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Sock Puppetry
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J.D. Oswald
- Reader
- Posts: 84
- Joined: May 2012
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Mythica
- Bibliophile
- Posts: 1095
- Joined: November 2010
- Preferred HF: European and American (mostly pre-20th century)
- Location: Colorado
- Contact:
[quote=""parthianbow""]
I too have been aware of it here in the UK. In fact, in 2010 I took the scalp of a very well known HF author here, after doing an immense amount of research on the net, employing an IT expert, and then calling the author's bluff. Suffice it to say, when 28 disparaging reviews of other HF works and glowing reviews of said author's own work vanished from Amazon one morning, I was not surprised. But I was very happy.
[/quote]
Ooooo, scandal, I so want to know who that was!
But I know it would be bad practice for you to tell us. 
What's sad is that with all the hype around the issue now, I've just caught myself questioning whether anyone might accidentally mistake my own reviews on Goodreads as a sock puppet! Before all this, I never would have thought mine could be taken as such, they are usually pretty detailed and I have a solid history of activity on the site. But then I saw some of the reviews that other people were pointing out as examples of ones they thought were sock puppets and I wouldn't have pegged most of them as such. Apparently, some people immediate dismiss all 5 star or 1 star reviews, assuming most of them to sock puppets!
I need to just do my own thing and not worry about what other people might think of my reviews. But still, I just don't get it.
I too have been aware of it here in the UK. In fact, in 2010 I took the scalp of a very well known HF author here, after doing an immense amount of research on the net, employing an IT expert, and then calling the author's bluff. Suffice it to say, when 28 disparaging reviews of other HF works and glowing reviews of said author's own work vanished from Amazon one morning, I was not surprised. But I was very happy.
[/quote]
Ooooo, scandal, I so want to know who that was!
But I know it would be bad practice for you to tell us. What's sad is that with all the hype around the issue now, I've just caught myself questioning whether anyone might accidentally mistake my own reviews on Goodreads as a sock puppet! Before all this, I never would have thought mine could be taken as such, they are usually pretty detailed and I have a solid history of activity on the site. But then I saw some of the reviews that other people were pointing out as examples of ones they thought were sock puppets and I wouldn't have pegged most of them as such. Apparently, some people immediate dismiss all 5 star or 1 star reviews, assuming most of them to sock puppets!
I need to just do my own thing and not worry about what other people might think of my reviews. But still, I just don't get it.
[quote=""Mythica""]Ooooo, scandal, I so want to know who that was! But I know it would be bad practice for you to tell us.
What's sad is that with all the hype around the issue now, I've just caught myself questioning whether anyone might accidentally mistake my own reviews on Goodreads as a sock puppet! Before all this, I never would have thought mine could be taken as such, they are usually pretty detailed and I have a solid history of activity on the site. But then I saw some of the reviews that other people were pointing out as examples of ones they thought were sock puppets and I wouldn't have pegged most of them as such. Apparently, some people immediate dismiss all 5 star or 1 star reviews, assuming most of them to sock puppets! I need to just do my own thing and not worry about what other people might think of my reviews. But still, I just don't get it.[/quote]
Just go on your merry way, and trust readers to know the difference. For me, it's the generic/canned/Klausner-ish style that sends out warning flags.
ETA: It's pretty rare for sock reviews at GR. I'm sure they are there, but it is more common at Amazon.
But I know it would be bad practice for you to tell us. What's sad is that with all the hype around the issue now, I've just caught myself questioning whether anyone might accidentally mistake my own reviews on Goodreads as a sock puppet! Before all this, I never would have thought mine could be taken as such, they are usually pretty detailed and I have a solid history of activity on the site. But then I saw some of the reviews that other people were pointing out as examples of ones they thought were sock puppets and I wouldn't have pegged most of them as such. Apparently, some people immediate dismiss all 5 star or 1 star reviews, assuming most of them to sock puppets!
I need to just do my own thing and not worry about what other people might think of my reviews. But still, I just don't get it.[/quote]Just go on your merry way, and trust readers to know the difference. For me, it's the generic/canned/Klausner-ish style that sends out warning flags.
