DRM-free at Kobo?

Hatgirl · 03-26-2011, 09:53 PM

DRM-free books on the Kobo site are a bit of a mystery. They've been claiming to have some available since September, but no-one can find any. I have personally emailed and tweeted polite queries and have been completly ignored by their Customer Service staff (not that I'm taking it personally, it seems to be a common complaint about Kobo

)

But this popped up on their Help page a few days ago:

Quote:

What's this about "DRM free e-pubs"?
Bob Gmeindl
posted this on Mar-24 11:37

There are eBooks in the Kobo webstore that are tagged as DRM free e-pubs. Some customers have asked what that means.
It doesn't necessarily mean that the eBook is free. It just means that the eBook is DRM free.
It means that if you buy that eBook and want to use it on a non-Kobo eReader or on a device with a non-Kobo eReading app, you can do it without having to run the eBook file through Adobe's ADE.
It also means that you can move the eBook file from platform to platform without any DRM restrictions.

I've just spend another fruitless 20 minutes poking around the site. Can ANYONE find these mythical beasts?

Edit: OMG, I found one! Gather around and stare...!

NightBird · 03-26-2011, 10:15 PM

I would imagine it's by publisher. It looks Ellora's Cave is one of them:

http://www.kobobooks.com/search/sear...lishing%20Inc&

Or maybe they are the only one? lol

Hatgirl · 03-30-2011, 09:50 PM

Ooh, some more publisher with DRM-free epubs at Kobo: ChiZine and about a dozen of the latest from Untreed Reads

ATDrake · 03-30-2011, 09:55 PM

I'm glad they're finally starting to fix this issue. Hopefully they'll go back and un-DRM the stuff from Carina Press and the other imprints who've publicly committed to DRM-free when possible.

In the meantime, it's great that they'll be able to serve up the files themselves and hopefully not have to continue eating the 22 cent cost of each unneccessarily DRM-ed book.

Hopefully this lets them keep going with the coupon discounts and other customer-friendly niceties. Or perhaps invest a bit more into training their CS staff. Either way.

neilmarr · 03-31-2011, 04:16 AM

My Tech partner, Tony (he's Mr member tonyszmuk), would know more; but I believe there is a DRM opt-out option at Kobo. We're strongly opposed to DRM and our entire catalogue there (always of 120 titles or more) should be DRM-free, as they are at Amazon, etc, and our own online store.

If anyone discovers a DRM hiccup on any of our titles, just let us know. As you'll see in a notice on the front page of the bookstore section of our website (link below), we will immediately replace any ebook of ours that carries store-imposed DRM padlocks against our will with a DRM-free copy and with our compliments; no questions asked, but we would like to know of the errant store if you care to tell us. Best wishes. Neil

taming · 03-31-2011, 05:04 AM

From my very distant vantage point it looked like when Kobo did a major overhaul of the website some months back something screwy happened. Part of the website change was to make it very clear whether a book was DRM free or not. Previous to the change, the only way you knew if a book was DRM free was if it downloaded without an acsm link.

After the change, the fact that it was clear on the website what versions were available and their DRM status was nice, but some books that had been drm free seemed to suddenly have it. Cory Doctorow's books are an example of that. Doctorow does not and will not sell DRMd versions, and his books were pulled (except for the PDF DRM free Gutenberg versions that are free on the site). I keep checking to see if the rest of his books come back DRM free.

Hatgirl · 03-31-2011, 08:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by neilmarr

My Tech partner, Tony (he's Mr member tonyszmuk), would know more; but I believe there is a DRM opt-out option at Kobo. We're strongly opposed to DRM and our entire catalogue there (always of 120 titles or more) should be DRM-free, as they are at Amazon, etc, and our own online store.

Neil, I can only find one ebook with BeWrite listed as a publisher, and I searched on Kobo for a half dozen or so authors and titles listed at bewrite.net and didn't find any of them. You might want to look into that...

Gardenman · 03-31-2011, 11:09 AM

I also only found one. That one lists the download options as Adobe DRM PDF

The author is - J Hunt, Michael

Gardenman · 03-31-2011, 11:53 AM

Neil
You might want to check BooksOnBoard too. Same book - Same DRM.

neilmarr · 03-31-2011, 12:06 PM

***Neil, I can only find one ebook with BeWrite listed as a publisher, and I searched on Kobo for a half dozen or so authors and titles listed at bewrite.net and didn't find any of them. You might want to look into that.***

Certainly will do, Hatgirl. I do know that Kobo has our entire catalogue (updated monthly with at least two new releases) because I distinctly remember that they had a strange way of going about things with publishers. We had to split each ebook for them into separate sections -- front matter, individual chapters, etc -- and upload them as separate files. Maybe they've fixed that darned annoying hitch now, but it does stick in my mind, even though I'm a mere scribe and not too involved in the tech side of BB.

And thanks, Gardenman. We'll take a look again at our BooksonBoard stuff. To be honest, things have been so darned hectic here over the past month that we've simply not had time to look back at what's bin did and what's bin hid.

