(UPDATE – May 5, 2022 – Yesterday, Amazon sent out an email that as of August 2022, MOBIs would no longer be supported via the send to kindle process and that effective immediately, EPUB files ARE supported for that process. Thus the article below is now out of date, but I’ll leave it for historical purposes as it was originally written in October 2021, which means it was more than half a year where Amazon’s support for the MOBI format was inconsistent)

Fairly recently, I’ve started getting the occasional email from authors asking why they still need to provide their ARC in the MOBI format, given that “Amazon no longer supports it”.  Often the question is backed up by the claim that even popular software like Vellum recognize the recent obsolescence of the format and thus no longer create MOBI files, making it harder for the author to provide them.

Both of these claims are technically untrue, but I can see why the facts are being interpreted this way. Unfortunately, as is so often the case, the reality of the situation is complicated and perhaps a bit half-baked, leading to misinformation and confusion among authors. And when that happens, I figure it’s time to add a new entry to our old rumor busting blog series.

So let’s dig into the facts and figure out what’s really going on here, because while it may be true that MOBI’s days are numbered, if you plan to continue sending free copies of your book to Amazon readers in the hopes of getting reviews, it’s premature to be turning your back on the format completely.

Does Amazon still use MOBI files or not?

Well… yes and no.

The issue is that while Amazon has gotten rid of the format in one place, they still require it in another.

To explain why, it actually helps to know a bit of the history of the MOBI file, so let’s go over that VERY BRIEFLY.

The original MOBI format was created by a company called Mobipocket back in 2000.  Amazon bought that company in 2005 and adopted the format as its own for a number of years, but eventually switched to the Kindle File Format (with the extension .azw). At first, the new format was just a minor change from the original, but with each new iteration new features were added and it began to drift further and further away from the original MOBI specifications. 

However, to maintain backwards compatibility with older devices, these new formats always included the original formats within them. This allowed the older devices to still read the new files, but at the expense of losing some of the newer features (and a more bloated file).

Devices that read eBooks have come a long way since they were first introduced, and newer eBook formats have evolved to make reading and displaying text (and graphics) much better – both to take advantage of what those devices can do, but also to provide a better and more customizable reading experience to a wider variety of readers.

But continuing to do it this way is far from ideal, and so as of August 2021, Amazon decided to officially stop allowing MOBI files to be published to KDP. The official explanation is that this will make it simpler to create reflowable eBooks by removing the overhead of having to support the legacy MOBI versions.

This means that you can’t upload a MOBI file to KDP anymore, you have to upload your book in one of a number of other formats, such as Word, KPF (Kindle Create files), or EPUB.

But that doesn’t mean MOBI files are useless now, because while Amazon has blocked authors from uploading the format to KDP, they did not make a corresponding change to the formats that readers can send to their kindle devices directly…

It’s all about your readers now…

As you can see here, the list of formats that can be sent to a kindle device has not changed.  Notice that the MOBI format is still listed, but the EPUB format is not. Even Amazon’s own KPF format isn’t one of the options!

This means that Amazon wants you to upload an EPUB (or Word doc, etc), and anyone buying the book from Amazon will automatically get whatever format works best for their device, but if you want to send the book file to someone (like an ARC reader) to load directly onto their kindle, you’re still stuck with the MOBI version*.

*Yes, technically you can send them any of the other supported formats on that list, but most authors would be very reluctant to send the Word doc version of their books out, and formats like PDF are not designed well for eReaders.

What about convertors dropping support for the MOBI format?

Another factor that has thrown some fuel onto the fire of the rumor of MOBI’s complete obsolescence, is that Vellum – a popular software conversion tool – has quickly followed Amazon’s lead and removed the creation of MOBI files from their default menus.

However, turning the option off via a preferences toggle was all they really did, and it can be easily turned back on by anyone wishing to continue creating MOBI files with Vellum.

Still, it’s an extra and unnecessary hoop to make already overburdened authors jump through. It would be far easier and more convenient for authors if the default was to keep the MOBI option turned on, but I suspect the reason for the change was that this way is better for Vellum (as a company). After all, one less format that authors create is one less format that they have to support in case of issues.

Even better for them would be to remove the feature completely, but they didn’t do that – which they surely would have if MOBI’s truly had no more use. But even Vellum is aware that the format is still necessary, and they admit as much to anyone that takes on the task of wading through their help files to figure out how to turn the MOBI option back on.

I’ll save you the trouble of searching for it, you can find the instructions right here. As you can see, along with the preferences you need to change to re-enable MOBI generation, you’ll see Vellum’s own explanation that you still need the format if you want to “sideload your ebook onto a Kindle – for your own testing or to send to an advance reader”.

They actually make another great argument against hiding the feature in that sentence. Even if you aren’t sending the book out to ARC readers (or friends, or family, etc), it’s always a smart move to load your book onto your own devices prior to publication to make sure everything looks okay.

At this point, though, if you already have an EPUB version of your book and need a MOBI, I wouldn’t even recommend jumping through the hoops and confusion of using Vellum to create it. Instead, I recommend you download Calibre. It’s free and easy to use eBook conversion software, and I find it handy for a wide variety of things. And using it to convert between formats is not just easy, but very fast and the result is usually a near identical copy – at least for novels that are mainly text based.

Will Amazon ever expand the list of formats allowed to send to Kindles?

I don’t know the answer to this, but I would assume that they will eventually. I’m actually surprised that they haven’t already. I could be lacking some technical knowledge, but to my mind, the issue is mainly a software problem. eBook formats are simply ways of describing a book that includes formatting information, which is why conversion software can easily convert between one eBook format to another.

