Until today we have refrained from contacting OneBookShelf; I saw no reason to waste time talking to them after being banned. However, since other people have emailed them and the official reply has been it was our attitude rather than “hostile marketing” or book content that got us banned, today I sent them the following:
Sir,
It came to my knowledge that several friends and customers have contacted you during the last few days. First of all, I would like to assure you that they did it of their own volition. Perhaps they are afraid a similar thing might happen to them (and they are probably right to fear it). I asked no one to reach out to you and would rather they didn’t. I know your decision was final, and I wouldn’t want it any other way. Unless the company changes hands, I have no wish to sell at Drivethru again.
Nevertheless, in your replies, you have insisted that the reason behind the Red Room’s banning from OneBookShelf wasn’t the content of the books and not even hostile marketing, but my aggressive behaviour towards your staff. However, you have yet to produce proof of that. Are you even aware if there is proof of aggressive behaviour? Or are you just trusting the word of (possibly) over-sensitive employees? I have already posted on my blog print screens of all my email contacts with your staff, and those who read them could find no trace of hostile behaviour in there. Also, I NEVER had any contact with your social media administrators. None at all, hostile or not. I didn’t even reply to this email at the time I received it because I assumed the “hostile marketing” was the reason for the ban. What constitutes hostile marketing is dubious enough to encompass a lot, and that includes some of my promotional posts, even though there was NEVER a first warning about it, as mentioned in your company’s guidelines. The only mention of “hostile marketing” from OneBookShelf came in your email of February 16, which I received at 7.51 PM, about an hour after the account had been already closed and my royalties transferred via Paypal. But those are just small details. I suppose OneBookShelve doesn’t really need a reason to ban a publisher, only an excuse…
So if you insist on claiming “aggressive, bordering on abusive” treatment, I would like to know where and when that happened and, please, provide concrete evidence of that. Otherwise, OneBookShelf is just slandering me without even clarifying what “bordering on abusive” means. It certainly doesn’t mean the same thing for you as it does for me, and I don’t think this is only related to cultural differences.
And the reply was the following:
Miguel,
As part of investigating what we initially considered a case of hostile marketing, we uncovered many Twitter and Facebooks posts as well as YouTube videos in which you and your partner have attacked, ridiculed, and insulted both DriveThruRPG and its staff over the past year. I will say that you have always seemed polite via email, which makes your demeanour elsewhere shocking by comparison. Your animosity was relegated to social media and thus previously seen largely by those few team members who manage our social media accounts.
You have demonstrated that you will not respect the confidentiality of any communications, so you can understand why I am not prepared to share any further details with you at this point.
(yes, he’s right, I do not respect the confidentiality of any communications. Fuck, I worked for a tabloid; they watch all of our videos, they should know that!)
I guess this is good news for all of your publishing through OneBookShelf/ Drivethru: As long as you don’t joke about them in public, you are probably safe! They can’t take jokes…
Now that you know, show you have a sense of humour and support us by buying at:
BIG GEEK EMPORIUM: https://biggeekemporium.com/?pr_author=redroom&wpf_fbv=1&all_products_filtering=1
LULU: https://www.lulu.com/search?contributor=Miguel+Ribeiro&adult_audience_rating=00
