So I think this is it for the night and I’m off to an early night’s rest. I wrote the Amazon Executive Team and Jeff Bezos to give them an update. For those that know my history, it’s not the first time I’ve been in communication with them. I’ll see how they reply to this new issue.
I’d add that I noticed that they implemented a few of my copyright infringement reporting suggestions from a previous issue with them. They had taken my best-selling Art Nouveau Coloring Book title down without any warning or justification over a month ago, and I fought tooth and nail to get it back. When I went to report my copyright complaint this morning, I noticed that they added a few additional fields and steps that I had originally suggested to them in order to benefit both them and other authors such as myself. So perhaps there is actually some glimmer of hope that they are actually listening. But it really shouldn’t take this much effort and screaming from the top of my lungs for us to be heard. They have a nasty habit and history or simply passing the buck as I suspect that no one wants to be bothered unless their livelihoods are on the line. Which is quite a shame for a supposed “customer centric” company.
The deeper I dig, the more I’m discovering. I ended up taking screenshots of all the pages this person or group “JoyCraft” has been repurposing without authors’ permissions only to be resold on Amazon. There turns out to be about 100 titles that I found so far, although there’s probably a lot more going by either different “companies,” or perhaps by different wording.
I performed a reverse search on the terms found within the plagiarized description of my own book:
‘“As per the right of first sale we lawfully purchase these books and later modify the binding” Amazon.’
For those that don’t know, here’s an explanation of the Right of First Sale Doctrine, which many people do not seem to understand:
The first sale doctrine is a legal principle in copyright law that allows the owner of a legally obtained copy of a copyrighted work to resell, lend, or otherwise dispose of that particular copy without needing permission from the copyright holder. Once the initial sale of a copy occurs, the copyright owner’s control over that copy is exhausted. This principle is essential for secondhand markets like used bookstores or DVD resale shops.
It originated in U.S. copyright law under the 1908 Supreme Court case *Bobbs-Merrill Co. v. Straus* and is now codified in U.S. law under 17 U.S.C. § 109. However, it only applies to the distribution right of the copyright owner and does not allow the reproduction or modification of the work itself.
In simpler terms, it never provided any protection for people or companies modifying the original works and reselling them. And we all know, “ignorance is no excuse in the eyes of the law.” But, it did serve a purpose when it first came about as the doctrine protected libaries, used book stores, etc. Things that I fully support and we often take for granted these days.
Again, it does not allow for the modification of the work itself.
Back on topic, below is a small sampling of the authors and titles I could find. Update: later on, I discovered even more by different operations engaging in similar behavior:
Below is a copy of all the authors this personn or group has been doing this to that I could find, just to give you an idea as to how prevalent this issue really is. It’s hard to believe that this has been going on for so many years. I have yet to check the dates of some of these titles, but I’m sure they go back a ways. I also wonder if Amazon would ever be willing to release information about these other book authors being targeted like I had been over false copyright allegations. But I’d also be willing to bet their policy of keeping things internal will never permit this data to be released short of a major class action lawsuit, which most likely ends up in quiet settlings out of court.
I’ve posted a gallery of all of these results, just so they’re recorded for posterity and in case they try to feign ignorance.
I mean, if I could sleuth this out and I’m only one person looking at this, why couldn’t Amazon figure this out over the course of the past two years?
Which reminds me to look at these book dates to determine how far back this issue goes and also to research “JoyCraft” to see what other books they’re targeting.
I suppose this is why pen names exist in the first place.
