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Amazon has taken down the Sad Bastard Cookbook
- wscourge 3y ago> Reaching a human at Amazon is a Kafkaesque experience that we haven't yet managed to do. It indeed is, I had the same experience. Good idea to asking here, you might just find some
- ufocia 3y agoIt is that, most likely by design. The harder to access a relatively expensive human, the better the bottom line.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- mikequinlan 3y agohttps://www.usatoday.com/story/money/retail/2022/09/14/how-to-contact-amazon-account-inquiries/7867529001/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/retail/2022/09/14/how-t...
- malermeister 3y agoI'm gonna guess their language police bot took issue with the word "bastard".
- wccrawford 3y agoThat, combined with that it appears to be aimed at "depressed, disabled, and broke folks" (their words, from that link) and I can imagine some people took offense and reported it.
- jayceedenton 3y agoThat can't be it. Their are hundreds of books on Amazon with far worse words in the title.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- Hamuko 3y agoWould you be interested in the paperback version of "Looks Like It's Fuck This Shit O'Clock"? https://www.amazon.com/dp/1092412743/ https://www.amazon.com/dp/1092412743/
- flir 3y agoThere must be a whitelist process though: https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=bastard&i=stripbooks https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=bastard&i=stripbooks
- lwhi 3y ago[flagged]
- zilti 3y ago[flagged]
- flir 3y agoIf I see you using allowlist (and denylist?), I promise not to correct you. That way we can all just rub along peacefully. (Edit: flagged? Jeez. I upvoted you).
- lwhi 3y agoFor the record I didn't flag you. However your point is null and void.
- flir 3y agoSorry, I didn't think you did. I didn't think you should have been flagged. Look, I don't think you're wrong, I just think going around correcting each other's language is an exhausting distraction from things that matter. Normally that kind of microaggression would have been water off a duck's back. I'm just having an off day and feeling sarcastic. Apologies.
- lwhi 3y agoFair enough, I do see your point .. I just figure there are a lot of small things we can all do that cost virtually nothing that can help make the world a bit more equitable.
- las_balas_tres 3y agoWhat about the book. "How to take a shit in the woods" https://www.amazon.com/How-Shit-Woods-3rd-Environmentally/dp/1580083633 https://www.amazon.com/How-Shit-Woods-3rd-Environmentally/dp...
- cafard 3y agoAmazon would love to sell me the novel Bastard out of Carolina in paperback or electronic format, or a DVD of the movie made from the novel.
- test77777g 3y ago[flagged]
- infotainment 3y agoDunno, hating on Amazon (in particular, for their counterfeit item problem) seems to be a pretty common commenter topic on HN. That, and talking about how Google search results are terrible now.
- ufocia 3y agoBoth true in many more ways than one.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- riedel 3y agoJust checked, interestingly it is still available for on demand order via other channels. Wonder if they still print it and only delist on their own frontend [0]. Maybe it is a bit of compensation if they profit from the Streisand effect. Regarding Amazon I find it funny that they actually engage quite a few people e.g. for tech support of end users. I think they know where to optimize.. [0] https://www.thalia.de/shop/home/suggestartikel/A1067374317 https://www.thalia.de/shop/home/suggestartikel/A1067374317
- javawizard 3y ago> interestingly it is still available for on demand order via other channels Where, if you don't mind my asking? This would make an excellent birthday gift for a good friend and I'd prefer to get her the print edition, but a quick search is failing to turn up anywhere that offers an actual hardcopy besides Amazon.
- ChrisMarshallNY 3y agoI'm trying to remember what service we considered, when an organization that wrote a book self-published (I was on the committee to write the book). We ended up actually commissioning normal printing, and selling the book, ourselves (it was quite successful, if I say so, myself. We made our money back in about a month), but we did consider a service that allowed you to sell print-on-demand. They ran the store, and the printer. You could also move eBooks through them. This was many years ago, and memory fails me.
- ChrisMarshallNY 3y agoMemory jogged. It was Lulu. Looked pretty good, but that was many years ago.
- riedel 3y agoThis was just a random German online book seller that are connected to a major distribution system. I don't know how it is elsewhere in the world, we in Germany have just a fe major distributors. I remember when publishing my PhD thesis I could chose if I wanted a ISBN and allow global distribution, when self publishing on Amazon (was much cheaper than any other options that required my to buy a batch). Actually small publishers have been living a lot of PhD theses in Germany, but nowadays electronic publication is allowed and not everyone has boxes of their manuscript in the basement as it used to be.
- andirk 3y agoI understand the obsession with being on Amazon, but can we please normalize selling elsewhere? The internet is a vast expanse. Why do we think Amazon is the end all be all? I do not understand this.
- mschuster91 3y agoFor consumers, it's easy: Amazon offers a consistent effortless experience. They already have all your payment and shipping data, so no need to create accounts and passwords at some random site with unknown security standards, you know what to expect in terms of shipping vs whatever that random shop is using, no need to worry if the shop will be around in a year or two to honor warranties, no worry about bullshit surrounding returns, warranty claims or refunds.
