There IS a Cyber Hell!

I am in a mood, so pardon me while I bitch for a few moments.

I had something happen to me this week that was just plain, unadulterated rudeness. And since it made my biscuits steam, it urged me to get up on my cyber soapbox about it—and honey, there isn't any Tide or Gain in my soapbox, only fire and brimstone!

I've said it once, I'll say it a hundred times, I stay off of most of the Yahoo loops because the crap that I see happening on them disgusts me to no end. I'll post blog announcements on the promo loops, but discussions (if it's not a chat, which I seldom do anymore either) are kept to the two loops I own and one nice li'l group I've been hanging out on the past few weeks. The petty crap that I see happening amongst authors is mind boggling. Note, however, I'm not saying all authors do mean and rude things. For the most part all the authors I encounter are nice. It's the people who walk all over everyone else who make me shake my head and think, "Oh, yeah, that behavior is really endearing h/her to everyone in Loop World."

So, what rudeness happened to me this week, you ask?

Well, it was a simple matter, really, but it still pissed me off. Never hijack someone's thread because A) you're too damn lazy to write your own thread header, or B) you see an opportunity to steal someone's thunder to promote yourself.

Why do people stoop so low? Do they truly believe that by undercutting someone that it will benefit them in some manner? Make them more sales (if an author)? Present them in a golden light with a li'l halo?

All that unprofessional behavior does is make the offender look like donkey's butt with devil horns.

Look, blatant promos aside, in e-Bookville people take time to compose posts that will grab attention. They want readers to come to their blogs, visit their websites, and check out the contest page they might be posting about. Matter of fact, I visit author sites all the time (and used to do it a lot when I was a managing editor and scouting for talent). I love to look at the various site designs, glance over book covers, read blurbs, and investigate blogs that are unusual, entertaining, thought provoking and humorous. When I see posts put together nicely and they're attention grabbing, I often visit the links within those posts.

It's no different than being at the park showing a crowd the new pair of Jimmy Choos you were given by someone special. Suddenly a bully stomps past, throwing mud and slush all over your nice shoes. Then she turns with an evil glint in her eyes, grins, holds up a pair of stilettos and says, "Look at my sparkly new Gucci heels. Now these are special shoes."

{Yeah, special shoes that will look really pretty stuff up your...! Ahem!}

I can't count the times another author has commandeered one of my posts to put themselves in the limelight. I've had it happen on blog posts too. One thing that will piss me off in a nanosecond—and I'm not speaking of it just my posts/blogs but anyone's site I'm visiting—is someone who comes into a blog to leave a thinly veiled promo post or go off on a spiel about their book and then leave a flippin' buy link.

There is a cyber hell for such people. Oh yes, indeedie! One with flaming pitchforks tipped with the poison of bad reviews, and a big fat, sweaty dude covered in the world's worst e-book covers who eats pickled eggs and farts constantly as the offenders are charbroiled in the flames of his ass.

And don't even get me started on cyber cliques. For God's sake, I left high school twenty years ago.

Readers will buy what they want to buy. No amount of hijacking threads or stealing someone else's thunder is going to change that. And when readers see authors backstabbing, undercutting, and badmouthing other authors, it makes an impression on the reader and it's not a good one.

Writers should support one another, not stab each other in the back with sharp, spiny apostrophes and exclamation marks. And never hijack someone's loop post because it's too much effort to start a new thread with your subject. After all, don't do to others what you don't want done to you. In other words, if a person has committed this crime, then don't cry and bitch when your post or blog is hijacked one day. Karma is a bitch (and so is my muse, but that's a post for another time).

I'm getting down off my soapbox. The brimstone oozing out of it is melting my sneakers.