Will I ever understand this game?

[Katie]

I just came across this on Twitter

http://bit.ly/kJaVR7

I have to admit I did wonder how a book could race to the top so quickly. Was it really that easy?

[Patricia]

I saw that on Twitter, too, but I didn't understand it. Guess you need to know the source material they were ripping off...

[James]

See, short term yes it worked. But am I the only one who thinks that they must be desperate crap writers, and so won't ever buy any book by them ever ever?

[Coral]

I don't know about that, but they are certainly sneaky.

[Katie]

James said See, short term yes it worked. But am I the only one who thinks that they must be desperate crap writers, and so won't ever buy any book by them ever ever?

All the self-congratulatory hype that went with it was enough to put me off buying - it was everywhere, over and over.

[Andre Jute]

James wrote: "See, short term yes it worked. But am I the only one who thinks that they must be desperate crap writers, and so won't ever buy any book by them ever ever?"

+1

...and how many more?

[Will]

This reminds me a bit of the tagging craze on Amazon. I'll admit that when I first published an ebook for Kindle, I read the discussions on tagging and tried it for a few minutes. Then I thought about what a waste of time it was.
Based on what these authors did, I won't buy or read their books, or promote them on my blog, or anywhere.
I'll bet they won't be selling many books in 6 months, unless their book happens to be good, but I doubt it.

[Shawn]

I think it's genius. They got to the top of the charts and now that Amazon has stepped in, they are getting quite the free publicity. If there books are halfway decent, they'll see continued success.

I'll take negative publicity over no publicity all day long.

[Andre Jute]

Shawn, the problem with negative publicity is that you need more skill to manage it than positive publicity. Most writers don't even have the skill to create positive publicity, never mind to manage it for greatest effect.