Well, that was an interesting read over at Dear Author on the
state of Ellora's Cave and the history of the ready availability of erotic romance.
And given the general results of Suing People Who Said Negative Things On The Internets*, it seems rather inadvisable for EC to spend their money on lawsuits instead of, say, paying monies owed to their authors and support personnel which would at least mitigate part of their bad publicity?
At any rate, it's sad to see things end up this way for yet another company who really should have been paying their content providers (hello there, remains of Dorchester, Night Shade Books, Books on Board, etc.). I hope the authors are able to get their rights reverted, if it comes to that.
As it is, I'd been thinking of picking up some of Roberta Gellis' historicals backlist from them now that they'd reduced the prices by half over the summer, but since it seems that the author might not be getting paid for her book sales there, it's probably just as well. I'll wait to see how things turn out and if her books end up going to another publisher with a higher price (hopefully couponable and possibly even DRM-free again), so be it, as long as she gets the money.
* Have people learned nothing from the Streisand Effect and Amy's Baking Company and so many other cases† which spring to mind?
† Some days I really miss the Fandom W*nk wiki. This is one of them.