Lisbon Portugal - Travel Photography, Art and Book Talk

Lisbon Portugal is enjoying a moment as the talk of the town and it’s long overdue. While we’re not so thrilled about one of favorite coastal idylls becoming a hotpot for remote workers and tourists, we are ready to share some of its secrets.

People often think of Lisbon as a port city in Portugal and an ocean beach destination, though the city itself is not actually on the ocean at all or even a direct beach destination. For starters, the coastal areas of Lisbon are on the banks of a river, the Tagus River. The Torre de Belem, the famous tower near the city limits that you see in photographs is ten kilometers from where the mouth of the Tagus River meets the Atlantic Ocean.

An enormous natural bay formed by the river around its delta contains a mix of salt and fresh water, and is home to expansive wetlands where thousands of bird species migrate through every year, making it one of the richest and most biodiverse places on the planet. This alone should make Lisbon a nature tourism destination, but the city is better known for nightlife, gastronomy (food) and beaches. The nightlife is good and often even great, as are the wealth of restaurants that range from inexpensive dives to fine dining. 

Portuguese cuisine like the language itself is unique. Heavily influenced by its proximity to the ocean, Portuguese food features a lot of fish and seafood, but also beef and pork. The most famous dish is bacalhau; a salted, seasoned cod, that is best in a stew or casserole. A close second may be the sweet, Portuguese egg tart. Some other great dishes...

As we said earlier, Lisbon itself isn’t really a beach or swimming destination at all. Those famous beaches people talk about in the same breath as Lisbon? They’re known as the Beaches of Almada and there are twenty eight of them. Yes, 28, from Praia Trafaria to Praia da Adiça. All fairly easy to access.

To get to the Almada beaches, you’ll have to get out of the city and across the stunningly beautiful 2KM suspension bridge known as Ponte 25 de Abril, where you’ll then find the closest beach is about a half hour’s drive away and some of the others are up to an hour’s drive away. The best of them include Praia da Cova, Praia de São João, Praia do Tarquínio-Paraíso, Praia Nova, Praia da Saúde, Praia da Cornélia, Praia da Mata, Praia da Riviera, Praia do Castelo, and Praia da Morena.

Pick one or several to visit. Your favorites will depend on whether you like to be with others or more isolated by yourself.

Another reason we love Lisbon because it is literally the beating heart of Portugal. Within an hour of the city, you have nature reserves, preserves, and national parks. All spectacular and stunning in their own way. Costa de Caparica is a nature preserve of protected coastal plains. Estuário do Tejo is a wetland estuary. Pena, Monserrate and Sintra are national parks within a forested mountain range, featuring mountain-side palaces and cliff-top castles.

One of these cliff-top castles is Castle of the Moors, shown below in a fine art photograph by William. Our photoshoot of the Castle of the Moors was incredibly challenging due to the mountainous terrain.

Most photos of Castle of the Moors are on the approach or close up, but William wanted to photograph the castle in a way that was different. As a result, we didn’t get the shots we wanted on our first visit to the castle. Instead, it was an exploration of approaches, light and terrain.

Getting around the mountainous terrain proved to be the biggest impediment. The narrow roads wind through the nearby village and up the steep mountain side. If you lose your way or miss a turn, you have to go around and around to get back to where you lost your way. On the mountain side, car parking ranges from difficult to near impossible. Hop on the shuttle or wander too far and you can easily lose where you parked, then hike the steep terrain for hours looking for your car.

After seven days of trekking up and down and all around, we came away with six photos of Castle of the Moors that William knew were keepers. Six of hundreds that were discarded. Still, those days weren’t all about a castle, they were also about a palace that looked like it was pulled straight from a fairytale. The Palace of Pena at Sintra.

If Castle of the Moors was William’s white whale that week, the Palace of Pena at Sintra was a dream through fog. The Palace is notoriously crowded from the time the park it lies within opens to the time the park closes. The Palace also has been photographed and photographed.

William took shots from many different angles and approaches. In different light. Early morning, full sun, late in the day. Day after day, he wasn’t happy with any of them. None of them were what he was looking for. Then on the fifth day as it rained on and off, William snapped two photographs of the palace emerging into the light from behind the shadows of clouds and knew they were the ones he’d been waiting for. Michelangelo of sunsets indeed. William works with light and shadow like few others.

One other photograph from the series of photoshoots made the cut. It was a photograph that also showcased shadow and light, taken from within the palace itself, on one of the many self-guided walking tours of the interior we took. Some photographs speak to you. Some loudly. Others in unassuming tenors, with simple splendor.

For fellow writers out there, it is true that one can write from anywhere, but it took a lot of special considerations to ship the crates of servers that William needed for technical how-to writing for Microsoft from one place to the next. But he never missed a deadline, and never told where he was writing from :)

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Hui Cha Stanek and William Stanek

About Hui Cha Stanek & William Robert Stanek

Erstwhile Photographer and Long-time Publisher Hui Cha Stanek has always been the woman behind the scenes. She has managed the day-to-day operations of Stanek Media for the past three decades. Her work has been featured in a number of gallery shows and recently in a career retrospective with her husband. She prefers candid street photography and photography of people (though not traditional portrait work). Some of her most famous works, including Tip Toe I See You and Salt Water Taffy, shown in Hui Cha William's career retrospective in Vienna can be found at https://www.pictorem.com/gallery/360.Studios?cat=10605&iframe=1.

Hui Cha's most recent project is writing the text for William R. Stanek: The Black & White Collection #1 Rare Masters. @ Amazon - BN - Walmart - HPB

Seattle-based Photographer and Artist, William Robert Stanek, is a combat veteran who supports other veterans, is also a vocal champion of books and libraries. Not only an artist, he wrote nonfiction for over three decades as William Stanek and fiction as Robert Stanek. Find his fine art photography and prints from his original oil paintings in his online studios:

360 Studios - https://www.pictorem.com/gallery/360.Studios

1North Studios - https://www.pictorem.com/gallery/1north

Studio 24 - https://www.pictorem.com/gallery/24

Robert Stanek Studios - https://www.pictorem.com/gallery/robert.stanek

Connecting to his roots in his work is important to William Robert. The beautiful fine art print that follows is a view from within Mont St. Michel in Normandy France, part of his popular A Day at Mont St. Michel photo series. Special to William Robert as this is the region where his French ancestors are from--an ancestry William Robert has traced back from Quebec Canada to its origins in France.




