During a recent interview with CBN, which you can view on YouTube, Alisse Wissman from InterVarsity Press explained how at least 15,000 fake copies of Christian author Tish Harrison Warren's book, Liturgy of the Ordinary: Sacred Practices in Everyday Life had been sold by third-party Amazon sellers before the publisher caught wind of the scam and decided to pursue shutting it down.
A reader who had unknowingly purchased a counterfeit copy of Warren's book apparently notified InterVarsity Press that "something was wrong" with her book, prompting an investigation by the publisher than uncovered a massive criminal racket. As it turns out, phony sellers had been marketing fake copies of Warren's book without consequence, as Amazon was simply too busy censoring free speech to actually take notice.
"We had them send the copy to us to inspect it, and we went back and forth and checked, and it turned out that it was, in fact, counterfeit," Wissman told CBN. "So we found out where she purchased it from, and were able to trace it through to a number of counterfeit, third-party sellers on Amazon."
Not only was Warren's book being counterfeited, but so were many other books by other authors and publishers, all of whom were being denied of their right earnings and royalties due to lost sales. And again, Amazon never would have noticed, let alone done anything about it, had a disgruntled customer not complained to InterVarsity Press.
"I think for us, there was a good bit of manpower that was put into uncovering, and then reporting, all of these issues that we were having, which we're very grateful that Amazon acted on it quickly, everything has been rectified as far as our books are concerned, and they've been very responsive to us, and we're grateful for that," Wissman says.
"I think as an author, it has to be a bit of a blow because they're books that you've written that are not being paid for that you're not getting credit for, and that's upsetting on a personal level."
While Wissman says that all counterfeit books by InterVarsity Press have now been identified and removed from Amazon, at least as far as she knows, there's no telling how many other counterfeit books are still being sold on Amazon. This is why she suggests that consumers pay close attention to the products they're receiving from Amazon purchases, and look for signs of counterfeiting before keeping them.
"There are a number of ways to tell that it's perhaps counterfeit, but they're not conclusive," Wissman says.
"Things like weird looking color on the cover, misprints inside the book itself ... but in order to determine that you're actually buying a legitimate copy, you can purchase through Amazon directly, so it would say ships by and sold by Amazon, and not necessarily a third-party seller – though not all third-party sellers are problematic; most of them are completely fine."
Wissman also says consumers can purchase books direct from InterVarsity Press through their direct-to-consumer program.
To learn more about how Amazon and the rest of the tech cabal is more concerned about censoring free speech than protecting the interests and livelihoods of their customers, be sure to check out Censorship.news.
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