That sucks for the author of the book though, if their books start getting low ratings for something entirely out of their control.

Bertrand Russell has been dead since 1970. I think he'll be okay. Or no worse off.

It does indeed, yet if the review makes it clear that the text of a book is not at fault, that the crappy print on demand edition is the issue, it should not matter too much. It would even give them arguments to ask a few pointed questions to their publishers.

And aggregated over all the books that use print on demand, the editors will notice.