Find William Robert's books at

Walmart https://walmart.com/c/brand/robert-stanek

BN https://barnesandnoble.com/s/%22Robert%20Stanek%22?Ntk=P_key_Contributor_List&Ns=P_Sales_Rank&Ntx=mode+matchall

Play https://play.google.com/store/search?q=robert%20stanek&c=books

iTunes https://books.apple.com/us/author/robert-stanek/id55535880

Amazon https://amazon.com/gp/product/B0841YDHSH

Spotify https://open.spotify.com/search/"robert%20stanek"/audiobooks 

eStories https://www.estories.com/author/654/Robert-Stanek

Chirp https://www.chirpbooks.com/authors/robert-stanek-audiobooks

Thanks for reading!

Finding the Armchair Traveler in All of Us

Hope you had wonderful holidays! As much as I enjoy traveling, I also enjoy reading about traveling. I think there’s a secret armchair traveler in all of us. Some know me as Katie/Kate from William Robert’s combat memoir, Air War: The Incredible True Story of the Combat Flyers, which was recently released in a 20th Anniversary edition. William Robert and I started our path together over 30 years ago, as husband and wife and as business partners. He has always been the creative, the writer and artist, but for just as long, I’ve been his arts & press publisher and the woman behind the scenes of our gallery partnerships, such as those with World Galleries. While I handled his small press work and art/photography, large multinational publishers handled his other work, including IDG, Prentice Hall, Simon & Schuster, Penguin Random House, Macmillan, McGraw-Hill, Hachette, HarperCollins, Pearson Education, Cengage Learning, Microsoft, Wiley, TimeWarner, O'Reilly, HMH, and over 100 other publishers globally.

Whenever I tell people my husband is the William Stanek/Robert Stanek, writer and photographer, I’m often asked what it’s like to live with someone so creative, so driven. Well, that’s kind of a difficult question to answer. But I will say, for all those curious, that William Robert’s been my best friend in life for as long as we’ve been partners, both in a romantic and a business sense. He’s the best husband, the best father to our children.

There’s a reason those who truly know William Robert, especially other writers and artists, think of him as a gentle giant, a warrior poet and a beautiful person. He’s not only one of the most kind and thoughtful, he’s also one of the most artistic, creative and inspiring people around. He’s overcome so much in his life to get where he is today—poverty, violence, neglect, death, homelessness, combat, health issues, more. It’s a wonder he got here at all, and yet he did.

William Robert and I have lived a wonderful and eventful life, a full life, due in large part to his creative eye and dedication to purpose, to craft, to the people around him. He expresses himself in his words and art, using the pain and the tremendous obstacles he faced in his childhood and early life as a source of inspiration, rather than despair, while striving for heights he would not have reached otherwise.

I may be biased, but I think his work is incredibly special. His photographs capture something very raw, real and beautiful about life, whether his subject is a medieval cathedral, a sky-filling sunset after a storm or a mountain half seen in the distance.

With this in mind, I want to invite you to visit the world with us and dream through our new premium large-format photography book: William R. Stanek. The Black and White Collection #1: Fine Art Photography Rare Masters.

@ Barnes & Noble

@ Amazon.com

@ Bookshop.org

@ HPB

Meant for discerning collectors and special collections, this premium, oversized book works wonderfully to display on a coffee or cocktail table to inspire conversation when you are entertaining and to simply pass the time. Inside, you’ll find more than 100 fine art photographs from the Rare Master series by William, photographs from throughout his 30+-year career.

Producing a premium fine art photography book is expensive. Individual photographs featured in this book sell for hundreds of dollars in William’s studios. It was a challenge to find the right balance, to ensure not to devalue the work to which William has dedicated his life while delivering value in book form to you as the reader. For this reason, we are delivering William’s Rare Masters as a series of volumes that can be collected individually at a lower price point, and as books that combine multiple volumes into a single volume at a higher price point. We hope you agree this balanced approach works well.

Throughout this book, I discuss the story behind the work when possible to give you insider insights and to inspire conversation and, perhaps, to inspire your own adventures too.

Full page photographs, with extras. Photoshoot locations:

1. Newport Beach, California, USA

2. Lucerne, Switzerland

3. Ghent, Belgium

4. Vienna, Austria

5. Paris, France

6. Lucerne, Switzerland

7. Paris, France

8. Costa del Sol, Andalusia, Spain

9. The Bernese Highlands, Switzerland

10. Bavaria, Germany

11. Vienna, Austria

12. Oa’hu, Hawaii, USA 

13. Orléans, France

14. Kauai, Hawaii, USA

15. Florida, USA

16. Kauai, Hawaii, USA

17. Zermatt, Switzerland

18. Ghent, Belgium

19. Kauai, Hawaii, USA

20. Ghent, Belgium

21. O’ahu, Hawaii

22. O’ahu, Hawaii

23. Hallstatt, Austria

24. Kinderdijk, Netherlands

25. Orléans, France

26. Washington state, USA

27. Colorado, USA

28. Lake Hallstatt, Austria

29. Oregon, USA

30. Berchtesgaden, Bavaria, Germany

31. Kinderdijk, Netherlands

32. Bavaria, Germany

33. Colorado, USA

34. Kauai, Hawaii, USA

35. Oregon, USA

36. Adelboden, Switzerland

37. Oregon, USA

38. Bournemouth, Dorset, UK

39. Vienna, Austria

40. South Carolina, USA

41. Vienna, Austria

42. Maui, Hawaii, USA

43. Cannon Beach, Oregon, USA

44. Hawaii, USA

45. Hawaii, USA

46. Florence, Italy

47. London, Great Britain, UK

48. Bavaria, Germany

49. Hawaii, USA

50. Hawaii, USA

51. Hawaii, USA

52. Lake Tahoe, California, USA

53. Berchtesgaden, Germany

54. Paris, France

55. Vienna, Austria

56. Rome, Italy

57. Rome, Italy

58. Salisbury, United Kingdom

59. Lucerne, Switzerland

60. Sintra, Portugal

61. … 81 The Netherlands, for the Art in Flowers special collection

82. Vienna, Austria

83. Maui, Hawaii, USA

84. Vienna, Austria

85. Vienna, Austria

86. Blois, France

87. Fontainebleau, France

88. Lucerne, Switzerland

89. Obertraun, Austria

90. O’ahu, Hawaii, USA

91. Rome, Italy

92. Salzburger Land, Austria

93. Delft, Netherlands

94. Rome, Italy

95. Kauai, Hawaii, USA

96. Gstaad, Switzerland

97. London, Great Britain, UK

98. Lake Walen, Switzerland

99. Hallstatt, Austria

100. Paris, France

101. Washington state, USA

102. The Bernese Highlands, Switzerland

103. Normandy, France

104. Honolulu, Hawaii, USA

105. Stirling, Scotland, UK

106. Loire Valley, France

107. Windsor, Great Britain, UK

108. Rome, Italy

109. Bavaria, Germany

110. Zermatt, Switzerland

111. Volendam, Netherlands

112. Vienna, Austria

113. Tyrrhenian Sea, Italy

114. San Francisco, California, USA

115. Auxerre, France

116. Bay of Naples, Italy

117. Florence, Italy

118. Washington state, USA

119. Vienna, Austria

120. Lazio Italy

About Hui Cha Stanek

Erstwhile Photographer and Long-time Publisher Hui Cha Stanek has always been the woman behind the scenes. She has managed the day-to-day operations of Stanek Media for the past three decades. Her work has been featured in a number of gallery shows and recently in a career retrospective with her husband. She prefers candid street photography and photography of people (though not traditional portrait work). One of her most famous works, Tip Toe I See You, is shown below.

