The review in question (click to enlarge)

Five months since we launched Bookgeeks, Simon A describes our first experience of being on the wrong end of plagiarism.

Something happened this week that has made me start thinking about some of the unintended consequences that may attend the growth of User Generated Content around the publishing industry, especially where there is a link between status and rewards. The event in question was plagiarism – an Amazon Vine programme member, Kinkazzo, posted a review on Amazon that was substantially based on my own review of The Gone-Away World, by Nick Harkaway. When I say substantially, it was probably about half of what I wrote, making up about two thirds of what he uploaded. Who knows whether he wrote the other bits himself or not, but he certainly seems to be a serial offender on Amazon (and who knows where else), adapting reviews from sites a great deal more august and established than your humble Bookgeeks.

I suppose I should have expected this at some point, but my experiences of the web have so far been unmarred by plagiarism of my work (my entire degree dissertation, has been on-line for ten years!). Thanks to the zeal of an eagle-eyed copycat-hunter calling himself The Cleaner, both myself and Nick Harkaway were notified about this fairly quickly, and Amazon today appear to have removed the offending review. Thanks to the wonders of Google’s cache, I have preserved it for posterity (click the image to enlarge).

Surprised not so much by the plagiarism as by the existence of someone giving up their free time to try and eradicate it, I asked The Cleaner a bit more about what’s involved in policing Amazon:

How you prove plagiarism in an Amazon review?

Not difficult. If I come across a review that is merely ‘suspicious’, I take a sentence, or part-sentence, and Google it. I usually look for unusual text or anything else that will make that extract as near to unique as possible, particularly with author names or book titles. The Google result, if done properly, will show two different sources – one will be the Amazon page that I copied it from, and the other/s will show the original source. That’s when I whisper “Gotcha”. I then send the two URLs and the book’s ISBN to a specific department at Amazon who, if they are are satisfied that my allegation is correct, will send me an email with a letter of thanks and confirmation that the offending review has been deleted.

How responsive are Amazon?

I learned within a few days that you have to get your facts right. If you just make unfounded allegations you won’t hear a thing. Provide all the detail they need however, and they are quite prompt – often the same day or within 24 hours.

I don’t really know. I work quite hard at doing my own reviews and my original ‘campaign’ targeted those who I perceived as cheats – one guy, for example, who I have yet to nail, and who is ranked in the Top 20, is a pathological ‘dust-jacket synopsis’ copier – he doesn’t really review at all and as far as I can tell doesn’t even read or possibly own the books he reviews.

I hate cheats, basically, and I like getting under their skin and publicly exposing them. Most respond very spitefully if they get the wrong kind of attention.

It’s all about vanity, a desire to be respected and the rather sad belief that a high Amazon Reviewer ranking somehow has meaningful kudos attached to it. I’ve been grateful to Peter Harris, the Amazon No.1, who shares my dislike for cheats, fake reviewers and plagiarists because he is a great source of ‘information’ about the more loathesome side of the reviewing business. He’s taught me that despite his lofty status he’s just an ordinary guy with similar outlooks on these issues to my own. Plagiarists are attention seekers with no literary talent or creative ability who want to fool the public into believing that they are clever, erudite and wise.

For the average book, music or film buyer, the opportunity to get free stuff before its release date, through programmes such as Amazon Vine and LibraryThing Early Reviewer Programme, could also seen as a fairly powerful incentive to cheat. I know how chuffed I was when my publishing clients started giving me Advanced Reading Copies of books, and it makes you feel like you have gained admission to a club normally reserved for journos and ‘opinion formers’. In that context, passing the work of others off as your own may be seen as a passport to freebies, and a victimless crime. Thanks to the technology of Amazon Web Services, Amazon reviews have the potential to be included in hundreds of other websites that source bibliographic data from Amazon through that channel, so this could be seen as a big deal for the victim.

It’s been a bit of an eye-opener for me going through this process, but it’s very reassuring to know that there are people are keeping an eye on the cheats!

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