- ufocia 3y agoHow does Amazon handle warranties, especially in a year or two? Pray tell.
- mschuster91 3y agoAmazon is a multibillion dollar company that has a consistent track record of prioritizing customer satisfaction ever since its inception, as does PayPal - admittedly though at the expense of merchants, where we've seen more than enough horror stories on HN about these two companies. Besides: The chances of either of them going belly-up are faaaaar lower than for Joe Random's webshop or, heaven forbid, physical store.
- lostlogin 3y ago> Amazon is a multibillion dollar company that has a consistent track record of prioritizing customer satisfaction ever since its inception A massive issue missing from this statement are the problems around fakes which has grown and is unaddressed by Amazon. Not such an issue with books though.
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- perihelions 3y agoAlso available here, https://nightbeatseu.ca/works/the-sad-bastard-cookbook/ https://nightbeatseu.ca/works/the-sad-bastard-cookbook/ https://traumbooks.itch.io/the-sad-bastard-cookbook https://traumbooks.itch.io/the-sad-bastard-cookbook - "We made it legal with Creative Commons (4.0 attribution non-commercial), but if you get a thrill from breaking the law, you can pretend it’s not."
- coolandsmartrr 3y agoI love the copyright description. Is this book full of humor like this?
- leetrout 3y agoYes. They note things like being reliably informed salt makes (most) things better.
- borlanco 3y agoI would say yes. They try hard to make cooks laugh. This is one of their recipes: APOCALYPSE RAMEN This is basically like regular ramen soup but with three critical differences: - It is intensely chaotic, which is to say that you can pretty much toss anything into it and say you did it on purpose. - It's slightly healthier, if your depression has lifted enough that you want to eat something other than delicious, delicious chemicals. - It involves a mason jar, so you can feel like you're riding out the end of days in true hipster style. Core Ingredients & Supplies: - Mason jar or other heatproof receptacle. - Boiling water. - The only requirement here is rice noodles. Why? Because they cook fast. Preparation: - Put all ingredients in the jar. - Boil some water. - Pour into jar to cover ingredients. - Shake it up a bit (not right away, otherwise you'll burn your hands and get more depressed). - Let it sit for a few minutes. - Enjoy??? Variations: - Remember those takeout packets of hot sauce and soy sauce? This is a good time to use them. - Frozen or fresh vegetables. Wilted is absolutely fine here. International readers may call them "wilty" vegetables. Reader, you are now bilingual. - Any kind of spices. We particularly suggest garlic or ginger powder, but seriously, anything will work. - If you have tofu or some other protein to use, go for it.
- swarnie 3y ago[flagged]
- cdrini 3y agoMy guess would be this is an overzealous AI-generated content detector. Amazon has been flooded with low quality AI generated books in the past ~year, and has been removing a lot of it. My guess would be they're still tweaking their algorithms as folks generating books change their tactics. Hopefully a human will respond soon!
- jruohonen 3y agoThat would be my guess too. A few months back they announced a ML model to clean up the reviews, but I'd argue that it is a lost battle; there is so much human-made and now AI-made garbage already. A solution might be a full deletion and then a real identity verification for reviewers.
- wil421 3y agoSometimes the merchant will switch a product with reviews with a different product. So it looks like it has 1,000 reviews but in reality most reviews are for something else.
- jruohonen 3y agoAnd then you have the ugly stuff; I remember reading a paper (cannot find it now, though) about fraud rigs through which people can buy fraudsters to promote their products and trash their competitors' products. With AI, that kind of stuff will surely accelerate.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- atlantic 3y agoAs we're beginning to discover in our generation, censorship is largely down to the individual censor, and if you're looking for some kind of underlying rationale, you're wasting your time. Censors too are sad bastards, and the one ray of dark sunshine in their little lives is to make others miserable.
- ChrisMarshallNY 3y agoI have a feeling that this will be resolved soon. Frontpage on HN tends to bring results. I wish the authors luck, and would love to hear the resolution. For myself, I haven't brought any books on Amazon for a long time, but that's mostly because I dislike the Kindle app, so I get my books through the Apple iBooks store.
- lawgimenez 3y agoI forgot why I had a pdf of your cookbook, have you at some point gave this out for free?
- felurx 3y agoIt is and afaik always has been available for free
- lawgimenez 3y agoOh got it. Thanks!
- philistine 3y agoFor years I made book versions of the articles on my website. When came time to make the third volume, Amazon threw a massive fit that my books were reusing content! I ended up abandoning their bookmaking service for Lulu. My books are still for sale on Amazon, but I’m not letting them do anything with the printing.
- ghaff 3y agoI ran into this with my first book on Amazon maybe a decade ago. I reused/refined a lot of my blog content as well as some material I published elsewhere. But I sent a bunch of links to show that it was my byline and didn't have any issue going forward.
- hiyer 3y agoIt's still free on itch.io
- FumblingBear 3y agoIt also made front page on HN a while back, maybe 6 months ago?