Others, not to be missed:

Salt Water Taffy

Let Me See Too

My Hair Day Too Mom

Where Did it Go

You'll find these fine art photography works and more at:

https://www.pictorem.com/gallery/360.Studios?cat=10605&iframe=1

About William Robert Stanek

Seattle-based Photographer and Artist, William Robert Stanek, is a combat veteran who supports other veterans, is also a vocal champion of books and libraries. Not only an artist, he wrote nonfiction for over three decades as William Stanek and fiction as Robert Stanek. Find his fine art photography and prints from his original oil paintings in his online studios:

360 Studios - https://www.pictorem.com/gallery/360.Studios

1North Studios - https://www.pictorem.com/gallery/1north

Studio 24 - https://www.pictorem.com/gallery/24

Robert Stanek Studios - https://www.pictorem.com/gallery/robert.stanek

Connecting to his roots in his work is important to Robert. The beautiful fine art print that follows is a view of Mont St. Michel in Normandy France, part of Robert's popular, limited A Day at Mont St. Michel photo series. Special to Robert as this is the region where his French ancestors are from--an ancestry Robert has traced back from Quebec Canada to its origins in France.

Find William Robert's books at

Walmart https://walmart.com/c/brand/robert-stanek

Barnes & Noble https://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/%22Robert%20Stanek%22

Google Play https://play.google.com/store/search?q=robert%20stanek&c=books

Apple iTunes https://books.apple.com/us/author/robert-stanek/id55535880

Amazon https://www.amazon.com/stores/Robert-Stanek/author/B001K8IESG

Go Brandon, No Not That Brandon, the Other One, Brandon Sanderson

They ceaselessly trashed Robert Stanek’s books and career for being self-published, now some of same helped Brandon Sanderson raise $20M to self-publish. The irony is not lost on me, nor is the fact that Brandon Sanderson is being praised for operating his own publishing company while some of the same spent years not only trashing Stanek’s career but also ensuring his publishing company couldn’t compete in the marketplace. The two-decades of background on all this abounds here, on readindies.blogspot.com and on Stanek’s sites, go read it.

Stanek and his family (for those who have a conscience, these
are the people whose lives you destroyed)

How dangerous Robert Stanek's ideas must have been, how perilous Robert Stanek's stories to their egos, to have now spent two decades stomping them into the ground. Robert Stanek has said all along they were being paid to do the deeds, and indeed they have been for the past two decades. I guess they believe the deed is done now so they can openly show their true colors. To that we say not so fast, we haven’t forgotten who you are, nor will we, nor will anyone we know. We know who you are and what you’ve done.

And meanwhile, the world of Ruin Mist is not going anywhere. The books remain in print. Readers can continue to enjoy them in editions for adults and children. Kids and teens start with The Kingdoms & The Elves of the Reaches 1 - 4 and then continue on to In the Service of Dragons 1 - 4. Afterward, read Breathe of Fire and Living Fire, the prequels, and The Dragon, The Wizard and The Great Door.

Adults, read Keeper Martin's Tale, Kingdom Alliance, Fields of Honor and Mark of the Dragon. Next, read Dragons of the Hundred Worlds, the prequel to the Ruin Mist Chronicles, and then Guardians of the Dragon Realms.

The graphic novel, A Daughter of Kings, answers many of the behind the scenes questions, as do the companion books, Illustrated Encyclopedia of Ruin Mist, Keeper Martin’s Guide to the Fantastical Beasts and Faerie Peoples of Ruin Mist, The Art of Ruin Mist: Heroes & Villains.

Read the Ruin Mist books if only because these people are so desperate for you not to that they’ve spent TWENTY YEARS and MILLIONS tearing down one of the great writers of our time. If not for you, fine, move on… If you love them though, like we do, tell the world about them and piss off those who think they can do whatever they want to whoever they want without consequences.

Emily, Cathy, Shannon

PS

This post is not about anything Brandon Sanderson has done personally. It is, however, about what those in his orbit have done. Cathy and I are readers of Mr. Sanderson's books. - Emily

Justice Department Identifies Ten Amazon Staff Accepting Bribes, Writing Fake Negative Reviews, Targeting Products for Take Downs

When the malicious targeting of my books stopped suddenly, I thought someone must have finally caught the Amazon insiders responsible, and someone had, the Justice Department. A grand jury in Washington indicted six of those involved in a $100M fraud scheme, involving at least 10 Amazon staff who were being bribed. In exchange for bribes, corrupted Amazon staff facilitated attacks against competitors of those paying the bribes, using their inside access to Amazon's network to suspend competitors' accounts and product listings, remove favorable reviews and commentary, write fictitious negative product reviews designed to hurt sales, post spurious comments to intimidate victims and drive away customers, and much more.

Department of Justice U.S. Attorney's Office Western District of Washington issued a press release on September 18, 2020 naming the individuals who had been indicted. EPHRAIM ROSENBERG, 45, of Brooklyn, New York; JOSEPH NILSEN, 31, and KRISTEN LECCESE, 32, of New York, New York; HADIS NUHANOVIC, 30, of Acworth, Georgia; ROHIT KADIMISETTY, 27, of Northridge, California; and NISHAD KUNJU, 31, of Hyderabad, India, who are charged with conspiracy to use a communication facility to commit commercial bribery, conspiracy to access a protected computer without authorization, conspiracy to commit wire fraud, and wire fraud.

