Amazon’s successful case against a UK-based author who manipulated Kindle page reads comes out strong against book-stuffing
Ever since the ebook subscription service Kindle Unlimited arrived on the scene several years ago, bad actors have been manipulating page reads and rankings in order to increase payouts—either for themselves or their clients. KU pays authors per page read, but the funds come from a communal pool—meaning that anyone cheating the system is also cheating other authors. We last reviewed the status of KU in May 2017, looking at what two years’ worth of page-based payouts had wrought. Back then, it was a decidedly mixed outlook.
So it was welcome news when, earlier this month, news reports surfaced that Amazon had won in arbitration against one author, Jake Dryan, and his related publishing companies. Law360 reports (paywall) that the award bars Dryan from “publishing works that are essentially duplicates of other books available for download and using bots or other tools to artificially increase page views.” Dryan’s tactics included hyperlink abuse (including links at the book’s opening that, if clicked, took readers to the end, bolstering the number of pages read); click-farming to falsely inflate the pages read; and publication of duplicate content, also known as book-stuffing. The latter tactic often takes the form of epic-length books that include multiple titles; the author uses various techniques to produce or trigger an apparent full read of the entire book (or books).
The details of the suit were remarkable for confirming that book-stuffing isn’t okay. There have been arguments from some in the indie author community that the book-stuffing technique of combining selections of works into new books is acceptable under Amazon’s terms and conditions. This new ruling is very clear that Amazon considers this a violation of its terms. David Gaughran told Forbes writer Adam Rowe, “Authors have very strong feelings about any kind of cheating or scamming, but book-stuffing stands out because it artificially inflates the payout that cheaters receive from Amazon—money which comes from a communal pot.”
Bottom line: Amazon first filed arbitration in September 2017 against several authors seen to be manipulating the system, but as Gaughran points out in the Forbes article, authors who engage in book-stuffing are still active and ranking well in the Kindle Store—and receiving bonuses.
Jane Friedman has spent her entire career working in the publishing industry, with a focus on business reporting and author education. Established in 2015, her newsletter The Bottom Line provides nuanced market intelligence to thousands of authors and industry professionals; in 2023, she was named Publishing Commentator of the Year by Digital Book World.
Jane’s expertise regularly features in major media outlets such as The New York Times, The Atlantic, NPR, The Today Show, Wired, The Guardian, Fox News, and BBC. Her book, The Business of Being a Writer, Second Edition (The University of Chicago Press), is used as a classroom text by many writing and publishing degree programs. She reaches thousands through speaking engagements and workshops at diverse venues worldwide, including NYU’s Advanced Publishing Institute, Frankfurt Book Fair, and numerous MFA programs.
