Today Rush Limbaugh talked up Who’s Counting by John Fund and Hans von Spakovsky.

Link: http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2012/10/01/john_fund_s_new_book_on_voter_fraud_is_well_worth_your_time

Down in the lower left corner of this blog, I’ve been tracking sales of four election law related books.  One is mine, which was released a year ago Thursday.  Another is Who’s Counting.  A professor’s academic press book is the third and Tova Wang’s virtually unread book is the fourth.  Naturally, Limbaugh’s mention caused sales of Who’s Counting to spike through the day. 

A few observations about Amazon.com sales rankings.  Once your book is in the top 10,000, it has an inertia, both up and down.  It becomes harder and harder to move up, and falls are slower.  Wild jumps usually represent singular purchases. The wildest jumps represent bulk purchases by a single buyer.  And after your book has been out for a year, as Injustice has, it is fitted with “lead boots.”  That means that for any short duration of low sales, Amazon sends it down faster than recent releases.  The sales rankings have been up for a couple of months and a couple of observations.

The conservative media still has the ability to move product (and thereby the narrative) in ways other venues can ony dream of.  One mention on Rush and your sales explode.  Last time Rush mentioned Injustice it went to about #550, five months after release.   Fund and von Spakovsky’s book is moving in part because of the power of 50,000 watt talk radio – a forum reserved for people who report on voter fraud instead of deny it.  Today was another example.