The names of the Amazon employees being bribed haven't been released yet. The defendants will make their initial appearances in U.S. District Court in Seattle on October 15, 2020. The case is being investigated by the FBI, the IRS-Criminal Investigations, and the Department of Justice Office of International Affairs. The Grand Jury Charges are detailed in a 38-page indictment:

https://www.justice.gov/usao-wdwa/press-release/file/1317986/download

Being on the receiving end of these self-styled "takedowns" for two decades, I recognized every tactic outlined by the prosecution in the charging document. These are the very tactics my competitors had been using to target my books on Amazon with the assistance of Amazon insiders, and as I've been blogging about just as long. My posts about the same are here:

The Devil Writes Romance Novels

https://readindies.blogspot.com/2023/01/the-devil-writes-heart-warming-romance.html

Speaking Out About Ugliness in the Publishing Industry
http://readindies.blogspot.com/2014/09/speaking-out-robert-stanek.html

Unethical Competitors
http://readindies.blogspot.com/2013/01/unethical-competitors.html

Authors who Trash Competitors
http://readindies.blogspot.com/2013/03/authors-who-trash-competitors.html

Authors who are Trolls
http://readindies.blogspot.com/2013/09/authors-who-are-trolls.html

Speaking out About Haters
http://readindies.blogspot.com/2013/06/haters.html

The Internet Isn't the New West
http://www.williamrstanek.com/internet-new-west.htm

My original blog at RobertStanek.com has posts about the same that go back to 2003:

http://www.robertstanek.com/rsblog1.htm

http://www.robertstanek.com/rsblog2.htm

http://www.robertstanek.com/rsblog3.htm

For years now, my every complaint about the targeting of my books was answered with retaliation, whether I wrote Amazon support or the Amazon executive team, and I finally have the definitive answer as to why. 

Despite these indictments Amazon is and remains the most corrupt marketplace on Earth, and this corruption goes from the bottom to the very top of the company, as evidenced by what has happened to my books for the past twenty years whenever I filed official complaints. Hundreds of billions of dollars of commerce flow through Amazon every year, and I'm certain many more former and current Amazon staff will be identified as part of similar schemes.

Thanks for reading, I’m William Robert Stanek, Microsoft’s #1 author for nearly 20 years, and author of over 250 topselling books.

Connecting with My Friend Walter Dean Myers, Talking Dysfunction & Diversity in America

The first time I met, Walter, aka Walter Dean Myers, we connected, and this led to an odd friendship of a sorts. The thing that bonded us was our similar childhoods, though decades apart. Walter was born in August 1937, my mamma was born in April 1937. Walter lost his mother when he was 2, and my mamma and her sister Dolores lost their daddy even earlier. Walter was given to Florence and Herbert Dean after his mother’s death, my mother, her sister and her mamma moved in with their gramma who raised them for the next few years until their mamma married again.

Walter saw me and knew who I was the moment he laid eyes upon me, never asked why I had a copy of Hoops in my hand. He just understood. As a child, I grew up in a predominantly black neighborhood in Racine, Wisconsin, which I write about here. It was rough and tumble, which I also write about, and that was something Walter understood too as he and I both had to use our fists to defend ourselves at an early age.

His family became dysfunctional with alcohol and grief when his uncle was killed, mine when my step-father and sister died because of an explosion. The library and its books became my refuge, as books were a refuge and a solace for Walter.

Reading pushed us both to discover new worlds. For me, the classics. Treasure Island. 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. Robinson Crusoe. The Time Machine. The Invisible Man. Journey to the Center of the Earth. The Last of the Mohicans. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. Around the World in Eighty Days. A Christmas Carol. Frankenstein. Dracula. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. The Lost World. And on and on.

Though never an apt pupil, Walter wrote well in high school and his English teacher recognized this, encouraging him to never stop writing no matter what happened to him. My English teacher in the 4^th grade recognized my writing skill and encouraged me to write for and edit the school newspaper, as did my Uncle Wally and both of whom told me to never stop writing, never stop challenging myself.

Walter dropped out of high school and joined the army at 17. I joined the air force at 17 after finishing high school because I was homeless and had no other options.

Walter was one of the most prolific writers, with more than 110 books to his credit, and is the recipient of a lifetime achievement award in writing for young adults, as well as many other awards. I also became one of the most prolific writers, with more than 250 books to my credit and counting, and have been nominated several times for lifetime achievement awards in writing.

After Walter passed away in 2014, I blogged about one of his last essays decrying a lack of diversity in writing, saying that diversity existed in writing it just wasn’t always plain to see. Diversity in my books has led to controversy. I haven’t let controversy change my views or my writing, nor have I kowtowed to White publishing, nor to the conscientious objectors who worship at the altar of George RR Martin and abhor veterans.

How odd that even after decades and decades, books must still be thought of as white or black, or for whites or for blacks. It was, after all, an interracial award for children’s books that put my friend Walter Dean Myers in the spotlight in 1969. We humans excel at putting up fences, we just don’t know how to take them down.

Thanks for reading, I’m William Robert Stanek, Microsoft’s #1 author for nearly 20 years, and author of over 250 topselling books.

The Guy Who Shares a Birthday With Tolkien Has Done Okay

It's official, my 250th book. Celebration soon. 20 million words, tens of thousands of pages. Published and/or distributed by every major US publisher from Pearson to Macmillan to McGraw Hill and Time Warner, Simon & Schuster, Random House, Hachette and Microsoft. Over 100 other publishers globally. Wow, what a ride it's been!!

Books written by William Robert Stanek (Reverse Chronological Order: Newest to Oldest, Present to 2014):

IIS 10: Web Apps, Security & Maintenance (IT Pro Solutions)

IIS 10: Essentials for Administration (IT Pro Solutions)

Windows PowerShell 6: Essentials for Administration (IT Pro Solutions)

Windows PowerShell 6 (IT Pro Solutions)

Exchange Server 2016: The Administrator’s Reference

Exchange Server 2016 & Exchange Online: Essentials for Administration, 2nd Edition

Office 365 & Exchange Online: Essentials for Administration, 2nd Edition

Windows Server 2016: Storage Solutions (Tech Artisans Library)

Windows Server 2016: IT Pro Library

Windows Server 2016: Domain Infrastructure (Tech Artisans Library)

Windows Server 2016: The Administrator's Reference

Windows Server 2016: Essential Services (Tech Artisans Library)

Exchange Server 2016: IT Pro Library

Windows Server 2016: Server Infrastructure (IT Pro Solutions)

Windows Server 2016: Installing & Configuring (Tech Artisans Library)

Windows Server 2016: Essentials for Administration (IT Pro Solutions)

Windows 10: Essentials for Administration (IT Pro Solutions)

Windows 10: The Personal Trainer, 2nd Edition: Your Personalized Guide

Exchange Server 2016: Server Infrastructure (IT Pro Solutions)

Office 365 & Exchange Online: Essentials for Administration (IT Pro Solutions)

Exchange Server 2016 & Exchange Online: Essentials for Administration (IT Pro Solutions)

Presenting Exchange Server 2016 & Exchange Online (IT Pro Solutions)

Windows 10: Step Up & Into

IIS 8 Web Applications, Security & Maintenance: The Personal Trainer

Windows 10: The Personal Trainer

Active Directory Administration for Windows Server 2012 & R2: The Personal Trainer

Windows PowerShell for Administration: The Personal Trainer

Windows Group Policy: The Personal Trainer for Windows Server 2012 and R2

IIS 8 Administration: The Personal Trainer

Windows Command-Line for Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2012 and R2 (The Personal Trainer)


*BIG thanks to readers who pointed out that the original book list was only through 2014 (which is the last time the list was updated). So I added a few books from present to 2014.


