Amazon is still serving weird AI book ads to Kindles and I wonder if anyone can check this
“I don’t know why I’m getting these weird ads for children’s books on my Kindle,” my wife said, waving her Kindle Paperwhite at me. I looked at the screen, which was locked but showing one of those screensaver book cover ads that Amazon likes to deliver unless you pay a little more to have them removedI saw a cute bear and a title in large font and shrugged at my wife.
But I had missed something. “You do realize,” said my son, who was nearby, “that is an AI-generated book.”
I picked up my wife’s Kindle and took a closer look. On the cover was a heartwarming illustration of a boy hugging a bear. Nothing seemed amiss until I looked at the large title: “The Brave Bear Mountain Cimb.” That’s right, “Cimb,” not “Climb.” Under the not-quite-right cover was the correct title: The Brave Bear Mountain Climb. I also noticed that there was no author listed on the cover.
A day later, I saw another children’s book on the sleep screen of the same Kindle. It had another cute illustration and many more words. About half of them were gibberish. They reminded me of some of the text I get when I ask one of the best generative AI engines to “imagine” something with specific text. It’s never quite right.
If you don’t have a Kindle reader, you may not be familiar with these screensaver ads. Because readers use E Ink, they can leave a persistent image on the screen even when the system is turned off, because it doesn’t take any energy to maintain an E Ink image (only what you used to generate it). Typically, these ads appear when you press the power button to put your Kindle to sleep, and they stay there until you turn the Kindle back on.
The writing stuff
I was wondering where that Brave Bear book came from. Turns out there’s a real The Brave Bear Mountain Climb by Bernadina Dilwalie. However, Dilwalie is an online ghost. They have not published any other books and there is not a single Google search result for the name. Maybe that is why the AI authors chose her, or Bernadina is also an AI author.
It is no news that the rise of generative AI has led to a tidal wave of AI-generated books And best seller counterfeit. And it turns out that Amazon’s AI-generated book ads aren’t a new problem, and were first reported in April of this year, first on Reddit and then in a report in FuturismThat story even included a statement from Amazon that read, in part:
“We proactively prevent books from being listed and remove books that don’t meet those guidelines. Amazon’s advertising policies are designed to maintain a high customer experience for the ads we show, and all ads must comply with Amazon’s advertising guidelines and acceptance policies.”
What is real
What I learned from this is that Amazon has been aware of this problem for months, and yet we are still seeing AI-generated book ads on our devices.
My wife was confused by this steady stream of AI-advertised books, but since they were all for children and our children are adults, the chances of her following one of the ads and buying one were slim. The problem is even greater for children and parents of young children who don’t look too closely and then buy AI-generated books.
The proliferation of AI-generated books has turned Amazon into a minefield of deception. Books with overly perfect or oddly shaped cover illustrations could be AI-generated. Telltale signs include the word “heartwarming,” strange misspellings, or double meanings that don’t make any sense. An example might be The Forest Defenders by Arun Kumar W (he has another title to his name which contains something similar to a highly AI generated illustration) . The cover shows a pair of turtles standing across from a small white table. The overlapping text promises “A Tale story”. Not “A Tail story” or “A Tall story”. “Tale” makes no sense and is in fact a repetition of the word “story”.
The proliferation of AI-generated books has transformed Amazon into a minefield of deception.
If you find one AI-generated book, you can usually find more by the same author. Maryam Amas seems to write in all genres. My favorite title might be: SAVING WATER: Do you know who I am? The details for the book feature Photoshopped images showing a stock photo child reading AI-generated text superimposed over what is supposed to be a photo of the book.
Most of these AI books are published through Amazon. To be fair, most AI authors probably use Amazon’s self-publishing system (I have used it myself), and the scale of self-publishing is so great that Amazon might struggle to keep up. On the other hand, I’m sure Amazon could implement an AI content checker and while there would certainly be false positives (“Do you write like an AI?!”), it would significantly reduce all of this crap.
That Amazon fails to stop the proliferation of these AI books and then delivers ads for them on Amazon Kindles is less forgivable. Is the system so hands-off that it simply selects books based on perceived topics of interest and delivers them to the devices with no checks and balances? That is clearly a recipe for disaster.
What Amazon Does
I reported the ad to Amazon, and Amazon spokesperson Tim Gillman gave me this response, which isn’t much different from what the company told Futurism a few months ago. Still, the last bit about the book and the status of those ads is noteworthy.
“We strive to provide the best possible shopping, reading, and publishing experience, and we continually evaluate developments that impact that experience, including the rapid evolution and expansion of generative AI tools. All books in the store must adhere to our content guidelines, regardless of how the content was created. We proactively prevent books from being listed and remove books that do not meet those guidelines.
When we become aware of an issue, we investigate and act quickly to protect customers. We suspend publisher accounts when warranted to prevent repeat abuse. We are committed to protecting customers from malicious actors attempting to abuse our services, and we continue to invest in improving our protections.
Amazon’s advertising policies are designed to maintain a high customer experience for the ads we display, and all ads must adhere to Amazon’s advertising guidelines and acceptance policies. The content in question is no longer available for sale, and no new ads will be displayed.”
The other morning I checked my wife’s Kindle to see if any more weird AI children’s book ads would pop up on the screen when it was saved. Nope, just another book more in line with her tastes. On my own Kindle Paperwhite I’ve never seen those weird AI ads. I hope I never do.