ETA: It's pretty rare for sock reviews at GR. I'm sure they are there, but it is more common at Amazon.
At home with a good book and the cat...
...is the only place I want to be
...is the only place I want to be
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DianeL
- Bibliophile
- Posts: 1029
- Joined: May 2011
- Location: Midatlantic east coast, United States
- Contact:
Hee - ECM. Well, considering I'm one of your real followers, maybe it's an improvement to manufacture 'em? 
"To be the queen, she agreed to be the widow!"
***
The pre-modern world was willing to attribute charisma to women well before it was willing to attribute sustained rationality to them.
---Medieval Kingship, Henry A. Myers
***
http://dianelmajor.blogspot.com/
I'm a Twit: @DianeLMajor
***
The pre-modern world was willing to attribute charisma to women well before it was willing to attribute sustained rationality to them.
---Medieval Kingship, Henry A. Myers
***
http://dianelmajor.blogspot.com/
I'm a Twit: @DianeLMajor
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Mythica
- Bibliophile
- Posts: 1095
- Joined: November 2010
- Preferred HF: European and American (mostly pre-20th century)
- Location: Colorado
- Contact:
[quote=""Misfit""]Just go on your merry way, and trust readers to know the difference. For me, it's the generic/canned/Klausner-ish style that sends out warning flags.
ETA: It's pretty rare for sock reviews at GR. I'm sure they are there, but it is more common at Amazon.[/quote]
That's half the reason I'm on Goodreads and not Amazon, because there was less sock reviews there - but apparently there's people on Goodreads who think there's lots of them. I always pegged sock puppets as vague too (someone hired to write reviews while never reading the book) - but if it's the author who is writing it, they can supply tons of details to make it sound legit. I also go by the reviewers history... on Amazon, it's a nearly a dead giveaway if the reviewer has only ever reviewed that one book/author/publisher. I've never seen that on Goodreads but still, some people are insistent there are lots of shills. I think they're just getting a little paranoid.
ETA: It's pretty rare for sock reviews at GR. I'm sure they are there, but it is more common at Amazon.[/quote]
That's half the reason I'm on Goodreads and not Amazon, because there was less sock reviews there - but apparently there's people on Goodreads who think there's lots of them. I always pegged sock puppets as vague too (someone hired to write reviews while never reading the book) - but if it's the author who is writing it, they can supply tons of details to make it sound legit. I also go by the reviewers history... on Amazon, it's a nearly a dead giveaway if the reviewer has only ever reviewed that one book/author/publisher. I've never seen that on Goodreads but still, some people are insistent there are lots of shills. I think they're just getting a little paranoid.
[quote=""Mythica""]That's half the reason I'm on Goodreads and not Amazon, because there was less sock reviews there - but apparently there's people on Goodreads who think there's lots of them. I always pegged sock puppets as vague too (someone hired to write reviews while never reading the book) - but if it's the author who is writing it, they can supply tons of details to make it sound legit. I also go by the reviewers history... on Amazon, it's a nearly a dead giveaway if the reviewer has only ever reviewed that one book/author/publisher. I've never seen that on Goodreads but still, some people are insistent there are lots of shills. I think they're just getting a little paranoid.[/quote]
The lightbult just went off, there are sock puppets there, but not much with reviews, at least that I've seen. There was one book up for a group read, and one particular book was getting heavy voting with a bunch of new-to-GR users. The mods spotted the pattern and the new users and removed the book from the vote list. It appears the author either created the new accounts and/or asked her friend to join and vote it up. The comments were fairly interesting. There were also a bunch (40-50?) of new accounts late last week that had just joined, all from the same city, same age (but different avatars) whose only activity was to vote the same book onto a list. GR zapped them all as soon as they were reported. Interesting note, the book these *people* were voting on was a Stacia Kane book, and voting it to the Badly behaving authors listopio. Kane has been extremely vocal and supportive of readers and reviewers in all these recent kerfuffles in YA and fantasy. Someone has it in for her.