Books written by William Robert Stanek (Reverse Chronological Order: Newest to Oldest, 2014 to 1995):

This Mortal Coil. After the Machines

Windows Command Line: The Personal Trainer

Windows PowerShell: The Personal Trainer

The Cards in the Deck (An NSA Spy Thriller)

A Legacy of Dragons (Guardians of the Dragon Realms)

Web Server Administration: The Personal Trainer for IIS 7.0 and IIS 7.5

The Dragon, the Wizard & the Great Door (Guardians of the Dragon Realms)

Windows Server 2012 R2 Inside Out: Services, Security, & Infrastructure

Web Applications, Security & Maintenance: The Personal Trainer for IIS 7.0 and IIS 7.5

Windows 8.1 Administration Pocket Consultant: Storage, Security, & Networking

Windows Server 2012 R2 Pocket Consultant: Essentials & Configuration

Group Policy Administration: The Personal Trainer for Windows Server 2008 and 2008 R2

Active Directory Administration: The Personal Trainer for Windows Server 2008 and 2008 R2

Windows Server 2012 R2 Inside Out: Configuration, Storage, & Essentials

Windows 7: The Personal Trainer

XML, DTDs, Schemas: The Personal Trainer

Windows Server 2012 R2 Pocket Consultant: Storage, Security, & Networking

Email, Internet, Web: The Personal Trainer

Windows 8.1 Administration Pocket Consultant: Essentials & Configuration

Exchange Server 2013 Pocket Consultant: Databases, Services, & Management

Twelve Dreams, One Dreamer

Buster's Birthday Wish

Exchange Server 2013 Pocket Consultant: Configuration & Clients

Sight Words Plus Level 9: Learning Essentials

Sight Words Plus Level 8: Learning Essentials

Skip Counting: Learning Essentials

Sight Words Plus Level 7: Learning Essentials

Sight Words Plus Level 6: Learning Essentials

Trouble with Dragons

Living Fire (Dragons of the Hundred Worlds)

Breath of Fire (Dragons of the Hundred Worlds)

Windows Server 2012 Inside Out

Windows 8 Administration Pocket Consultant

Windows Server 2012 Pocket Consultant

Colors & Shapes Storybooks: Learning Essentials

Buster’s on the Job: Bugville Critters

How Many Fish Colors?

Sight Words Plus Level 5: Learning Essentials

Sight Words Plus Level 4: Learning Essentials

Pirates Stole My Booty: Bugville Critters

Addition Level 4: Learning Essentials

Subtraction Level 3: Learning Essentials

Subtraction Level 2: Learning Essentials

Twelve Dresses, One Star: Bugville Critters

Mamma Sea Turtle Lost Her Babies: Colors & Shapes

How Many Fish?

Addition Level 3: Learning Essentials

Addition Level 2: Learning Essentials

Sight Words Plus Level 3: Learning Essentials

Sight Words Plus Level 2: Learning Essentials

Sight Words Plus Level 1: Learning Essentials

Into the Stone Land (Magic Lands #2)

Racing Super Buster Counts And You Can Too

Racing Super Buster Letters And You Can Too

Racing Super Buster Counts Higher And You Can Too

Racing Super Buster Shapes And You Can Too

Subtraction Level 1: Learning Essentials

Addition Level 1: Learning Essentials

Have a Spooktacular Halloween: Bugville Critters

Buster Feels Sad and Mad and Happy

Barry Lives Large

Sarah Gets Angry

Outside in the Snow with Buster and Friends

Buster Explores the Sea

Buster's Undersea Counting Expedition 1 to 10

Buster's Undersea Counting Expedition 1 to 20

Undersea, 2, 3 with Buster and Friends

Undersea, 4, 5 with Buster and Friends

Buster's Big Top Little Letters Show

Undersea, 6, 7 with Buster and Friends

Buster's Big Top Big Letters Show

Buster's Big Top 1 2 3 Show

Buster's Really Great Big Top Show

Discord (A Daughter of Kings, Comic #4)

Rise of the Fallen (Ruin Mist: Dawn of the Ages)

Start Summer Vacation

Save Their Allowance

Visit the Library

Remember Their Manners

Go to Camp

Explore the Solar System

Every Day Is Different

Catching A Cup Of Sunshine

Betrayal (A Daughter of Kings, Comic #1)

Deliverance (A Daughter of Kings, Comic #2)

Rebirth (A Daughter of Kings, Comic #3)

Windows 7: The Definitive Guide

Windows 7 Administrator's Pocket Consultant

Group Policy Administrator's Pocket Consultant

Active Directory Administrator's Pocket Consultant

PowerShell, VBScript and JScript Bible

Windows PowerShell 2.0 Administrator's Pocket Consultant

Have Trouble At School

Break Their Bad Habits

Stay After School

Have a Bad Day

Visit City Hall

Have a Surprise Party

Have a Backyard Picnic

Compete in the BIG Spelling Bee

Battle for Ruin Mist Core Roleplaying Games Rules

SQL Server 2008 Administrator's Pocket Consultant

The Art of Ruin Mist: Heroes and Villains

Rush to the Hospital

Play Their First Big Game

Windows Server 2008 Inside Out

Windows Server 2008 Administrator's Pocket Consultant

IIS 7.0 Administrator's Pocket Consultant

Absolutes and Other Stories

Buster Bee's Adventures With Letters and Words

Go on Vacation (2008) (RP Books)

