You may have noticed that you can’t find any Castalia House ebooks on Amazon right now. That’s because Amazon shut down our KDP account on the basis of a wildly spurious claim of publishing material to which we do not have the necessary rights. We happen to have some VERY bad news for them on that subject….
The book in question? You guessed it. Corrosion: The Collapsing Empire again. This is the second attack on that book this month, as ten days ago, they pulled the book itself down for the sixth or seventh time due to claims that it was “misleading”.
From: Amazon.com [kdp-quality-assurance@amazon.com]
Sent: 21 January 2019 21:59
Subject: Notification from Amazon KDPWhile reviewing the following books we found the title, cover image, descriptions and/or authors of the following book(s) are misleading to our customers:
Title: Corrosion (The Corroding Empire Book 1)
ASIN: B06XFQ24QCAs a result, the book(s) have been removed from sale from Amazon.
Not only have they shut down the account, but they sent us an email today declaring that they will not pay us any of the unpaid royalties, thereby screwing over each and every author we publish.
As last communicated in the message on January 21, 2019, we have identified the submission of content for which you did not have the necessary rights. Due to this and previous violations, we are terminating your account and your Agreement effective immediately.
As part of the termination process, we will close your KDP account and remove the books you have uploaded through our channels from sale on Amazon. Note that you are no longer eligible to receive unpaid royalties for sales that occurred prior to this termination.
Additionally, as per our Terms and Conditions, you are not permitted to open any new KDP accounts.
Of course, there were no previous violations that internal SJWs did not invent as we’ve been repeatedly cleared of the “misleading” charge for that book. Needless to say, we will not be taking this latest attack lying down. I won’t be surprised if the account is rapidly restored once we contact the manager who has been repeatedly dealing with this issue, especially since we were promised that it would never happen again after the last time.
Of course, this is precisely why we established the Arkhaven and Catalia Direct stores, because we knew better than to trust Amazon’s assurances that it would keep its SJWs under control. If you want to show support for Castalia and its authors, you can either write to Amazon and complain about this unwarranted action or pick up a print, ebook, or audiobook from one of our direct stores.
This is precisely why it is so important to a) build your own platforms and b) support the alternative platforms. This isn’t just about Castalia House because the same thing can be done overnight to any author or independent publisher who utilizes KDP. And if you’re a Castalia House author, please don’t panic, rest assured we are already in the process of taking care of things. But if you want to send an email to Amazon protesting their unwarranted removal of your books, please feel free to do so.
UPDATE: Amazon can’t even find the account information. It looks like whoever was responsible actually wiped all the data.
How can I trust Amazon’s products after a scandal like this?I
Their credibility has become dubious. I’m uncertain they can be trusted as a reliable company, now.
I had no idea this was going on!
I have purchased from Castaliahouse in the past. After learning about Amazon’s shenanigans regarding Castaliahouse you can be sure I will make any future purchases through your Arkhaven and Catalia Direct stores.
As a matter of fact – I am going to purchase Corrosion: The Collapsing Empire right now!