Amazon has reportedly begun a new wave of review take-downs, from what I’ve been told.
Firstly, in an effort to kill off phony reviewers, anyone posting a review to a book used to abuse the KU rules and “skim the till” at Amazon (see my older article when scammers started doing this) are getting shut down. Amazon isn’t just deleting the review on that book in question… they are deleting every review that person ever posted. Hack and slash baby, Amazon isn’t messing around.
The second reason is more insidious. It may be just a rumor, but reviewers must spend at least $50 per year for the privilege of reviewing a product. I’ve been told that spend-deficient Amazon accounts are first notified of the policy, “and then [Amazon] deletes review privileges along with every review posted by that person.”
I’ve previously lamented that focusing book sales so heavily within Amazon is a little like making a deal with the devil. I guess that sometimes, the devil comes to take his toll.
Inside the Inkwell 