Illustrated Encyclopedia of Ruin Mist: The Essential Reader's Guide

Keeper Martin's Guide to the Fantastical Beasts and Faerie Peoples of Ruin Mist

Visit Garden Box Farms

Have A Sleepover

Exchange Server 2007 Administrator's Pocket Consultant

Go to School

Visit Dad and Mom at Work

Windows Vista: The Definitive Guide

In the Service of Dragons IV

In the Service of Dragons III

Mark of the Dragon

Stormjammers: The Extraordinary Story of Electronic Warfare Operations in the Gulf War

The Pieces of the Puzzle

MCSE Core Required Exams In A Nutshell

Introducing Windows Vista

Windows Vista Administrator's Pocket Consultant

Fields of Honor

In the Service of Dragons II

In the Service of Dragons

Students Classroom Guide to Robert Stanek's Magic Lands

Teacher's Classroom Guide to Robert Stanek's Magic Lands

Web Guru's Guide to JavaScript

Microsoft Group Policy Guide

SQL Server 2005 Administrator's Pocket Consultant

Windows Server 2003 Inside and Out

Windows Command-line Administrator's Pocket Consultant

Kingdom Alliance

Magic of Ruin Mist

Robert Stanek: Candid Conversations

Students Classroom Guide to The Kingdoms and the Elves of the Reaches

Teacher's Classroom Guide to Robert Stanek's Ruin Mist

The Kingdoms and the Elves of the Reaches IV

The Kingdoms and the Elves of the Reaches III

Exchange Server 2003 Administrator's Pocket Consultant

Faster Smarter FrontPage 2003

IIS 6.0 Administrator's Pocket Consultant

Windows Server 2003 Administrator's Pocket Consultant

FrontPage 2003 Unleashed

Elf Queen's Quest

Journey Beyond the Beyond

Keeper Martin's Tale

The Kingdoms and the Elves of the Reaches II

The Kingdoms and the Elves of the Reaches

Effective Writing for Business College & Life

Essential Windows 2000 Commands Reference

Essential Windows XP Commands Reference

FrontPage 2002 Unleashed

Windows 2000 and IIS 5.0 Administrator's Pocket Consultant

Windows XP Professional Administrator's Pocket Consultant

XML Pocket Consultant

All-In-One Java 2 Certification Guide 3rd Edition

Exchange 2000 Server Administrator's Pocket Consultant

SQL Server 2000 Administrator's Pocket Consultant

Windows 2000 Administrator's Pocket Consultant

Windows 2000 Scripting Bible

FrontPage 2000 Unleashed

Netscape Mozilla Source Guide

Windows NT Scripting Administrator's Guide

Microsoft Windows NT 4.0 Administrator's Pocket Consultant

SQL Server 7.0 Administrator's Pocket Consultant

FrontPage 98 Unleashed

Increase Your Web Traffic in a Weekend

FrontPage 97 Unleashed

Netscape One Developer's Guide

Learn the Internet in a Weekend

Web Publishing Unleashed Professional Reference Edition

FrontPage Unleashed

Peter Norton's Guide to Java Programming

Web Publishing Unleashed

Electronic Publishing Unleashed

Other books written by William Robert Stanek including collections, compilations, etc. (Reverse Chronological Order: Newest to Oldest):

Step Up & Into Windows PowerShell 4.0

Big Book of Math (Math Superstars)

Dragons of the Hundred Worlds Omnibus

Complete Magic Lands Omnibus

Complete In the Service of Dragons (Boxed Set Edition)

Big Book of Subtraction (Math Superstars)

Complete Kingdoms and the Elves of the Reaches (Boxed Set Edition)

Complete Ruin Mist Chronicles (Boxed Set Edition)

Big Book of Addition (Math Superstars)

Keeper Martin's Tale, 10th Anniversary Edition

Critter Subtraction Essentials Level 3

Critter Addition Essentials Level 4

Complete Learning Adventures of Racing Super Buster (The Complete Series Omnibus)

Complete Sight Words Learning Adventures of Buster Bee (The Complete Series Omnibus)

Critter Subtraction Essentials Level 2

Numbers Flash Cards: Learning Essentials

Alphabet Flash Cards: Learning Essentials

Critter Addition Essentials Level 3

Complete Undersea Counting Adventures of Buster Bee (The Complete Series Omnibus)

Complete Big Top Adventures of Buster Bee (The Complete Series Omnibus)

Critter Subtraction Essentials Level 1

The Bugville Critters Audio Collection Volume 6

The Bugville Critters Audio Collection Volume 5

Complete First Year Adventures of Lass Ladybug (The Complete Series Omnibus)

Complete Second Year Adventures of Buster Bee (The Complete Series Omnibus)

Every Letter Has a Sound (Audio Only)

Big Number Count Down (Audio Only)

Division Flash Cards: Learning Essentials

Multiplication Flash Cards: Learning Essentials

Complete First Year Adventures of Buster Bee (The Complete Series Omnibus)

Complete Magic Lands Books 1 & 2 Omnibus

Critter Addition Essentials Level 2

Critter Addition Essentials Level 1

The Bugville Critters Audio Collection Volume 4

The Bugville Critters Audio Collection Volume 3

Complete In the Service of Dragons (The Complete Series Omnibus)

Complete Kingdoms and the Elves of the Reaches (The Complete Series Omnibus)

Subtraction Flash Cards: Learning Essentials

Addition Flash Cards: Learning Essentials

Colors & Shapes Flash Cards: Learning Essentials

Effective Writing for Business, College & Life, 2011 Edition

A Daughter of Kings (Battle for Ruin Mist: Graphic Novel #1)

Practice Makes Perfect (Lass Ladybug's School Days #4)

Sometimes There's No Need to Worry (Lass Ladybug's School Days #3)

Bugville Jr. Learning Adventures Collection #1

Bugville Jr. Learning Adventures Collection #2

Bugville Jr. Learning Adventures Collection #3

Bugville Jr. Learning Adventures Collection #4

Vacation Surprise (Buster Bee's School Days #3)

Some Days Are Better Than Others (Lass Ladybug's School Days #2)

So Many Lessons to Learn (Lass Ladybug's School Days #1)

SQL Server 2008 Administrator's Pocket Consultant, 2nd Edition

Windows Server 2008 Administrator's Pocket Consultant 2nd Edition

The Kingdoms and the Elves of the Reaches IV, Special Illustrated Edition

Bugville Critters Treasury Volume 2

Bugville Critters Treasury Volume 1

Too Much Sweets (Buster Bee's School Days #1 )

Make New Friends (Buster Bee's School Days #2)