The ability to interpret these formatting languages and use them to properly display the text on a kindle (or any eReader) is all done via software, so I can’t think of any reason why they couldn’t push through a software update to their devices that would allow them to understand and display the EPUB format (or any of the others).  Even if some newer features couldn’t be supported on specific devices, I’m sure they could have some sort of workaround to disable those features for those devices. Or even if that were impossible, they could at least make it work for the majority of cases and those that don’t could simply send back an error message if a specific format is incompatible with the device it’s being sent to.

But the most perplexing reason is that they’re already doing it!  You upload your EPUB to KDP, and Amazon does whatever they do on their end to format it so that it can be sent to whatever device is used by the person that buys it. I can’t think of a single legitimate reason they couldn’t use that same process to convert an EPUB sent to a kindle device – at least by the email feature (sideloading it to your device directly is another story).  If I email a book in any of the supported formats to my @kindle email, it shows up on my kindle device. For many of those formats (if not all), some sort of conversion is necessary. So why can’t they add EPUB to that list, when they clearly already know how to convert it to display on kindles?

I said I couldn’t think of any legitimate reason, but that doesn’t mean I can’t think of any reason at all. Again, I’ll preface this by saying that there may be some technical issue I’m unaware of, but I doubt it.  More likely, it’s just a priority issue. 

Amazon isn’t earning any revenue when a customer sends a file directly to their kindle, and thus improving the options and experience of that feature is likely a very low priority for Amazon.  They may eventually get around to it, but who knows when.

Until they do, though, we’re still stuck with MOBI files.

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If there’s one thing that the internet excels at, it’s spreading misleading or even false information. There is so much misinformation floating around that independent authors are often led down the wrong path even after they’ve done their best searching for the right one. Best-selling author Stuart Thaman spends a lot of his time advising authors via his own blog or the writing forums he helps moderate, and he was kind enough to put together a list of tips that correct many of the most popular misconceptions he’s heard.  While our blog has covered some of these in the past, it’s very useful to have them summed up so succinctly in a single post—and the addition of many points we haven’t yet covered makes this list worth reading not only for new authors, but more established ones as well.  

I see a lot of the same mistakes being made everywhere. Reddit, FB author groups, real life—the mistakes are always the same.

Here’s a quick guide to help newer authors avoid the most common pitfalls that I see all the time. 

Never pay to be published.

That’s basically the first rule of publishing. Money flows to the authors when you are “being published” by a press or some company. You don’t pay for anything.

Self-publishing is not free.

Might seem contrary to the first point, but it isn’t. If you’re doing things on your own with a company like Amazon or Ingram, pushing the buttons is technically free, but producing a professional product is not free. You’ll pay for things like editing, cover, formatting, and ISBN, maybe more, and all that costs money.

If you build it, they will come does not apply to books.

A lot of writers have the notion that if they publish a book, that book will sell. Not true. Without marketing, your book will do nothing.

“My friend with an English degree edited my book” is a bad idea.

Friends are not professional editors. Editing is also not a fly-by-night skill. With few exceptions, we need pros to make professional products.

Read the Copyright Office’s (or whatever your country’s equivalent is) rules for copyrights.

Firstly, there’s no such thing as a ‘poor man’s copyright’ despite how many people think there is. Read the laws. Copyrights in the USA are free and automatic. Along those lines, here is a useful discussion on ISBN options (for the USA).

Book trailers are generally ineffective.

That doesn’t need a whole lot more clarification. In almost all cases, book trailers are a waste of resources.

Don’t spend more than a pittance marketing your debut.

It won’t apply to all cases, but to most. Marketing your debut book with no backlog is a surefire way to run a starkly negative ROI. As a general rule, make fans on book 1, then money on books 2+. Start marketing heavily when you have 3+ books launched.

The day of the week you launch is meaningless.

I see this one a lot. People think Tuesday is a magical day for book launches. It is not. Marketing sells your book, not the position of the moon or any other such bullshit.

Don’t focus on media options or distribution deals.

A lot of new authors seem to be obsessed with selling media options or securing big money financing deals. Obviously, that works out well for some indie authors. But not most. And the more time you spend trying to sell the option to a book with mediocre sales, the more precious writing time you waste. If you sell enough copies, people will come to you looking for those options and deals. Do it that way.

Writing to market can be a great sales booster.

What that means is following micro- or sub-trends within your genre. It does not mean switching genres altogether to chase the profits. If you are good at writing horror, don’t jump into historical romance just because you think that genre is your golden ticket. There are no golden tickets.

Romance and erotica are not golden tickets.

I see a lot of authors online and at conventions bemoaning poor sales and then blaming it on a lack of sex in their novels. That’s incongruous. You don’t need sex to sell genres that aren’t about sex. Something else is hamstringing your sales. Probably your marketing (or more likely lack thereof).

Bucking the system is generally a bad idea.

What does that mean? Covers wildly out of norm for your genre and writing styles more like Cormac McCarthy or James Joyce fail for 99% of people that try them. Not trying to stifle creativity, but know your limits. Do weird stuff once you have an established base. It’ll pan out a lot better that way.

Rapid release schedules work and are possible.

Launching 4+ novels in a year genuinely works to keep momentum going. And it is possible. If you write every day, you’ll hit your goals. If you have good grammar skills and produce clean first drafts, you’ll go even quicker.

Study your genre. Learn from other books.

I can’t say how many authors I’ve met who don’t read. They “don’t have time” or some other excuse. That’s insane. Sports teams spend hours each week watching tape and learning from it. Reading books in your genre is the same thing. Read them and learn from them. Use the literary analysis skills you hopefully acquired in high school to constantly get better.

No one is going to steal your book / ideas, especially not editors and the like.

