Avon Romance has launched a new social reading app on Facebook, the Avon Social Reader. Folks can read samples of books – up to 20% of a novel – and (this is the super cool part) there are links to buy that book DRM FREE from AllRomance.
DRM. FREE.
Readers can also “choose to purchase DRM-enabled versions of the books at other online retailers.”
I have lit the bonfire of joy and am now dancing while I read. Hope I don't set my hair on fire.
The Avon partnership with AllRomance, which as y'all know sponsors the Sizzling Book Club in these parts, allows AllRomance to sell DRM-FREE epub copies of selected books. Quoth the press release, readers and authors had asked for the DRM-free option: “Bestselling author Tessa Dare expresses her excitement, saying, 'I know that DRM can be a frustration for honest, paying readers who just want to purchase and read books on their preferred devices. Avon's experiment will help me reach a new segment of the digital readership.'”
More good news: if you're not a Facebook reader, the DRM-free option is available at the book page on AllRomance. You don't have to go through the Facebook app to access the DRM-free editions.
If you look at the listing page for the following books on AllRomance, you'll see two options: Available in: Epub, Secure Adobe Epub eBook.
And there's a whole collection of books now available as DRM-free ePubs on AllRomance. Ready? Here we go!
I think this is tremendously awesome, and I hope that other retailers follow suit (though I am not holding my breath). DRM-free books is a good thing for everyone, readers and authors like. Thank you Avon!
I KNOW! Very exciting! We decided a few minutes ago to celebrate by rotating in some special rebate offers for these books over the next couple weeks. Until Friday we’re going to be rebating 30% in eBook Bucks for A NIGHT LIKE THIS, A LADY BY MIDNIGHT, A SCANDALOUS SCOT, SINS OF A VIRGIN, and THE ART OF DUKE HUNTING. One more reason to go on a historical binge.
What does DRM mean exactly?
I’m so excited, since I refuse to buy DRM-protected e-books. I bought one at ARe before, just to see what the process of getting it onto my reader would be like. I decided I really hated Adobe Digital Editions after that. Since I dislike DRM in general and don’t feel quite comfortable removing it, I don’t even buy from BN, where I’d at least be able to avoid the headache of ADE.
I’ll have to look through this list of titles after work today. Definitely good news, and I can’t wait for more publishers to finally start going DRM-free. If Harlequin would finally unbend, I could pick up some of the Spice Briefs titles that have been on my wishlist for ages.
From your lips to Harlequin’s ears! I dream of the day I can put them on my iPad and not use Overdrive.
… Am I the only one that got the Allromance newsletter last night? Anyway. In it, All romance annouced that they are celebrating by offering a 30 % rebate on A lady by Midnight by Tessa Dare, A Scandalous Scot by Karen Ranney, The Art of Duke hunting by Sophia Nash, Sins of a Virgin by Anna Randol and A night like this by Julia Quinn.
The rebate ends on midnight tomorrow.
Digital rights management, which usually means Adobe Digital Reader. Which requires you to register all of your devices on the Adobe website. (And I REALLY dislike the Adobe Reader application.)
Driving Readers Mad.
As in, I bought the freakin’ book four years ago but I can’t read it because it’s tied to an antiquated format and the ereader I had for that format gave up the ghost and I freakin’ want to hulksmash all techological “improvements” that make my book that I freakin’ paid good money for freakin’ unreadable!!! That’s the meaning of DRM. Or “Digital Rights Management” …
Anyway…
DRM is the security wrapper on a book, usually tied to either your computer (Adobe) or your credit card (BN.com). It makes upgrading computers and transferring books from old devices to new ones utterly impossible and completely infuriating. DRM free means that the book can be converted into a new format, transferred from one device to the next, etc. without verification problems or being locked out of the file altogether.
Since I heard about two years ago that there were, at that time, at least twelve sites that tell you how to strip DRM, and I know it was discussed at length on this site, I am wondering why anybody is bothering with DRM nowadays. I kind of never understood the purpose of it in the first place. Is it done as a courtesy to the author to make him feel his work has that much worth?
I, an unsophisticated, elderly housewife from the Midwest, know how to copy, paste, snip, steal, download, whatever, just about anything on the web anywhere.
If only I could get my son in law’s Netflix subscription to work on my laptop. . .