems like nobody (presumably with the exception of Kobo themselves) really knows exactly what happened, or which books were removed and which weren't.