I see this one all the time as well. People sign unnecessary non-disclosure agreements and all sorts of other things protecting their ideas and work from editors and illustrators. Think for a moment how much work and how little reward that would be for the offending party. It flat out doesn’t make sense. Not even a little bit. Sure, keep your contracts if you like (that’s quick and easy, after all), but don’t lose sleep over it.

Don’t click the ‘Contains Adult Content’ box on KDP.

Unless you’re writing some truly heinous stuff, you don’t need to click that box. Curse words, child abuse, standard horror elements, etc. don’t meet the criteria that Amazon is looking for with that box.

Don’t get your friends and family to buy your book unless they already read your genre.

This happens all the time. An author publishes (for example) a sci-fi novel and immediately sells a hundred copies to friends and family. Then their sales fall off a cliff. Hard. The reason? The ‘also bought’ section below the book’s listing is all messed up. Mom and 3 aunts bought the book to support the author, but they read cozy mystery, cookbooks, and Dr. Who fanfic erotica. Not sci-fi. But Amazon doesn’t know that, so the algorithm just breaks. That can seriously ruin an otherwise decent launch.

Newsletter marketing is one of the most powerful tools you can have.

Get a newsletter pronto. Put a sign-up with a loss leader in the back of all your books. Organize newsletter feature swaps with other authors in your genre. Subscribe to other newsletters in your genre to see what their newsletters look like. Imitate the best ones. Make sure yours is hyper professional.

Poetry is not dead.

Along those lines, yes, some genres are easier or harder to sell. Sure. But I see the notion all the time that ‘poetry is dead’ and other such claims. The world of insta-poets proves that wrong. You can market just about any genre, you just have to know how.

Format your em dashes correctly.

Probably the most common mistakes I see in indie novels (speaking to American English) are poorly formatted em dashes. Look up how to use them—and don’t put spaces on either side.

Apostrophes are used for possessive and not for plurals.

I see this all time as well. Such a glaring mistake. Decades are almost never being used in the possessive. “I enjoyed the 90’s,” is simply wrong.

I’ll conclude with the 3 best pieces of advice I ever learned in my writing career.

The first comes from Mark Steyn. He’s a massively successful writer and also happens to be a professor at my alma mater where I met him. His advice is simple: you have to fall in love with words and grammar. That’s true. Unique and varied word choice—and not just vomiting big words on a page—is where a lot of the masters like Stephen King tend to stand above the rest. Interesting grammar and syntax serve to bring stories alive as well.

Advice #2 comes from writer AJ Scudiere who I met once at a conference: write a practice novel. Don’t publish your first attempt. That’s true for just about everyone, and I wish I had learned it before publishing my very first novel…

And my third piece of advice comes from some cheesy IG post or Twitter or something. I don’t remember exactly, but here it is: if you want to find time to write, throw your phone in the ocean. The quote is getting at the concept of removing distractions. If you want to write and want to write on a rapid release schedule, you need to actually do it. That means removing time from other pursuits. Maybe you don’t get to binge Stranger Things every other weekend. Maybe you cut back on sleep by an hour or 2 each night. Set your goals and actually go out and do them. No one is too busy to write a novel. Many people, however, have other priorities and then blame their lack of writing on being busy.

I hope that helps.

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There’s a lot of mistaken belief when it comes to free books, from both authors and readers alike.  After all, whether they’re doing it for the love of the art, or just as a job, most authors still want to earn money from their work, so how can free books ever be a good thing?  The truth is, the relationship between authors and free books go back a long time – and like any relationship… it’s complicated.

Every so often I see a reader don their white hat to make the argument that they don’t use an ARC program because they think that authors should get paid for their work.

An admirable sentiment, for sure.  Still, I can’t help but wonder if those same readers have ever used a library, or borrowed a novel from a friend?  After all, readers have been using those as traditionally acceptable sources of free reading material since the dawn of books. Yet you rarely hear criticism about them, despite the fact that while the author was paid for the initial copy sold they didn’t get a penny more for the countless reads that came from sharing those copies.

So what’s the difference between those examples and an ARC program (or any other sort of legitimate source of free online reading material)?

Turns out, quite a bit – but all of them favor the online sources of free material over those more traditional types of borrowing books. 

It’s A Problem of Perception

Online piracy has been in the media for so long that everyone is aware of the issue by now.  It started with games and other applications, then it hit music, and eventually books as well.  If you sell any sort of digital product, piracy is going to affect you.  And while the issue may not be quite as bad as some believe, no one wants their work to be stolen.

The battle against piracy is ongoing but is unlikely to ever really stop. It took dozens of takedown notices from major publishers like Penguin Random House and HarperCollins before one of the worst offending websites – OceanofPDF – was shut down last week, but we know from experience that it won’t last. Like the hydra, the moment one pirate site is closed, two more spring up in its place.

But another unfortunate side-effect of this ongoing issue is that many have come to believe there is some sort of equivalence between the idea of “free books” and piracy. As soon as they learn that a book is free online, they immediately assume it must be stolen, or that somehow authors are getting ripped off.

In most instances, that isn’t the case at all. 

Aside from the blatant pirate sites, there are actually plenty of options to get free eBooks that are completely sanctioned – even desired – by the authors themselves.

It’s A Difference of Choice

When it comes to legitimately free books, there are different degrees of what that really means – from buffet free, to free for some, to totally free – but they all have one thing in common. The choice to offer the book for free was done intentionally by the author instead of being foisted upon them by an online pirate.

And given the variety of ways and places those free books are offered, readers are also given more choice as to how they can find and receive that content.

