An OPEN Letter To The Staff @ GoodReads.com
Originally published at StonesThrowGathering. You can comment here or there.
Dear GoodReads Staff:
I am writing with a suggestion for your site and although I am writing this independently of any other person(s), please know that I have had conversations with many members of goodreads.com and other organizations.
I am writing to ask you to reconsider your policy on giveaways being restricted to physical copies of books. I understand your policy and probably the reasons for it, however there are a few things you may have not taken into consideration.
You have patrons who enter any and all giveaways for the sole purpose of reselling those copies and without any intent whatsoever to actually read and review the copy they receive. Several authors have verified this and I have spoken with and confirmed by some of them actually finding the signed copy of the books on sale within days of shipping it to your chosen winner.
In one case the author went into an actual bookstore and found the signed copy being sold by the owner who actually admitted that she had won it on your site.
As you know, we have to pay for those copies. Out intent is to generate interest in our work, not just give away our work to be sold for profit by someone else.
If you would allow e-books to be given away, it would eliminate much of this dishonesty and for the most part, ensure that people who enter the giveaways might actually read it.
Barring this, you might actually implement a rule limiting the number of giveaways a person can enter without posting a review and having the author check off on that review so that they can tell the person actually read the book.
You provide a great service, but you should know that some people would exploit your service while doing a disservice to writers everywhere.
Please consider our suggestions.
- Vincent