The lightbult just went off, there are sock puppets there, but not much with reviews, at least that I've seen. There was one book up for a group read, and one particular book was getting heavy voting with a bunch of new-to-GR users. The mods spotted the pattern and the new users and removed the book from the vote list. It appears the author either created the new accounts and/or asked her friend to join and vote it up. The comments were fairly interesting. There were also a bunch (40-50?) of new accounts late last week that had just joined, all from the same city, same age (but different avatars) whose only activity was to vote the same book onto a list. GR zapped them all as soon as they were reported. Interesting note, the book these *people* were voting on was a Stacia Kane book, and voting it to the Badly behaving authors listopio. Kane has been extremely vocal and supportive of readers and reviewers in all these recent kerfuffles in YA and fantasy. Someone has it in for her.
At home with a good book and the cat...
...is the only place I want to be
...is the only place I want to be
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Justin Swanton
- Reader
- Posts: 173
- Joined: February 2012
- Location: Durban, South Africa
- Contact:
[quote=""Justin Swanton""]Personally, I never read the 5 star reviews on Amazon - at least, not often and never first. I take a close look at the 1 to 3 star ones. I find I can assess a book's true worth much better by seeing what others don't like about it than what they do. Too many 5 star reviews just read like hype.[/quote]
I do the same, particularly when I'm having issues with a book. I've been thinking more about Goodreads and reviews there since the last comment(s) I've made. I mostly stick with reviews from friends I have there, and since we 1) don't always like the same book every time and 2) can respect that we can't always like the same book and can politely disagree with healthy discussions about what worked and what didn't work, so I rarely look at community reviews. That is, until I'm having a problem with a book and then I look at the critical ones, which are rarely shills and/or sock puppets.
Honestly, with all the nonsense that's been going on lately (google Melissa Douthit and Carroll Bryant if you dare), many bloggers/reviewers are really cutting back on accepting review books, especially from self-published authors. Some blogs are shutting down completely. I'm at the point where I can count on one hand the authors I'd still jump at an ARC from. Other wise I can just wait for the library to get a copy and I'm able to close it quietly after a few chapters and walk away without the must review pressure.
I have a healthy stack of OOP books from dead authors
I do the same, particularly when I'm having issues with a book. I've been thinking more about Goodreads and reviews there since the last comment(s) I've made. I mostly stick with reviews from friends I have there, and since we 1) don't always like the same book every time and 2) can respect that we can't always like the same book and can politely disagree with healthy discussions about what worked and what didn't work, so I rarely look at community reviews. That is, until I'm having a problem with a book and then I look at the critical ones, which are rarely shills and/or sock puppets.
Honestly, with all the nonsense that's been going on lately (google Melissa Douthit and Carroll Bryant if you dare), many bloggers/reviewers are really cutting back on accepting review books, especially from self-published authors. Some blogs are shutting down completely. I'm at the point where I can count on one hand the authors I'd still jump at an ARC from. Other wise I can just wait for the library to get a copy and I'm able to close it quietly after a few chapters and walk away without the must review pressure.
I have a healthy stack of OOP books from dead authors
At home with a good book and the cat...
...is the only place I want to be
...is the only place I want to be
[quote=""Misfit""]many bloggers/reviewers are really cutting back on accepting review books, especially from self-published authors. Some blogs are shutting down completely. I'm at the point where I can count on one hand the authors I'd still jump at an ARC from. Other wise I can just wait for the library to get a copy and I'm able to close it quietly after a few chapters and walk away without the must review pressure.
I have a healthy stack of OOP books from dead authors [/quote]
Personally, I never understood why a person who is just a reader (not a publishing insider and not out to make a name for oneself reviewing books) even wants an ARC. I want the finished product, finely honed and edited in its final form. Too many advanced reviewers are turning the process into a pissing contest and contributing to the mountain of hype one has to wade through to get to the information I really care about as a reader.
I have a healthy stack of OOP books from dead authors
[/quote]Personally, I never understood why a person who is just a reader (not a publishing insider and not out to make a name for oneself reviewing books) even wants an ARC. I want the finished product, finely honed and edited in its final form. Too many advanced reviewers are turning the process into a pissing contest and contributing to the mountain of hype one has to wade through to get to the information I really care about as a reader.
An interesting postover at Dear Author this morning.
At home with a good book and the cat...
...is the only place I want to be
...is the only place I want to be