The Bugville Critters Audio Collection Volume 2

The Bugville Critters Audio Collection Volume 1

The Elf Queen & the King 2

The Kingdoms and the Elves of the Reaches III, Special Illustrated Edition

Exchange Server 2007 Administrator's Pocket Consultant, 2nd Edition

Windows Command-line Administrator's Pocket Consultant, 2nd Edition

Keeper Martin's Tale, Special Illustrated Edition

The Kingdoms and the Elves of the Reaches II, Special Illustrated Edition

The Kingdoms and the Elves of the Reaches, Special Illustrated Edition

Windows XP Professional Administrator's Pocket Consultant 2nd Edition

Sovereign Rule

Magic Lands & Other Stories

The Elf Queen & the King

Windows 2000 Administrator's Pocket Consultant 2nd Edition

All-in-One Java 2 Certification Guide 3rd Edition

Increase Your Web Traffic 3rd Edition

All-in-One Java 2 Certification Guide 2nd Edition

Increase Your Web Traffic in a Weekend 2nd Edition

Professional Web Development Kit 2.0

Web Publishing Electronic Resource Kit

Managing Group Policy Classroom-To-Go: Windows Server 2003 Edition (Audio Only)

Active Directory Infrastructure Classroom-to-Go (Audio Only)

Internet Explorer 7 Classroom-To-Go (Audio Only)

Windows Media Player 11 Classroom-To-Go (Audio Only)

Windows Photo Gallery Classroom-To-Go: Windows Vista Edition (Audio Only)

Active Directory Sites, Trusts, and Troubleshooting Classroom-To-Go (Audio Only)

Managing Network Infrastructure Classroom-To-Go: Windows Server 2003 Edition (Audio Only)

Classroom-To-Go Training Course 3: Managing and Maintaining Network Resources (Audio Only)

Classroom-To-Go Training Course for Managing and Maintaining a Server Environment (Audio Only)

Classroom-To-Go Training Course 1: Managing Users, Computers, and Groups (Audio Only)

Classroom-To-Go Training Course 2: Managing Devices and Implementing Disaster Recovery (Audio Only)



It's been a long road. More news in the days and weeks ahead.



Thank you,



Robert Stanek

Inside Job: Amazon.com Employee Stole Credit Data of 106 Million

Amazon.com is rotten to its core. This latest case of "employee gone bad" (https://heavy.com/news/2019/07/paige-adele-thompson/) is yet another example of the widespread patterns of misbehavior, misconduct and mismanagement by Amazon.com employees that have been ongoing for the better part of two decades. From alleged money laundering to racketeering to computer fraud, the culture of misconduct and malfeasance starts at the top with the win-at-any cost disruptor model espoused by Amazon.com executives. A few examples for reference:

Misconduct stemming from office of the CEO: In 2013, dozens of Amazon.com employees and the CEO's own wife were caught flooding Brad Stone's book, The Everything Store, with unfavorable reviews to keep the book from damaging the reputation of Amazon.com and its CEO. (http://readindies.blogspot.com/2016/08/amazons-blackened-soul.html)

Misconduct organized and ordered by executives: In 2018, at least 50 Amazon employees were caught creating fake accounts on Ebay and accused of multiple federal crimes, including criminal conspiracy, fraud and racketeering. (http://robertstanek.blogspot.com/2019/08/amazon-employees-caught-creating-fake-accounts.html)

Misconduct organized and ordered by executives: In 2019, Amazon.com was caught in a highly unethical and likely criminal pay-for-praise scheme involving several hundred employees. (http://robertstanek.blogspot.com/2019/08/amazon-caught-in-pay-for-praise-scheme.html)

Although the SEC, FTC and DOJ are all circling Amazon.com with possible intent to act, the federal crimes, misdeeds and abuses of Amazon.com executives and employees have so far carried on with impunity—more likely due to the deep (dare I say, cozy) relationships Amazon.com has with the Justice Department, U.S. Intelligence and hundreds of other government agencies than a lack of evidence. However, with the deepest secrets of our government, including the Sensitive, Secret and Top Secret information of the Justice Department (https://aws.amazon.com/stateandlocal/justice-and-public-safety/) , U.S. Intelligence (https://aws.amazon.com/federal/us-intelligence-community/)and more (https://aws.amazon.com/government-education/defense/), hosted on Amazon’s cloud servers, this latest case of "employee gone bad" is likely too hard to overlook.

To wit, the Amazon.com employee involved in the theft of the credit data of over 100 million people did so by using the knowledge gained working in Amazon’s Web Services division as a software engineer to hack into the data Capital One stored on Amazon’s servers. This data was stored in the Amazon Simple Storage Service, also referred to as Amazon S3, which is a service offered by Amazon Web Services to supposedly securely store the data of thousands of companies. Care to guess where many of the deepest secrets of the Justice Department, U.S. Intelligence and hundreds of other U.S. agencies are stored? Yep, Amazon S3.

While Capital One, like Amazon.com, largely downplayed the extent of the damage done in the data breach, the estimated dollar cost of the damages, as stated by Capital One itself, are telling: $100 to $150 million in damages. (https://www.inc.com/minda-zetlin/paige-thompson-capital-one-hack-former-amazon-engineer-social-security-numbers.html). Most troubling about all this? The (technically "former") Amazon.com employee involved used knowledge and skills gained from 2015 – 2016 to hack the Capital One data stored on Amazon’s S3 servers in 2019. This was an inside job. Amazon Web Services tactics, techniques and security surely should have changed considerably in 3 years—however, clearly they had not. Sort of like the lengthy Amazon Web Services S3 outage on February 28, 2017 that was so bad Amazon couldn’t even get into its own servers to warn anyone—a problem that occurred because of gross mismanagement involving Amazon Web Services procedures and tactics. Other examples of gross mismanagement? How about:

* the days’ long outage in April 2011 that Amazon didn’t make a public statement about for a week,

* the infamous Friday the 13th outage of September 2013 that left regional customers without service for several hours due to a simple load balancing misconfiguration,

* the lengthy Amazon Web Services S3 outage in November 2014 because of the failure of the AWS CloudFront DNS server,

*  or the 10-hour outage in June 2016 due to stormy weather that hit numerous prime websites and businesses.

