"Sharing with Writers" Subscribers:

I apologize. The e-mail address I gave you to send feedback to Amazon.com appaprently doesn't work.

Instead go to your book's page, scroll down to the pale blue box with the "Feedback" title (it's very near the bottom of the page), click on "Is there any other feedback you would like to suggest" link and a box where you can paste a message of 1024 characters opens up.

I had to shorten my message a bit to get it to fit in the box. Please take a moment to do this. If this feature hasn't appeared on your book's page yet, I suspect it won't be long and when it happens, it will affect the future of your book sales, too.

Here's the a modified copy of thee original letter I suggested you copy and paste or edit to meet your needs:

Dear Amazon People:

In spite of the fact that I have recommended Amazon as friendly to emerging authors--both in The Frugal Book Promoter and in my lectures at UCLA, I must tell you that your new feature, "What do customers ultimately buy after viewing items like this?" is the most self-defeating feature ever introduced on your site.

This feature does exactly what the bookstores and bestseller lists do; it makes sure the big guys and the big sellers are seen as winners and the smaller (but still excellent books) are seen as losers thus perpretrating sales of the books based on sales figures rather than quality.

Even the wording in the introductory sentence makes it appear as if people who visited this page didn*t buy the book they come for but another (published by a big press, of course!).

I hope you will reconsider. I'm sure your smart marketers and tech department can come up with somthing that helps the entire publishing industry--like AuthorConnect or your Shorts.

You name and title will go here. (-:

Thanks and my apologies for sending out this correction--it's just that I consider it so important.

Best,
Carolyn Howard-Johnson
Your fairthul "Sharing with Writers" editor and founder of Authors' Coalition.