Buffet Free

While not totally free, this category provides all you can read for one low price – sort of like Netflix or Spotify, but for books.  Amazon’s Kindle Unlimited is the biggest example of this, boasting a library of over 1 million titles to choose from, including some audiobooks.

Ideally this would be the best of both worlds, giving readers a low monthly price and a huge assortment of books to read while still paying authors from the pool of money collected from those fees. Unfortunately, not everyone agrees that the payouts are fair and the program has been plagued by scams and people trying to cheat the system. This, along with the exclusivity requirement, has limited the number of books that actually participate in the program, and have led to it being mostly populated by books from self-published and newer authors (which isn’t necessarily a bad thing!).

Free For Some

This category includes a variety of sources, where free books are available but only to some readers. In most cases, it isn’t difficult for anyone interested to become part of that group, but it usually involves joining an author’s mailing list directly or simply signing up for an ARC program like ours here at Hidden Gems.

Totally Free

The easiest place to find legitimately free books that don’t require joining lists or becoming a member to anything are on the online bookstores.  Although most books listed do have a price attached, some authors choose to list some of their books completely for free. 

So in the cases where authors are willingly, knowingly, and often eagerly providing free books to readers – the question remains – why would they do that?

The answer is actually quite simple.

Marketing.

Free Done Right Leads To Money

No matter how an author chooses to distribute their free books, the reasoning behind it is the same. Free copies are sent out in the hopes that they’ll lead to something tangible in return – increased exposure, reviews, new fans, etc.

In the days of traditional publishing, if an author was lucky enough to get a deal they would often have the weight – and budget – of those big companies behind them to handle the marketing and drive sales. But with the rise of self-publishing, authors are responsible for doing it all themselves – not to mention footing the bill. And to make matters worse, there are far more books out there to compete with. Standing out from the crowd is much harder than it used to be.

Promoting a book in a newsletter or by buying ads on Facebook or elsewhere can be expensive but making free digital copies available can be one of the cheapest forms of marketing – and if done right can be very effective.  Sure, there is the soft cost around loss of sales – but in many cases the people downloading the free books aren’t the author’s regular customers. Instead, they’re potential new customers, which can be far more valuable.

Similarly, if an author can get reviews back from some of the free copies they send out – by using an ARC service, or even by mining their own list for reviewers – they can raise the credibility of their book in the marketplace – another marketing tool that can lead to increased sales.  Reviews give a book the social proof that someone else has read it, allowing potential buyers to see what others thought about it first. And in today’s socially driven world, that sort of marketing has become even more relevant and valuable.

Self-Published Authors Create Their Own Success

The key is the control an author has over their own destiny.

These aren’t unwitting novelists whose books have been stolen and offered up on virus laden piracy sites. Rather, these are intelligent entrepreneurs who have made informed choices aimed at boosting sales – becoming authors not only of their books, but also of their own success.

That means that if an ARC service is offering free copies of a book, turning your nose up at it because you want to support the writer is doing exactly the opposite. Authors want readers to download those books, hopefully choosing to then leave a review and maybe even becoming a new fan of their work.  The authors themselves are the ones that provided the service with the copies to distribute freely to readers in the first place – which is certainly not something that can be said about the physical copy someone borrowed from a friend.

So while libraries and lending books may also provide exposure, they do so far more slowly – one reader at a time. And those avenues aren’t necessarily sanctioned by the author and only pay them a fraction more than when they’re ripped off completely by piracy sites.

Free books distributed online in places where an author has made an informed choice to do so, however, are far more helpful and valuable.

Just because you got it for free, doesn’t mean the author is getting ripped off. It’s just the opposite.

So why not help an author out by joining our ARC service today, or sharing this article or link with someone who might?  Each month we send out over 10,000 copies across 15 different genres, and have worked with thousands of authors – most of whom use our service regularly. You only sign up for the books you’re interested in and read as often as you have time for. No fees, no catches. The author’s only hope is that you choose to leave an honest review on Amazon when you’re done.

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In order to send eBooks out to the most number of readers, Hidden Gems asks authors to provide different file formats. With such a wide variety of devices and applications, the more formats we can provide, the more potential readers we can satisfy.  However, one objection we hear at least once a month is about book piracy – specifically having to do with PDFs. “Do I have to supply a PDF version?  I’ve heard PDF versions are much easier to pirate.”

I wanted to bust the rumors that give rise to this objection, and while I’m at it weigh in on the overall issue of piracy.

First of all, the short answer to the first question is “Yes”, we do need a PDF version.  Many of our readers are not tech savvy, and often have issues with the other formats. The nice thing about the PDF version is that almost every device can open and read it natively, meaning it allows the book to be accessible to more readers.

But it’s the second part of that objection that I want to clear up.  PDFs aren’t easier to pirate and even if they were, only supplying a MOBI and/or EPUB version of your book isn’t going to help at all.

Let’s break it down.

If PDFs are easier to pirate, shouldn’t we stop supplying PDFs?

Working backwards, let’s start with the assumption that PDFs are somehow easier to distribute to pirate sites. If true, logic dictates that the simple solution would be to not produce or distribute PDFs in the first place.

Tada! Problem solved, right?

Unfortunately not.  An ebook is simply a digital version of your book put into a specific format for eReader devices or software to interpret and display.  A MOBI file is just a different format than an EPUB file which is just a different format than a PDF file.  And in order for all of those devices and software programs to work they rely well known, freely published standards and rules that define those formats. If a format doesn’t follow those well established standards than the eReaders cannot read them.

And what do software programs excel at doing?  Applying clearly defined sets of rules, quickly and efficiently.

Thus, the eBook conversion software industry was born.  With the press of the button, you can use free software like Calibre to convert a book file from one format to another in seconds.  In fact, there are even websites that do it – no software or registration required.  Simply upload your book in one format and have it emailed to you in a different format.

