[LINK] kindle spammed

[Kim Holburn]

http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2011/06/kindle-e-book-store-slammed-by-spam-authors.ars
> Kindle e-book store slammed by spam "authors"


> Amazon's Kindle e-books store has been hit hard by spam in the last few months, according to Reuters. Hundreds of entities are pulling quasi-useless content found for free or for a small price on the Internet, reformatting it into e-books, and selling it under catchy titles for very little, clogging Amazon with low-value materials that stand to mire the platform and maybe make customers think twice about future e-book purchases.
> 
> Many of the books are created with Private Label Rights (PLR) content, which is often milled by content creators on the Internet and then made available for free or a low price. PLR content can then be reformatted or even modified if the buyer wants, and then put up for sale under virtually anyone's name. PLR content is usually of the beginner-how-to or get-rich-quick variety that baits those looking for their elevator to success: make a certain number of dollars in a much smaller number of days, money-making blogging for beginners, how to start an Internet marketing business.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/16/us-amazon-kindle-spam-idUSTRE75F68620110616

> Spam clogging Amazon's Kindle self-publishing
> 
> (Reuters) - Spam has hit the Kindle, clogging the online bookstore of the top-selling eReader with material that is far from being book worthy and threatening to undermine Amazon.com Inc's publishing foray.
> 
> Thousands of digital books, called ebooks, are being published through Amazon's self-publishing system each month. Many are not written in the traditional sense.
> 
> Instead, they are built using something known as Private Label Rights, or PLR content, which is information that can be bought very cheaply online then reformatted into a digital book.
> 
> These ebooks are listed for sale -- often at 99 cents -- alongside more traditional books on Amazon's website, forcing readers to plow through many more titles to find what they want.
> 
> Aspiring spammers can even buy a DVD box set called Autopilot Kindle Cash that claims to teach people how to publish 10 to 20 new Kindle books a day without writing a word.
> 
> This new phenomenon represents the dark side of an online revolution that's turning the traditional publishing industry on its head by giving authors new ways to access readers directly.

-- 
Kim Holburn
The Pinchgut Press
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