Authors are protesting Amazon's 'read and return' e-book policy

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

I will say that your argument is less than convincing. I could fertilize my garden with it (if I had a garden and cared to fertilize).

Glad you think so.

In the end, you are arguing that you should be able to read for free and pay only for those you like. That is an argument pirates occasionally use and is a surprising attitude coming from someone in the book biz.

No, that's absolutely not what I said. I said, if I find a book unacceptably bad, I should be able to return it. I never said I'd finish the cursed thing and THEN return it. If I finish it--I don't return it. You should have asked before you made that assumption, although I think that was implicit earlier that I only returned those that I didn't complete.

Just like I don't buy the argument that so many authors make, that they would "never" return a book, because they know how much blood, sweat and tears the author put into it, how hurt their feelings will be, etc. Really? What, that's somehow different for other people who work? If someone makes something and sells it, does that mean that the buyer can't return it, because the builder/carver/whatever put their heart and soul into it? Or is it ONLY authors that bleed for their work? It's WORK.

I can just imagine--if I hired some new bookmaker and an author came to me for book design. New Bookmaker--we'll call her Suzie--puts her heart and soul into it, but, meh, the layout is bad. Should the author keep the layout, because poor little Suzie will cry? Or, do you think that the author will rightly demand that I bloody well fix it? That author's book, and my work, are the same thing--commercial service products. No damn difference. If an author writes a book and puts it up for free, on Wattpad, A03, etc. then I will be exceedingly gentle with any critique, because that person is not saying to me that they've done everything possible--that this product is commercially ready to be bought. Once an author chooses to launch their own small business--become a publisher, NOT an author--then s/he has an obligation to those that buy his/her service, to make it a commercially-viable product. Not schlock or dreck.

Incidentally, I don't remember seeing an answer (and if I missed it, I do apologize): Do you walk out of a theater demanding a refund if the movie you saw sucked? Did you return your copy of CCR's Mardi Gras after realizing there were only two good songs on it? In the days of paper books, were you in the habit of returning your half finished paper books, explaining your problems with structure or murkiness of themes to the cashier in order to justify your demand for a refund?

You didn't get an answer because the last time I was in a theater was literally decades ago. Mr. Hitch has tinnitus, so movie theaters are out for me. Have I returned movies that I've rented, for a refund, when I get 10% or 20% through them and find that they awful or repugnant, etc. You betcha.

Don't assume that I'm finishing those books and returning them because I'm cheap. I'm not a) finishing them and b) the pricing has nothing to do with it--most of them are $0.99-$1.99 or thereabouts. It's that, or I'll leave a review and honestly, I still think that they'd rather refund that $0.66 or the $1.20 or whatever, than get a bad review. When I've polled my customers, that's their overwhelming response.

I just see no good purpose served, other than throwing my money away, in buying a book that's lousy and allowing the author to assume that you loved it. You're hardly doing him any damned service.

Hitch

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by Hitch

I said. I said, if I find a book unacceptably bad, I should be able to return it.

Why?

I need more characters to post a response.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by Hitch

I don't buy the argument that so many authors make, that they would "never" return a book, because they know how much blood, sweat and tears the author put into it, how hurt their feelings will be, etc.

I don't buy it either. That has nothing to do with my concern.

[issybird]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

But they are treated equally according to the return policy.

And yet I suspect the lion’s share of returns are self-pubs. They may be treated equally, but the self-pub aficionado relies on it more. Self-pubbed truly is a special category; the qc just isn’t the same overall.

Nonsense. Caveat emptor.

There is more than enough information out there to make a good judgement before buying a book. And if there is not, then maybe you shouldn't put yourself up as the guinea pig.

Nobody deserves to be insulated from the risk of paying for entertainment that they didn't enjoy in the way they thought they would.

And yet in this particular instance, Amazon seemingly has no issue with it. So why are you imposing a personal moral constraint on someone doing something entirely legit? Pronouncements from on high on moral issues are always suspect, frankly.

That it is legit is the whole point of the story I linked to. The purpose of this thread.

Let's say Amazon's return limit is two books (I know two books is okay, because I have returned two books). Using your logic, a person could read a trilogy and only pay for one book. If the limit is two in a month, that could happen every month.

That example wouldn't violate the letter of the return policy, but would violate the spirit of it.

Let’s look at the big picture. Amazon sells more books with a liberal return policy than with a restrictive one. Amazon prefers to sell more books. Duh. That some are making out by pushing the policy to its limits does not override the first and primary consideration. You refuse to acknowledge this. Right behavior by certain bad apples is more important to you than maximizing sales and that’s silly, frankly. And then there are the constraints that would be put on the good apples if the policy became more restrictive, but hey! Fewer people would be getting away with something. Gee, that feels good - but your priorities are screwed up.

And again, you define your situations so narrowly as to be absurd. I have every faith that Amazon’s algorithms are much more flexible than that. I’m sure returns are looked at in the context of sales/profits from an account overall. The person who’s returning two books of three each month is going to be flagged much sooner than the person who’s returning two of thirty - I suspect Amazon loves that latter customer, in fact. Nuance matters.

