Eldon’s Comments (group member since May 30, 2016)

Eldon’s comments from the Support for Indie Authors group.

Leah wrote: "Haha, Eldon, I was going to say the same thing! Robert would be a great professor of statistics and probabilities!"

Indeed Leah ;)

Robert wrote: "Eldon wrote: " Hi Robert. Do you think being able to leave a rating without a review leads to higher fa..."

That's hard to say. A while back, I did some comparisons between reviews of best sellers..."

Well, Robert, that is a well thought out and technical point of view. Since you lost me around histogram, I'll take your word for it lol :)

Robert wrote: "Their shop, their rules, but it seems to me that it's a pretty easy way to game the system."

Hi Robert. Do you think being able to leave a rating without a review leads to higher false ratings? Or, does the requirement on Amazon to have a review in order to rate lead to less ratings/reviews for authors?

Where is the risk perceived to be higher?

Phyllis wrote: "I have had very little success with Smashwords either as a distributor or as a marketplace. Just the occasional sale, even when participating in their regular promotions. I've tried it several time..."

My experience has been similar Phyllis. While there can be advantages to being wide and using a service like Smashwords, I found it stretched the marketing budget too thin as I then needed to maintain visibility on numerous sites as opposed to just one with Amazon.

Dwayne wrote: "JAKe wrote: "Question about a person that seems to have made a claim to have posted on this thread - that would be Janice_The_Review_Girl. Is this person real? I did not see a post from her on this..."

Thank you Dwayne :)

Ian wrote: "If she regularly posts reviews on Amazon they are hardly likely to take that attitude. I did say first check what reviews she has posted. If she is a disaster waiting to happen, there will not be a..."

Jake asked for opinions on this and I think we've given him some. I say we agree to disagree Ian :)

Ian wrote: "Just because the person does not post on Goodreads does not mean it is a scam. One approach might be to ask for links to some of her reviews. If she posts reviews on Amazon, why not? The cost of on..."

It's more than the cost of one ebook though, Ian. Consider if Amazon sees this arrangement as a paid review. They could cost an author far more than one ebook. There's also the potential piracy issue at play as well. It's been my experience that reputable sources of promotion/review rarely contact an author - instead it's the other way around.

And lastly, in this case, I saw the post and it looked very suspect.

JAKe wrote: "Question about a person that seems to have made a claim to have posted on this thread - that would be Janice_The_Review_Girl. Is this person real? I did not see a post from her on this thread and I..."

It sounds suspect. Personally, I would not engage.

Jim wrote: "That should give you an idea of the flexibility that Creative Commons brings to copyright. One thing to remember is that you can change the license after you apply it, but it can't become more restrictive. For my own novels that I have licensed under CC, I chose CC-BY-SA. I don't mind if people change them or make money from them. In fact I'd love to see it."

Thanks for sharing Jim! I'm sure that will be most helpful to many members here :)

Jim wrote: "Thank you for your comment, B.A. What I should do is helpfully point out where you're mistaken and try to explain it for you, but I think you'll do better to look it up for yourself. Thanks again."

In the interest of fairness to the group at large, Jim, it would be awesome if you could clarify the difference here so all members could benefit from the knowledge :)

Peter wrote: "Oof, I just read that article. I'm not so much bothered by the lost sales as I am that they're drowning out genuine, budding authors with all the noise of cheap, cookie-cutter/plagiarized work."

For sure the rise in plagiarism is a growing concern within the industry :(

Anna Faversham wrote: "One of my books also had the "Amazon Best Seller" banner across the top for a while, then I noticed it had disappeared. This means I have "Amazon Best Seller" on my Amazon Blurb but no evidence.

..."

Way to go Anna :) Couldn't happen to a nicer person!

Belle wrote: "Screenshot! I knocked off Amy Tan and Ken Follett and knew that would never happen again so I definitely screenshot it."

Awesome Belle!! :)

Jim wrote: "Eldon wrote: "Hi Jim! I admit to being a bit of a neophyte here. Could you explain further what a "Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike" is?"

Creative Commons is a way for creators to have mor..."

Yes that does help. It reminds me where I've seen Creative Commons before - on font purchases :)

Personally, I've only ever applied for a copyright on my books, so I won't have much to add to this discussion, I'm afraid.

Jim wrote: "I'm wondering if anyone else on here has used a Creative Commons license for any of their books. I applied Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike (CC-BY-SA) to my XXXXX XXXXX trilogy. I named the..."

Hi Jim! I admit to being a bit of a neophyte here. Could you explain further what a "Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike" is?

Dwayne wrote: "And I haven't officially welcomed you to the fun world of SIA moderation, yet. So, welcome. And if you need anything, let me know."

Thanks Dwayne :) I'll let you know if I need anything.

Dwayne wrote: "When I typed in my own name and New York Times Bestseller, it crashed my computer. So, yeah, it seems to work."

LOL

Ahh, I should've known Google would have the answer :) Thanks!

Jim wrote: "That's a good way to look at it. It disappoints me to see people wasting time worrying about "lost sales" and inflicting DRM on their paying customers. Write good books, treat your readers well and..."

Absolutely Jim! While I'm a staunch advocate of protecting creator's rights, for me, sharing books is the way things have always been. There is nothing wrong with sharing something you love.

I'm just curious. I came across a book this morning with New York Times Bestseller emblazoned on the cover. I won't name the author so don't ask. Suffice to say, the place they were promoting, and the quality of their cover, got me to wondering if the claim was bogus or true.

Is there anyplace the veracity of bestseller claims can be investigated? Is this a trend in book marketing? If the claim is untrue, would this not qualify as misleading to a reader?