Not only is this type of software easy to use, but it’s completely legal and useful for legitimate purposes like when an author needs to convert their own books from one format to another. Unfortunately, there’s no way to prevent others from using it for less legitimate purposes – like someone converting a book that is not their own from one format to another.  (Ironically, you might be surprised to learn that the hardest format to use as a source file when converting an eBook is actually a PDF. That’s right.  The reason is that a PDF is almost like a bunch of pictures of your book pages put together, so it’s very difficult for conversion software to use it to create different eBook formats like MOBI or EPUB.  Not if you want something that is easy to read and navigate, at least.)

So even if it was somehow easier to upload or download a PDF file to a pirate site, it doesn’t matter.  If you’re providing a MOBI or EPUB version instead, the would-be pirate could simply convert it first. If they’re already taking the time to steal your work and send it to websites for free, spending an extra few seconds converting the files isn’t going to stop them.

But are PDF files easier to pirate?

Quite simply, no.

As discussed above, a PDF is simply one type of format you can convert a digital book file into, with the added benefit of being so common and well established that most devices can open them natively, without any extra software installed.

But that doesn’t make PDFs inherently “easier to pirate”.  You can copy an EPUB or MOBI file just as easily and quickly as a PDF, and it would take the same time and effort to upload any of those formats to a pirate site.

So why are so many convinced that it’s easier to pirate PDF files?

DRM

One possibility is DRM. While it’s true that you can more easily apply DRM to MOBI and EPUB files than PDFs, very few authors add DRM to their books. The reason for that is that customers hate it. DRM just makes using files harder for customers that actually paid for them. Anyone that wants to steal the work knows how to strip that DRM off very quickly and easily, and if they don’t, it’s just a google search away.

Ease of Use

Another possibility is the one we brought up earlier as the reason we like to supply PDF files to our readers. They’re much easier to use for those that aren’t tech savvy, which makes them accessible to more people.

So wouldn’t that also hold true for a pirate site distributing a PDF? More potential book thieves because PDF files are easier to open?

Possibly.  However, you also have to consider that anyone not tech savvy enough to work with an EPUB or MOBI file is likely not someone tech savvy enough to search the web for reliable pirate sites or install a BitTorrent client to steal books in the first place. And even if they did all that, then that means they likely also have the skills to find a website or install a software program to convert those files to a PDF.

So what should an author do?

My advice is to not lose sleep over it.

Unfortunately, piracy is a fact of life in the digital world, and if the big movie and game companies can’t stop it, with the millions of dollars that they throw at it, then there’s little hope that the small time self-publisher can do anything either. Besides, as much as they don’t want to admit it, there is evidence that it doesn’t really affect sales anyway.

Book piracy is similar. There are those that argue that it hurts sales, and those that argue that it doesn’t.

Those that are determined to steal your book don’t need an ARC copy or a digital file from us or anyone else to do it. They can download the book right from Amazon, rip it off their kindle and send it to a pirate site in any format they want.  So no matter what a website or book distributor says about the awesome ways that they combat piracy, keep it in mind that they’re mainly telling you that to make you feel better. In practice, there is very little they can do to stop it.

Once a book is sent electronically to someone, the author or publisher has virtually no control over what is done with it.

However, I believe that the majority of readers are law abiding and conscientious, and they understand that if an author isn’t paid for their work, they will soon stop creating books. The more someone steals from their favorite author, the more likely their favorite author will eventually have to stop writing.

Of those that do choose to download books via pirate sites, I’m of the opinion that the vast majority were never going to buy that book anyway. Sure, a few of them might have, which means at worst you lose a few sales to that small minority.  From everyone else, you didn’t lose any sales but you did increase your exposure – your book was seen by an entire audience of readers that would have never discovered you.  Maybe that will lead to you gaining a few more paying fans – either directly, or from the word of mouth all of that fresh exposure creates.

Either way, you’ll make more sales if you stop worrying about the whole issue altogether and go and write your next book.

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Last week, many Amazon customers were greeted with an ominous sounding message when they tried to leave reviews. It was just the latest in a long line of glitches affecting book reviews, but because the issue was so widespread and absolute, it caused rumor and speculation to fly into overdrive.

Fortunately, your Amazon book reviews are still safe. What it really demonstrated, though, is how easily information can be distorted – especially when the company at fault refuses to acknowledge the issue publicly or to their own employees.  Now that it’s all behind us, let’s look at what happened.

The Timeline

Beginning on May 22^nd, we were alerted by some of our HG readers that they were being greeted by the following message when they tried to leave reviews on Amazon.

Sorry, we are unable to accept your review of this product. This product currently has limitations on submitting reviews. This may be because we detected unusual reviewing behavior on this product, or to maintain the best possible shopping experience. For more information, see the Customer Reviews Guidelines.

Of course, the first thing we did was check the community guidelines page to see if the rules had changed, but they had not (and still haven’t).

Book authors and publishers may continue to provide free or discounted copies of their books to readers, as long as the author or publisher does not require a review in exchange or attempt to influence the review.

As the day and week wore on, we heard from more and more readers and authors and it became apparent that the issue was affecting all customers and books, within certain parameters.

At first, author message boards were silent on the issue – likely because most authors were unaware unless one of their readers pointed it out to them. But eventually the discussions began and eventually everyone involved began to share information and a clearer picture emerged.

The issue was affecting unverified reviews on all books, but there was no official announcement from Amazon. Emails were flying, rumors were being sparked, Facebook theories were forming, but no one really knew anything.

