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Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks
The DRM, from what I read, was at the behest of the big publishers. I think they are able to turn it off if they want as well (and turn on or off the text-to-speech.)
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Maria, this is unfortunately incorrect. Amazon insists on DRM with publishers. (I don't know who first wanted it, but that's the situation now.) Where I think you've been misled is that indie authors submit their work differently from the way publishers do. Indie authors can turn DRM on or not. Publishers submit through a channel that doesn't give that option.
If you look at the E-reads section at Fictionwise and Webscription, you'll see that all their books are multiformat, DRM-free. The same books in the Kindle store carry DRM. That's not because they want it, it's because they submit to Amazon through the Mobipocket store, and they're given no choice. Same with Sony, and I presume B&N.
One of the holdups on Tor ebooks was that they were trying to work out DRM-free distribution deals, and it was hard. (So I was told by a Tor staffer.)
I think you're right about the TTS function, though I don't know if an actual mechanism is in place to turn that on and off.