ANGEL'S WONDER Agreed. I have no idea how OBC selects which updates to implement, but there are other far more critical issues that need addressing that would be very easy to fix and that are being overlooked.

So I have a UK accent. I don't live in the UK. Does that make me more or less likely to keep the rules? More or less likely to plagiarize? What the hell does a reviewer's accent, country of origin and country of residence have to do with how good and trustworthy they are at their job? That's setting aside the little fact that I for one would not be comfortable handing out my phone number over the internet! Some suggestions are unimportant and unrequested, but I do get the thinking behind them. This one's just bizarre.

With all due respect to the OBC team, the percentage of Planned suggestions made by high-ranking members of that team make it seem like this is less, "Tell us how we can improve OBC" and "This is what we've decided to do."

One of my suggestions got high votes and a number of supportive comments and was ignored, and I'm not the only one in that situation. This suggestion gets one upvote - by the OP - and three comments that basically boil down to "WTF?" but it was made by Scott Hughes so ZAP! It's in!

Fine, I get that you definitely can't implement every suggestion and some are just plain bonkers, but despite several people pointing out definite flaws in OBC's review system from the POV of the authors that DO need to be addressed (some of my bulk reviews have been waiting literally YEARS to be rejected or published, meaning they're no longer relevant. Why is there no auto-reject-if-no-consensus-reached-after-X-months system for bulk reviews?) we get this.

Tone is hard to judge on the internet, so I really want to make it clear that I don't intend any offense to OBC and the team. I'm a huge fan and have been and will continue to be. However, as an author and long-time client, I'm losing a lot of confidence in it because of how these matters are being handled.

J Kato Very valid outburst. I quit OBC 3 months ago because of the constant misuse and incompetence against long time, very good trustworthy reviewers even though I had enough points to be a level 6(P.S I reviewed over 100 books for them). It was just too frustrating and tiring for my peace and mental health.

The pay is no longer worth it, so many mistakes that never gets fixed but reviewers and authors get punished for it, the I don't care behavior of the admin and top staff etc. Good luck to them anyways and y'all be safe out there. ❤

ANGEL'S WONDER I used to be a reviewer and I also climbed to Level 6 and the fabled Editor-dom. That was some years ago. Sure, there were rules back then, but it wasn't so restrictive and arbitrary as it seems to have become (emphasis on "seems;" I have no idea what it's like for reviewers now, so I could be talking out of my ass! I'm just going on what I've been hearing here).

Back then, there were standards you had to keep to (IIRC, minimum 800 words per review spread over five paragraphs, titles in italics, final score in bold) but that was it. It was work and it was taken seriously, but it was also fun. Sure, if you wanted to climb the rankings, you had to review more, but there was no minimum requirement that I remember, and you could dip in and out of reviewing as your schedule allowed.

I joined OBC because I was a seriously struggling film student in Tokyo who literally couldn't afford to buy new books, and this was a great way to read something new, discover authors I wouldn't otherwise have found and get paid. I used to net about $40 a month, so not a fortune, but enough to treat myself to a pizza occasionally :P

I actually can't complain about my personal treatment by OBC, apart from the bulk review issue. I've always found them professional and quick to respond...but I'm very glad I jumped the fence to the author's side of things.

ANGEL'S WONDER My thoughts exactly! I find it laughable that the page on the site linking to here says the programmers select what to update based on the number of upvotes; they clearly don't.