We contacted our affected authors and dealt with panicked emails as they came in. Our stance was that this was likely just a glitch that would hopefully be quickly resolved, since the posted policies hadn’t changed and this issue was breaking those policies, and urged authors to send emails to Amazon asking for answers.

While no official word ever came, the issue was suddenly resolved on Saturday, May 26th.

The Facts

From the discussions we had with both customers and affected authors that were doing their own investigations, certain facts began to emerge, leading us to our own theory about what happened.

FACT: Only unverified reviews were being blocked.  That is, reviews of a book by someone that did not purchase that book on Amazon.  Anyone that did buy the book was still able to leave a verified review.

FACT: 10 unverified reviews could be left on a book, although if a book had more than that prior to the issue beginning those reviews remained but no new ones could be left.  However, when a new verified review was posted, a certain number of new unverified reviews were allowed again – pointing to the idea of a ratio being employed of verified vs unverified reviews. The exact ratio is unknown.

FACT: Reviews were not being blocked based on content, as the blocking message showed up as soon as the customer chose the star rating for a book, before they had a chance to write or submit their review.

FACT: The issue affected products by ASIN, so you could have 10 unverified reviews on an ebook, and then another 10 on the linked paperback version.

So why did all this happen?

Our Theory: Based on the fact that the posted policies didn’t change and Amazon’s ongoing war with fake review sites for non-book related products, our theory is that Amazon instituted some new rule that was erroneously applied to books. Books have long been exempt from the usual rules, and still are, and it could just be that someone forgot to tell the developer in charge of implementing this change.  Unfortunately, only certain people at Amazon know for sure, and they aren’t telling.

The Rumors and Speculation

It’s not surprising how fast the wild rumors about the imminent demise of ARC reviews flew through the author ranks. After all, we know that rumors are spread when there is uncertainty and anxiety, both of which we had in spades here.  But what is really unconscionable is that a lot of the misinformation was coming from Amazon support staff themselves.

Here are some of the most common bits of misinformation we were sent about this issue during the few days that it lasted.

• Amazon is now only allowing five unverified reviews per book

This was the most common rumor we were sent, and was clearly just a matter of people trying to shoehorn an existing rule into a new problem. The new issue was a limit on the number of unverified reviews, so of course the natural place to look would be the rule that deals with unverified reviews and limits. Here’s the rule that was being misinterpreted – and you can see why the number five kept being cited as the threshold (even though the real threshold was 10).

Customers can submit five non-Amazon Verified Purchase reviews each week. Non-Amazon Verified Purchase review counts are calculated each week from Sunday at 12:00am GMT through Saturday 11:59pm GMT. This policy does not apply to Vine reviews or reviews on digital and physical books, music, and video.

Problem is, that rule:

1. Has been around for a couple years or longer
2. Applies to a limit of reviews particular customers can leave in general, not how many reviews from different customers can be left on a specific product
3. Doesn’t apply to books

Seriously, the last line of that particular rule is probably the most overlooked line of all the polices: “This policy does not apply to Vine reviews or reviews on digital and physical books…”

And well it shouldn’t, especially given that KU borrowed books still don’t show up as verified purchases…

• There’s a new policy that Amazon isn’t allowing free ARC reviews on books any more

This one was literally posted on a Facebook group.  The person that posted it claimed it was a change in policy, and that there was an announcement about it that she saw “somewhere”.

Right.

There is no such policy, and when and if one does get written, it will be spread wide and far.  It will be posted on Amazon’s policy pages, not in some super-secret place that only this one FB user knows about.

• It’s happening to people that haven’t spent enough money on Amazon

The rule about spending $50 before being able to post reviews has been around for a while but it does seem like Amazon has only recently started to strictly apply it. However, it doesn’t apply to this case because all reviewers were blocked, regardless of their Amazon spending habits, and they were only blocked on books that had already gotten a certain number of unverified reviews.

• Amazon is targeting people that write that they got a free copy of the book

This is an argument that we hear fairly regularly, from both authors and readers alike – and once it again it was brought up about this issue. So let’s address it first in the context of this latest glitch.

Readers trying to leave reviews were being blocked BEFORE they could write their review.  As soon as they clicked the star rating for the book, the error message would appear – before they had a chance to write anything.  That means that this issue couldn’t have anything to do with the content of the review.

However, as a more general comment about this rumor – it seems very unlikely that Amazon has or will target the disclosure of getting a free book and voluntarily reviewing it as part of any of their sweeps. For one thing, their sweeps are all based on algorithmic rules, and searching for a specific phrase is something an algorithm is perfectly suited for – especially one that is written in a very specific way across most ARC reviews.  If Amazon wanted to target variations of that phrase, the reviews containing it would all be wiped out at once. But most of our readers write a similar phrase on their review, and their reviews are all still intact.

More importantly, although Amazon themselves don’t require this disclosure, the reason Hidden Gems still suggest including it to our readers is because it’s actually an FTC rule.  And in the US at least, FTC rules trump Amazon rules.

Amazon’s Response

As mentioned, we directed affected authors to contact Amazon about why this error message was being applied to their book. The number of different answers we heard was almost equal to the number of authors that got a response.  Everything from this is our new or existing policy, to it’s a glitch that we’re working to fix. In some cases, the answers didn’t even make sense when applied to the question being asked.

The only thing that was clear was that Amazon front-line support had no clue what was going on, which is fairly typical in situations like this. However, what was more frightening was how uniformed they were about their own policies in general.

Here are some examples of those responses and the problems with them.

