Author Central now has global reviews

[Gerri Attrick]

*Sigh* i thought it bad enough when Amazon started mixing ratings and reviews, but now Author Central (UK and .com) have lumped everything together under "Global reviews". Impossible to tell if there is anything new, because it can be days before a review shows up under the Customer Reviews tab.

With sales/rankings taking hours, if not days, to change, Author Central is now nigh on useless. A pity.

[notthatamanda]

I'm not saying Author central is not mostly useless, but I took a peek and it looks the same to me. I'm in the US. I've always found new reviews first on Author central by using the reviews tab and sorting newest to oldest. It can take a while going to every store to figure out where it was posted, but that's not something I care about anymore.

Does it look different from that in the UK?

[VanessaC]

I'm having the same issue. Both Author Central US and UK claim to show "global reviews" but the numbers of reviews on each site don't match, and I noticed earlier this week that it took a good few days before a review left on the US store made its way to the summary list of reviews on Author Central.

I don't mind them changing things, that's just part of life, but it's the inconsistency that's making me twitch just now.

[notthatamanda]

I haven't had a new review in might as well be forever so that may be why I can't see any discernable change. Thanks.

[DrewMcGunn]

I'm not sure about why there's a discrepancy, but for my account, the US version of author central lists all of my amazon.com reviews - I don't see anything outside of the US store there. The UK version of Author Central is listing all of my UK reviews plus all of the verified purchasers' reviews from the US and other amazon portals.

[Gerri Attrick]

Isn't it typical of Amazon that they put in a new system and it's as glitchy as hell?

As Vanessa said the global review count doesn't match on the different sites. Ever since they started accepting only ratings, even on a book's product page, the number of reviews was often way off. It might say 8 reviews, then there'd be 12 ratings, but only 6 actual reviews.

I can't see how this helps buyers - it certainly doesn't help authors any more. I used AC to keep track of reviews and, to a lesser extent (because of the time lag) ranking. Easy to see, at a glance, what had changed, but now that's virtually impossible. Bah! I do wish Amazon would stop fiddling - or at least ask us first if it's a change that we want.

[Marti Talbott]

*Sigh* i thought it bad enough when Amazon started mixing ratings and reviews, but now Author Central (UK and .com) have lumped everything together under "Global reviews". Impossible to tell if there is anything new, because it can be days before a review shows up under the Customer Reviews tab.

With sales/rankings taking hours, if not days, to change, Author Central is now nigh on useless. A pity.

I'm not seeing that on either the old Author Central or the beta. Global reviews? I do agree that it takes days to see a new review. So many problems lately. I suspect all those people working at home are not really working. Maybe that's why companies are selling out of "I-can-see-you"cameras.

[Gerri Attrick]

It's on the Books page of AC, Marti.

You get the thumbnail and the title and under the title it gives:
Edition
Current Ranking
Average review (stars) (#global reviews)

Perhaps they are split testing.

[Marti Talbott]

It's on the Books page of AC, Marti.

You get the thumbnail and the title and under the title it gives:
Edition
Current Ranking
Average review (stars) (#global reviews)

Perhaps they are split testing.

I see it now. Thanks!