Amazon.com has some ‘splainin’ to do.
I wanted to update my publication history in my brief profile at Amazon.com (I have one because I’m an Amazon Vine reviewer), and it wouldn’t let me — it said my update contained “profanity.”
Well, here’s what I was trying to do — you tell me if there’s any hidden profanity here, OK?
Current publication history:
November 2010 — “No Rest” (poem), to Midwest Literary Magazine. Also forthcoming in the DUE NORTH anthology.
October 2010 — “The Fair at South Farallon” to e-Quill Publishing, a small yet reputable publishing house in Australia.
September 2010 — “Trouble with Elfs: A Story from the Elfyverse,” with Michael B. Caffrey, to e-Quill Publishing (reprint sale — originally published at the Written Word online magazine in February 2007).
“A Dark and Stormy Night: A Joey Maverick Adventure,” Michael B. Caffrey with Barb Caffrey, to e-Quill Publishing (reprint; originally appeared in the Written Word online magazine in May 2005).
Editor for “Columba and the Cat,” “Columba and the Committee” and “Columba and the Crossing”, three of my late husband Michael B. Caffrey’s original stories, to e-Quill Publishing, September 2010.
December 2009 — “Break the Dark Lens” (poem), to Joyful! Online magazine.
“Trouble with Elfs,” to the Written Word online magazine, February 2007.
“A Love Eternal” (poem), September 2006, to the Written Word online magazine.
“A Dark and Stormy Night,” to the Written Word online magazine, May 2005.
The BEDLAM’S EDGE anthology (Baen, 2005), “Bright as Diamonds,” with Michael B. Caffrey.
“On Collaboration” (nonfiction), to Vision Online magazine, July 2004.
Editor, ComicsBulletin.com (an occasional, yet real, gig), mid-2010 to the present.
Editor, Masterpiece Comics, 2005-2008.
Editor, the Written Word online magazine, November 2007 to January 2009 (when the WW went on hiatus).
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It was at this point I also tried to add that I am reviewing books for ShinyBookReview here at WordPress, and it kicked out. (I know Amazon.com also is holding my review for Connie Willis’s book ALL CLEAR because I’d said my Amazon.com review was a shortened version of the same review I’d done for SBR.)
I would really like to know what, if anything, was profane in my update, because I would like to know why Amazon.com refused to update my profile, or at least have some justification for why they were so very stupid this evening.
Barb Caffrey's Blog 
LOL! I guess someone has a potty-mouth. But honestly, Amazon is never that specific about why things are rejected so I have to wonder if you are making that up, or perhaps you are just assuming that’s what the cause is. (I’ve been apart of the reviewing community at Amazon for 10 years, so I’ve heard alot)
My guess is that in your case Amazon doesn’t like your use of outside URLs — which is against the TOS. And no one follows those types of links anyway. People are slow enough to follow ones from big publications and news sources. Bloggers have no chance at generating traffic that way. Especially when there are better reviews sitting right there in front of there eyes.
BookHarpie
December 13, 2010 at 7:20 am
Possibly, BookHarpie, but they’d already accepted my own one for my personal blog. It even did, eventually, allow me to post the ShinyBookReview link (as it has allowed other reviewers to post) for the review I did of Connie Willis’s “All Clear.” (I thought that to be the only honest thing to do, as I had already reviewed it for SBR.)
I have re-reviewed a few books that I’d previously reviewed for Amazon at SBR; I read ’em again, comment on ’em in depth, and try to do what I can in the space allowed. I can do more at SBR — I reviewed all four of Sherry Thomas’s romances together, for example — but I’ve reviewed books for Amazon Vine now for four years and have reviewed books overall for seven-plus, so I certainly don’t want to give up on that.
I am telling the truth as to what I put down; I cut and pasted it exactly as I had typed it. But it just would not let me change/update anything.
I’m not making up what the reason is — it yellowed out the _entire thing_ and said “material may not contain profanity.”
I know that at this point in my life very few people are going to look up my profile, but for those who do, I want to send ’em here because if they like my writing, they may well like reading whatever I feel like writing about today. Or may want to read my published stories — one can only hope.
As for traffic — I didn’t write about this to gain traffic. I wrote about it because it doesn’t make any sense.
I still fail to see where the profanity is.
Barb Caffrey
December 13, 2010 at 9:34 pm