Example 1:

…we couldn’t accept a review for [BOOK NAME REDACTED] because we detected unusual review behavior on this product. We place limits on reviews to preserve trust in customer reviews. This can include limiting submission of all reviews or limiting reviews to Amazon Verified Purchase reviews.
For more details, please see our Community Guidelines

Unhelpful. The community guidelines page is the one that mentions that authors can provide free copies as long as reviews are voluntary.  However, there is also one catchall line that this (and other) support techs were likely referring to – the wonderfully generic:

“We may restrict the ability to submit a review when we detect unusual reviewing behavior, or to maintain the best possible shopping experience.”

Sound familiar? That line is basically a shorter version of the new review blocking error message. The problem is, that line has been in the rules for years, has never been applied this way before, and was now being applied to ALL books in the same way for the same reasons, which is actually the opposite of the word “unusual”.

Example 2:

We recently made changes that limit the extent to which reviews from customers who don’t qualify for an Amazon Verified Purchase contribute to the Customer Reviews experience on Amazon. This change applies to books as well as other products and was made in order to protect the integrity of the Customer Reviews system.

Like our Facebook friend, this support rep gives no link or indication of where this recently changed policy might exist.  More likely, this rep was just guessing, and the fact that everything went back to normal a day or two after this response was sent is evidence of that.

Example 3:

We do not permit Customer Reviews or votes on the helpfulness of Customer Reviews that are posted in exchange for compensation of any kind, including free or discounted products.

Receiving payment or any other incentive for a Customer Review is considered compensation. Payment includes receiving money or a gift certificate to purchase the product. Incentives include any type of reward that is given in return for a Customer Review such as free or discounted products, bonus content, entry to a contest or sweepstakes, discounts on future purchases, and other gifts.

To learn more about this policy, please see the following Help pages:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=201929730

What’s most distressing about this response is that the link provided as evidence is the same community guidelines page that states that books are the exception to the very rule mentioned.  If only this rep had read just a little further down.

Example 4:

This one is from a chat with Amazon support, and is the absolute best (meaning worst).

Author: …do you know how long before non verified purchasers will be able to leave reviews??

“Book authors and publishers may continue to provide free or discounted copies of their books to readers, as long as the author or publisher does not require a review in exchange or attempt to influence the review.”

Amazon: No we do not follow such trend so that the review are true from the original purchasers.[sic]

Author: That was copied and pasted directly from Amazon

Conclusion

Glitches are bound to happen, but when you’re a company the size of Amazon there should be a responsibility to keep your community informed about them.  Whether that’s through an official statement, or simply making sure that your front-line support reps are properly informed and can speak intelligently about the current issues.

Authors affected the most by issues like this are often small time self-publishers who have built their livelihoods around Amazon’s platform, and whose work help keep that platform filled with new and creative content that bring customers to the site to spend their money.

It’s time they were treated with more respect.

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Hidden Gems is best known for helping authors get book reviews by sending their work to interested readers, so it’s no surprise that when some perceived threat to Amazon reviews appears, we hear about it quickly.

That’s why it makes sense that the first article in our new Rumor Busting series takes on this pair of related statements that come to us persistently.

1. Amazon is coming after ARC book reviews, they’re no longer allowing them!
2. Amazon is removing reviews that say they were given a free book or from an ARC!

Given the importance of book reviews to us, we have to admit that even we aren’t immune to having our hearts beat just a little bit faster each time someone sends us a panicked email repeating one of these claims.

But only for as long as it takes for us to verify that Amazon’s community guidelines page still states:

“Book authors and publishers may continue to provide free or discounted copies of their books to readers, as long as the author or publisher does not require a review in exchange or attempt to influence the review.”

After reading such an easily verifiable source of truth on the first rumor, you might wonder why this issue continues to come up?

There are a couple of contributing factors at play here.

A Fresh Catalyst

This particular rumor usually reappears most often following some new article or blog post somewhere talking about anything to do with Amazon and reviews.

For instance, this article from the Washington Post was used by some sites as evidence that the sky was falling on book reviews in general, despite the fact that it doesn’t even mention the word “book” a single time.

The truth is, Amazon banned incentivized reviews for all products EXCEPT books back in 2016. Yet many still ignore that exception – either through ignorance, or willfully because it hurts the particular argument they’re trying to make. After all, capitalizing on fear, uncertainty and doubt is a great way to sensationalize an issue, giving it a better chance of going viral and bringing in more readers.

Those types of articles can be particularly effective by supporting the existing worldview of authors that already believe Amazon is coming after their reviews. But why do these fears already exist for so many authors in the first place?

Answering that question brings us to contributing factor number two.

Author’s Anxieties

Despite the fact that Amazon’s guidelines still state that they allow book reviews based on free or ARC copies, the retail giant does have a long history of changing their rules, and they don’t always get it right.

And even when the rules don’t change, they’re not always crystal clear or applied evenly, as anyone that’s been tossed into the adult dungeon will tell you. After all, when your content guidelines define offensive material as “about what you would expect”, you’re leaving quite a lot of room for interpretation.

Book reviews are an important part of an overall marketing strategy and as such a self-published author will often spend a lot of real time and/or marketing budget to get them.  Considering that within the context of ever-changing marketplace rules, it’s no wonder that authors are filled with anxiety about the uncertain future of those reviews.

So to answer the question about why this particular rumor continues to persist, we only have to look at the research about why rumors are spread (as opposed to why they get started in the first place).

They’re spread most through uncertainty and anxiety.

From an author’s perspective, if they’re always worried about the rules being changed and the ball being yanked away, it’s no wonder they’re so quick to believe that their world is coming to an end every time an article points to a few reviews disappearing as proof that the end is near.

The fact is, even if the rules do change, authors won’t be able to stop it. And it’ll probably happen all at once, not just a review disappearing here or there.

But the reason for that is actually one of the best reasons to not believe the claims that it’s already happening.

