Welcome to Mobileread. You've found the right place to gets lots of useful info, and lots of opinions.
Digital Rights Management (DRM) -- to "protect the content from copying/printing" -- is useless. PDF, ePUB, LIT and Mobipocket DRMs have all been broken. Apart from that, paper books can be scanned and OCRed. All it does is annoy your actual customers, and it doesn't inconvenience "pirates" at all.
However, if you can't persuade your author of that, your hands are tied.
Ebook distribution: There are several large ebook retailers/distributors, and several popular ebook formats. Many distributors/retailers won't accept direct submissions from publishers who don't have at least half a dozen books by more than one author.
PDF is easy for you to produce, but a poor ebook format, as the text can't be resized or reflowed for different display and/or font sizes. However, it does turn out to be quite popular with noviceebook buyers who just want to read on their computer screen.
People more into ebooks (like most here on mobileread) usually
hate PDF as an ebook format. ePUB and Mobipocket are the way to go. Both are forms of HTML.
ePUB has DRM only through the Adobe servers - I don't know how you go about signing up with them.
Mobipocket is owned by Amazon, and you can sign up with them, creating the ebook with the free Mobipocket Creator. Going through Mobipocket will also get your ebook available on the Amazon Kindle, as well as most other ebook retailers. They do take 65% of the retail price though.
Smashwords.com is worth taking a look at - they take 20% of retail.
Best of luck!
Quote:
Originally Posted by GraceCreekPress
I've been given electronic distribution rights to an approximately 200 page book that will be of the most interest to people who spend a lot of time on the internet. Since I'm used to dealing with distribution of paper, I have no clue where to begin.
I've visited a few sites that sell ebook compiler software that put the files into either a pdf or .exe file (which seems like a good route since the target audience is computer/internet users). I am obligated by my agreement with the author to somehow protect the content from copying/printing by the purchaser. The primary route of distribution will be email.
I'd love the thoughts and opinions of serious ebook readers. 
I can be contacted directly at mccutct@yahoo.com if you prefer.
If you're interested in seeing our first release (yes, in caveman paper only) you can visit the author's site www.MenAtHouseWork.com. It is a very funny read written by a stay at home dad.
Tim
Grace Creek Press |