Look, I’m not saying that each person doesn’t have an obligation to act morally. They do and yet some don’t. But sometimes all you can do is look after your own behavior and let the chips fall where they may. And in this case, where the victims, i.e. Amazon and the authors, are doing better by tolerating returns, I truly don’t get your beef.

[Little.Egret]

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

Just to be sure I understand correctly - you're saying you support the current policy because of a tiny typo left uncorrected?

Twenty-eight occurrences of "lead" that should have been " led", no "led" occurrences at all. Much more annoying than meals ending with a desert.

[maddz]

Originally Posted by Little.Egret

Twenty-eight occurrences of "lead" that should have been " led", no "led" occurrences at all. Much more annoying than meals ending with a desert.

I've tended not to return books apart from accidental purchases when my fingers slipped on the trackball (the perils of age and stiff hands). I have left bad reviews on books I thought atrocious - poor spelling, poor grammar, bad plot and so on but not returned them. One was a novella that read like bad fanfic written by a pre-teen, another was an ebook version of a print book I loved. The latter I suspect was pirated - that I read and then went through on the Kindle app reporting every typo and misspelling (the hero's name was spelt at least 4 different ways, only one was correct). Both I left reviews - the first got a 1* review, the second was more nuanced as I had both print and digital editions, and basically warned people of the poor proof-reading in the digital edition.

As far as I am aware, none of the reported errors have been corrected...

[Uncle Robin]

Originally Posted by Little.Egret

Twenty-eight occurrences of "lead" that should have been " led", no "led" occurrences at all. Much more annoying than meals ending with a desert.

Thanks. Your initial post did not indicate multiple occurrences. typos/poor editing like that don't trigger me much, although one I see a lot that is mildly irksome is "discrete" for "discreet". I guess that's a separate issue though.

[Apache]

Any craftsman, whatever trade they are in, should take pride in their work. In my line of work, I find that fully 60% of bench jewelers should go into another line of work. I have been a bench jeweler for 43 years and I have seen some truly awful work put out by jewelers. I have also seen some amazing work by jewelers. I cannot speak for other industries, but I feel that it is probably close to the same. I had a customer come in Saturday with a wedding set that a local store had sized. It had been sent out to a wholesale jeweler. The sizing was abysmal, and the jeweler should be ashamed of what he did. The store should have inspected it when it came back, but obviously did not do so. The store they purchased the rings from refused to do anything about it. The store should have sent it back and demanded that the job be done correctly. Now I have to charge a customer to fix something she should not have to pay for. So yes, there should be laws to force companies to accept returns or repair merchandise that is shoddy and poorly crafted. Those laws that do exist are usually hard to enforce at a retail level when the only recourse the customer has is seeking expensive legal assistance.
Apache

[Little.Egret]

The usual scheme has the trading standards office of the borough, consumer advocate at your Better Business office or a master jewellers guild look into the problem.

Doesn't always work and someone has to provide resources but the idea can be seen working world-wide.

[jhowell]

This topic reminds me a lot of the opinions around DRM. Whether to have a liberal policy that benefits consumers but is open to potential abuse by bad actors or a restrictive policy that punishes everyone.

In the case of DRM Amazon leaves the choice to the publisher. Perhaps this could be done for returns also. A large banner on the page stating, “The publisher of this book does not allow returns. You must agree to this before purchasing.” I doubt that Amazon would do that though.


(Added: I know that Amazon has been slowly adding DRM even if the publisher does not want it.)

[Apache]

Originally Posted by Little.Egret

The usual scheme has the trading standards office of the borough, consumer advocate at your Better Business office or a master jewellers guild look into the problem.

Doesn't always work and someone has to provide resources but the idea can be seen working world-wide.

Not available or powerless in the US.
Apache

[tomsem]

Originally Posted by Critteranne

Also, accidental purchases are way too easy because of the 1-Click button. It’s also possible to buy the same ebook twice of the publisher changes the edition.

You can turn off 1-click on per-device basis (except for Kindles, it looks like) or 'everywhere' in your Amazon account settings.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by jhowell

This topic reminds me a lot of the opinions around DRM. Whether to have a liberal policy that benefits consumers but is open to potential abuse by bad actors or a restrictive policy that punishes everyone.

But there is middle ground. Say, leave the return policy at 7 days or X% read, whichever comes first. That doesn't seem to be unreasonable at all.

(I'm a lot quieter today. My router died which caused everything else to back up.)

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by tomsem

You can turn off 1-click on per-device basis (except for Kindles, it looks like) or 'everywhere' in your Amazon account settings.

I just tried. I turned off 1-Click everywhere. But when looking at an ebook, it still says 'Buy now with 1-Click'

[Little.Egret]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

I just tried. I turned off 1-Click everywhere. But when looking at an ebook, it still says 'Buy now with 1-Click'

Yep, I have it turned it off for everything but if I could succeed in preventing its use for ebooks I wouldn't be able to buy ebooks.