- zillanovikov 3y agoZilla here (one of the Sad Bastard Cookbook authors). Thanks so much for your support ... I'm lowkey dropping "front page of Hacker News" when I talk to Amazon Service reps now, in the vague hope they have any power to actually help me. I think I've reached at least one real person, but in the days of AI voice chat, who can tell? Many of you asked why we use Amazon as the exclusive printer/distributor of the print edition. Variations of this happened to basically every self-pub author I've met, so why didn't I use another platform? 1) Reach. As Ma8ee pointed out, there's literally dozens of people buying books online but not on Amazon. If I want readers to find it, I need to be on Amazon. Bonus, one of the most important controlling factors in new people finding your book is whether the Amazon promo algorithim suggests the book to them, so any sale off Amazon doesn't contribute to building an avalanche. The game's rigged, but it's the only game in town. 2) Money/quality. Last time I checked (few years back, things might have changed), Draft2Digital print books were bad quality. Ingram print books are decent quality but their calculation for printing fees and royalties means they usually don't pay out at nearly the same rate. I've not compared directly for the Cookbook, but for Instant Classic, it's the difference between making a couple dollars or a couple cents. We did it for Instant Classic as a service for people who despise Amazon, but the royalties from the Cookbook are a substantial factor in "eating" and "making rent" for one of the Cookbook team, so there's a limit to how much I want to give away the print edition of the Cookbook. Especially if "giving it away" involves the reader paying Ingram, just not us. If anyone knows a print-on-demand distributor who pays out enough in royalties for authors to make money, please respond to this. 3) Distribution. We're small fry self-pub, without a big publishing house behind us. I've looked around for places which will take us on self-pub books and distribute them, and the options are pretty limited. I'm convinced we'd sell in brick-and-mortar stores, but that's typically not an option for self-pub unless you approach the owner of an independent bookshop on an individual basis. (We approached a couple proper distributors who accept query letters from non-traditionally published books, but they focused on specific genres and we weren't the right fit.) Basically, if you're not traditionally published, you're looking at Amazon, Ingram, or Draft2Digital to print and distribute your books. If anyone knows of other printer/distributors which take self-pub books, PLEASE tell me. ETA: people are informing me that Ingram can make money, and that Lulu exists. I am investigating.
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- andsoitis 3y ago> Reaching a human at Amazon is a Kafkaesque experience Material for their next book!
- ArtemZ 3y agoOk how do I order the book now? Why there is no website to buy it directly?
- OJFord 3y ago> Amazon in all its wisdom has taken down the Sad Bastard Cookbook. They won't tell us why. I mean.. I assume it's right there in the title? Not that there isn't other stuff available with such words, but there's not much, and the bar/automation might be higher for self-published or other 'indie' stuff? (If anyone's interested in jars of 300 F's to give or not, by the way...)
- juunpp 3y agoThey should re-publish is as The Sad Motherfucker's Cookbook. There are a lot of sad motherfuckers out there who could use some skill.
- ao98 3y agoIf your first thought was “what is The Sad Bastard Cookbook”, here’s an except (and yes, totally worth fighting for :) “Life is hard. Some days are at the absolute limit of what we can manage. Some days are worse than that. Eating—picking a meal, making it, putting it into your facehole—can feel like an insurmountable challenge. We wrote this cookbook to share our coping strategies. It has recipes to make when you’ve worked a 16-hour day, when you can’t stop crying and you don’t know why, when you accidentally woke up an Eldritch abomination at the bottom of the ocean. But most of all, this cookbook exists to help Sad Bastards like us feel a little less alone at mealtimes. The Sad Bastard Cookbook is funny, realistic, and kind. It’s vegetarian/vegan. It’s a community-built project. And the e-book is free. It’s hard to survive late capitalism and we want to help.”
- dotancohen 3y agoInteresting correlation, by the time I got to "when you can’t stop crying and you don’t know why" I thought to myself the cookbook had better be vegetarian. Is there a known correlation between emotional distress and vegetarianism or veganism?
- ao98 3y agoThat’s a good question (and I don’t know the answer). As a practical matter, if you’re strapped for time, having fresh meats on the ready isn’t practical. And canned/frozen aren’t great options. The opposite holds true for many veggies because they are seasonal - for big portions of the year, canned or frozen are the best you can get. Beans/lentils, dried or canned, etc.
- dotancohen 3y ago> As a practical matter, if you’re strapped for time, having fresh meats on the ready isn’t practical I usually have some form of pastrami in a well sealed container in the refrigerator, this is one of my ingredients for a need-a-quick-to-prepare-meal. They last for weeks if properly sealed. But my point wasn't really about the fitness of the specific ingredients, rather, why would I associate those with emotional distress with vegetarians? My wife and daughter are vegetarians and I have no negative associations with that lifestyle. But looking back, many emotionally distressed people that I've met have been vegetarians I think, thought I do not imply that the association also goes the other way. I wonder if there have been studies on correlations - I should not have been able to predict that.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- devwastaken 3y agoUse the optimum tactic other sellers do: relabel.
- wseqyrku 3y agoHas the US downgraded to a third world shit hole that people/companies tend to be concerned with this kind of stuff? Disclaimer: I live in such a place and this is normal.