As I stated previously, the culture of misconduct and malfeasance starts at the top of the company while the patterns of misbehavior, misconduct and mismanagement extend throughout the entire organization. More examples of mismanagement and failure of Amazon Web Services:

2017 - https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2017/03/02/aws-outage-that-broke-the-internet-caused-by-mistyped-command

2017 - https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/uptime/equinix-power-outage-one-reason-behind-aws-cloud-disruption

2015 - https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2015/09/24/heres-what-caused-sundays-amazon-cloud-outage

2015 - https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2015/09/21/amazon-data-center-outage-affects-netflix-heroku-others

2013 - https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2013/09/13/network-issues-cause-amazon-cloud-outage

2012 - https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2012/10/27/cascading-failures-caused-amazon-outage

2012 - https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2012/07/03/multiple-generator-failures-caused-amazon-outage

2012 - https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2012/06/30/amazon-data-center-loses-power-during-storm

2012 - https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2012/06/29/another-outage-amazon-cloud

2011 - https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2011/08/15/amazon-provides-more-details-on-dublin-outage

2011 - https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2011/04/29/amazon-networking-error-caused-cloud-outage

2011 - https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2011/04/21/major-amazon-outage-ripples-across-web

2010 - https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2010/12/13/amazon-hardware-failures-caused-outage

2009 - https://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2009/07/19/outage-for-amazon-web-services

With this much going wrong and the regulatory hammer looming, is there any wonder why there is an outflow of executives, including Zumwalt, Blackburn, Wilson, Jain, and Chew for starters. In his new book, Talking to Strangers, Malcolm Gladwell talks about Harry Markopolos, the guy who gift-wrapped and delivered the Bernie Madoff ponzi scheme to the SEC. Much like the case of Amazon.com, federal regulators spent years ignoring Markopolos and what was plain to see before their eyes. They couldn’t be bothered to conduct a thorough and proper investigation. Like Harry Markopolos told Malcolm Gladwell: "the truth is in the math"; "people have too much faith in large organizations"; "the emperor has no clothes".

The truth of Amazon.com is in the math too—in the patterns of misconduct and malfeasance that start at the top of the company. Indeed, the emperor has no clothes, and that’s something I have said before as well.

Circling back, bottom line, this person worked for Amazon S3 as a software engineer, subsequently hacked Amazon S3 and did so using intimate first-hand knowledge gained while employed at Amazon S3. This intimate first-hand knowledge included information about possible vulnerabilities, how those vulnerabilities potentially could be exploited and exactly how Amazon S3 worked. As a former Amazon S3 software engineer, this person knew exactly what to do and where to go once she got into Amazon S3. So let's call this hack what it was: An inside job. If Amazon.com were a bank and a former teller knew the contents of the bank vault and then robbed safety deposit boxes 7, 17 and 73 of their contents, everyone would call this what it was: an inside job. Well, that’s exactly what happened. This was an inside job. This former employee knew exactly the vulnerabilities to look for, how they could be exploited and which deposit boxes to steal—and she learned it all while working at Amazon S3.

Thanks for reading, I’m William Robert Stanek, Microsoft’s #1 author for nearly 20 years, and author of over 250 topselling books.

--

Addendum: Interesting comments earlier on Facebook and in private regarding said employee's role at Amazon.

As explained in the article, this person was employed by Amazon as a software engineer for S3 from 2015-2016. The Capital One data was stolen from Amazon's S3 servers in 2019. This was done using insider knowledge and tactics gained while working for Amazon. Amazon and Capital One both have underplayed how damaging this whole thing was... though Capital One admits this is likely to cause the company $100 - $150 million in damages.


P.S> This case gets curiouser and curiouser when you dig below the surface. Basically, the "employee" did the crime then gift-wrapped herself for authorities by not only giving them a trail of breadcrumbs to follow but copping to the crime on social media. This ensured quick arrest and abrupt ends to certain internal investigations (and primarily at Amazon.com). Inquiring minds might want to hazard a few guesses why. Two obvious questions for starters: What else might have been uncovered with continued, deep investigation? Who else might have been uncovered? I’m sure the curious can discern others.

Amazon Reviews: Broken System

Between 1 in 3 and 2 in 3 product reviews on Amazon.com are fake. They are bought and paid for. They are written by friends and family. They are swapped and traded on Facebook. They are incentivized from readers. Talking about this problem as I have for nearly 2 decades now has made me the repeat target of the thousands who make their living writing reviews, the millions of sellers who benefit from the fake praise and the dozens of Amazon employees working the system for personal and/or professional benefit.

Having reported problems with reviews to Amazon over many years and received repeated, direct retaliation from Amazon employees for doing so, I learned the hard way about the active involvement of Amazon employees in Amazon’s own marketplace, whether to ensure the success of themselves, family or associates or simply to ensure the failure of particular targets. This occurring repeatedly despite state and federal laws protecting those who report criminal activity, corporate malfeasance and other corporate wrongdoings from retaliation by those they are reporting.

Letters and emails to Amazon executives were answered with retaliation, as were letters and emails written to Amazon’s own legal team. This occurred because of the hundreds of billions of dollars of commerce that flow through Amazon annually. This occurred because those who rock the boat are targeted and thrown overboard. This occurred because of Amazon’s deep ties with local, state and federal government. This occurred because Amazon's executives buy entire newsrooms. This occurred because the truth could utterly destroy Amazon's marketplace dominance.

With control within the government and within the media, Amazon knows it has little to fear. Maybe a decade or so from now they’ll get a fine with a slap on the wrist despite ongoing, widespread corruption and corporate malfeasance. How quaint of them to recently throw their hands up in the air and declare they can no longer guarantee their marketplace. Meanwhile their own employees have steered billions in sales from one direction into another, harmed the sales of this product to ensure the success of that and more. Meanwhile Amazon employees have enriched themselves, their families, their friends, their associates. Meanwhile their executives have become billionaires by ensuring not even the truth affects the flow of commerce across their server engines.

If you know me, you know I’ve written many times about this problem, this widespread corruption. You know Amazon has targeted my books repeatedly because I’ve spoken out, because I’ve complained about my books being bombarded with unfavorable reviews by unscrupulous competitors, because I’ve let others know that Amazon itself was part of the problem. Speaking out about this problem has cost me millions of sales and tens of millions in earnings—and yet I will continue to speak out. I will not be silenced by Amazon’s continued heavy-handed retaliation or the criminal actions of its employees or others.

For those who don’t know me, please do take the time to read the numerous articles I’ve written about this problem. You’ll find the articles here at Linkedin, in my personal blogs (http://robertstanek.blogspot.com/ and http://williamstanek.blogspot.com), at Go Indie (http://readindies.blogspot.com/) and on my websites (http://www.williamrstanek.com and http://www.robert-stanek.com/). You’ll find posts about this problem going back to 2003 here @ http://www.robertstanek.com/rsblog.htm. I do of course write as William Stanek, Robert Stanek, William R. Stanek and William Robert Stanek.

Thanks for reading, I’m William Robert Stanek, Microsoft’s #1 author for nearly 20 years, and author of over 250 topselling books.