If Amazon ever decides to change the rules and not allow ARC reviews, most authors will know it without anyone having to tell them.

Why?

The Almighty Amazon Algorithms

According to the Washington Post article cited above, Amazon admits to using algorithms for things like determining book rankings and predicting behavior of customers, so it’s very safe to assume they’re also using it to remove reviews that it determines to be fake.  Even with their billions of dollars, Amazon couldn’t afford to have humans reading all of the reviews that get posted to their site daily, so they have to be using some sort of algorithm to help.

Given the lack of clear information about it, we can only speculate, however it is our opinion that there are likely at least two types of algorithms already being used on reviews.

The first is a real time algorithm used as a sort of gatekeeper against common review issues. This is the algorithm that comes into play when you try to leave a review with profanity. It may even be the same algorithm used to block individual reviews based on other factors – such as when someone gets told that their review isn’t allowed because they have a previous relationship with the author.

The second algorithm is one that Amazon runs periodically to clean up reviews they suspect to be fake. Occasionally there are instances, usually taking place over a 24-48 hour period, where a large number of Amazon customers have ALL of their reviews removed and are banned from leaving further reviews. When it happens, many authors and readers are affected, and in a couple of past instances even some Hidden Gems readers have been swept up in it.

There are a number of factors that make these seem like algorithmic purges.

• They happen over a short amount of time and affect a large number of users at once. Much easier to do with an algorithm following a set of pre-defined rules.
• For reviewers targeted, ALL reviews are removed from all product categories, including verified purchases and future reviews blocked. Algorithms can determine bad reviews based on criteria but are likely unable to evaluate others so may be instructed to simply consider the entire account suspect.
• Most importantly – upon appeal, almost all reviewers had all reviews restored.

That’s right. When affected Hidden Gems readers contacted us about their book reviews being removed unfairly, we suggested that they contact Amazon and gave them instructions on how to appeal properly. Of all the readers that told us they did so, about 97% had ALL of their reviews restored within about 3 days, and their reviewing privileges returned.

To us, this indicates that Amazon acknowledges that the algorithm used for these purges isn’t perfect, and when appeals are launched they hand those cases off to human reviewers who then look at the affected accounts and make a decision – almost always reversing the algorithms actions.

But what about the second related rumor?

Amazon is removing reviews that say they were given a free book or from an ARC!

Guess what? In the vast majority of the cases where readers had their removed reviews restored after an appeal, the readers in question had used some variation of “I received a free copy of this book and am leaving a voluntary review”.

If that rumor were true, those reviews wouldn’t have been restored.  In fact, if that statement was being used by the algorithm, we wouldn’t have seen just a small handful of our Hidden Gems readers affected, because we suggest to all of them that they include that line.

We would have seen almost all of them affected.

But after both of the algorithm purges that affected us in the last few months, we had less just over half a percent of our readers affected. And almost every one of them was restored.

So the next time you’re worried about whether ARCs are still allowed, first check to make sure Amazon hasn’t changed their community guidelines. And if you’re still wondering whether or not your reviewers should bother taking the chance and disclosing that they got a free copy of your book when they write their reviews, remember that even if Amazon didn’t require it, the FTC does.

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As a service that sends out thousands of free books daily across multiple genres, it’s probably no surprise to learn that Hidden Gems hears more than our fair share of self publishing industry rumors from both authors and readers alike.

Most are sparked by some sort of catalyst, like a vague or misleading news story, or an industry heavyweight changing their policies. Those type come in waves, rolling in repeatedly from different sources all devouring the same misguided conclusions.  Other rumors are more persistent, coming in less evenly but still consistently over time, never quite fading away completely.

However, there’s a benefit to hearing all of this speculation from so many varied sources. It provides us with a unique opportunity to watch these overall issues as they develop, giving us fresh perspectives and differing viewpoints into each.  When we combine that with our experience in the self publishing industry, some research, and a bit of logic, we’re often able to help determine fact from fiction.

Still, while we’re always happy to ease the minds of those that bring rumors to us directly, it’s always disappointing when we hear the same thing again from someone else.

Truth spreads slower than fiction, so replying one by one just isn’t cutting it anymore.

Besides, for every author or reader that takes the time to reach out and confirm something with us (or anyone else), there are probably far more that are just sitting around worrying about the same issue.

So instead of talking the problem through one author at a time, we decided to try and help everyone at once with a new, ongoing blog series called Rumor Busting.

Whenever we hear a persistent rumor that affects the publishing industry that we think we can help clear up, we’ll dig into the heart of the issue and try and figure out what’s going on. We’ll do our best to present clearly referenced evidence, wherever possible, or at the very least use the incomplete data that is available to present a more reasonable explanation of the issue.

In the self publishing world, where authors typically have so many roles to fill – as their own writers, publishers, editors, marketers or designers – it’s only natural that they feel overwhelmed with everything they need to know and filled with fear and anxiety about what they don’t. But fear and anxiety are the breeding ground of rumor, making them much easier to believe and spread.

At Hidden Gems our main services revolve around lightening some of those burdens that authors have to carry on their own, giving them more time to concentrate on what they do best – giving us great stories. And that’s what we hope to continue to do with this blog.

Below is a list of all the Rumor Busting articles in this series which we will continue to update whenever new ones are written, but you’ll also be able to find them using the Rumor Busting category on the right.

And if you have any rumors you want busted within the world of online book publishing, feel free to send us an email!

Rumor Busting Series

• Yes, Your Amazon Book Reviews Are Still Safe
• Reviewers Locked Out By Amazon’s Latest Glitch
• Book Piracy – Rumors, Facts and Opinion
• The Complex Relationship Between Authors and Free Books

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