I sent a note to tech and design partner, Tony, earlier asking him to weigh in on this thread with anything he can offer. He's nine hours behind me as the clock flies, but if he can grab a few minutes wwhen he's back in the Land of the Living, we can count on him showing his face and whispering words of wisdom.

Thanks for the interest, folks. Much appreciated. We DO follow every lead when someone's kind enough to offer a thought. Very much appreciated is that.

Cheers. Neil

PS: And here's karma to you both for the heads-up. N

Tony Szmuk · 03-31-2011, 02:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by neilmarr

My Tech partner, Tony (he's Mr member tonyszmuk), would know more; but I believe there is a DRM opt-out option at Kobo. We're strongly opposed to DRM and our entire catalogue there (always of 120 titles or more) should be DRM-free, as they are at Amazon, etc, and our own online store.

If anyone discovers a DRM hiccup on any of our titles, just let us know. As you'll see in a notice on the front page of the bookstore section of our website (link below), we will immediately replace any ebook of ours that carries store-imposed DRM padlocks against our will with a DRM-free copy and with our compliments; no questions asked, but we would like to know of the errant store if you care to tell us. Best wishes. Neil

The DRM/non-DRM option is definitely the publisher's choice at Kobo, as well as in other stores.

Tony Szmuk · 03-31-2011, 02:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hatgirl

Neil, I can only find one ebook with BeWrite listed as a publisher, and I searched on Kobo for a half dozen or so authors and titles listed at bewrite.net and didn't find any of them. You might want to look into that...

Yup, we know about that. We've sent our catalogue to Kobo late last year, but they are moving terribly slow...

unicorn1 · 04-12-2011, 09:18 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tony Szmuk

Yup, we know about that. We've sent our catalogue to Kobo late last year, but they are moving terribly slow...

Somehow I am not surprised.......

Tony Szmuk · 04-29-2011, 12:21 AM

Just a quick update: Finaly, all BeWrite Books' titles are now available ib the Kobo store. Enjoy!

J. Strnad · 04-29-2011, 12:49 AM

My book, at Kobo through Smashwords, was supposed to be DRM-free, but it says Adobe DRM. I don't know what to do about that.

03-31-2011, 12:06 PM	#10
neilmarr neilmarr Posts: 7,216 Karma: 6000059 Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Monaco-Menton, France Device: sony	*Neil, I can only find one ebook with BeWrite listed as a publisher, and I searched on Kobo for a half dozen or so authors and titles listed at bewrite.net and didn't find any of them. You might want to look into that.* Certainly will do, Hatgirl. I do know that Kobo has our entire catalogue (updated monthly with at least two new releases) because I distinctly remember that they had a strange way of going about things with publishers. We had to split each ebook for them into separate sections -- front matter, individual chapters, etc -- and upload them as separate files. Maybe they've fixed that darned annoying hitch now, but it does stick in my mind, even though I'm a mere scribe and not too involved in the tech side of BB. And thanks, Gardenman. We'll take a look again at our BooksonBoard stuff. To be honest, things have been so darned hectic here over the past month that we've simply not had time to look back at what's bin did and what's bin hid. I sent a note to tech and design partner, Tony, earlier asking him to weigh in on this thread with anything he can offer. He's nine hours behind me as the clock flies, but if he can grab a few minutes wwhen he's back in the Land of the Living, we can count on him showing his face and whispering words of wisdom. Thanks for the interest, folks. Much appreciated. We DO follow every lead when someone's kind enough to offer a thought. Very much appreciated is that. Cheers. Neil PS: And here's karma to you both for the heads-up. N Last edited by neilmarr; 03-31-2011 at 12:08 PM. Reason: for PS

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03-26-2011, 10:15 PM	#2
NightBird Wizard Posts: 2,364 Karma: 3724797 Join Date: Jan 2010 Location: California Device: KPW, KF, KF HD, iPod Touch	I would imagine it's by publisher. It looks Ellora's Cave is one of them: http://www.kobobooks.com/search/sear...lishing%20Inc& Or maybe they are the only one? lol

03-30-2011, 09:50 PM	#3
Hatgirl Addict Posts: 296 Karma: 955301 Join Date: Oct 2008 Device: Sony PRS-300, Sony PRS-T2, Kindle (7th Gen)	Ooh, some more publisher with DRM-free epubs at Kobo: ChiZine and about a dozen of the latest from Untreed Reads

03-30-2011, 09:55 PM	#4
ATDrake Wizzard Posts: 11,517 Karma: 33048258 Join Date: Mar 2010 Location: Roundworld Device: Kindle 2 International, Sony PRS-T1, BlackBerry PlayBook, Acer Iconia	I'm glad they're finally starting to fix this issue. Hopefully they'll go back and un-DRM the stuff from Carina Press and the other imprints who've publicly committed to DRM-free when possible. In the meantime, it's great that they'll be able to serve up the files themselves and hopefully not have to continue eating the 22 cent cost of each unneccessarily DRM-ed book. Hopefully this lets them keep going with the coupon discounts and other customer-friendly niceties. Or perhaps invest a bit more into training their CS staff. Either way.

03-31-2011, 04:16 AM	#5
neilmarr neilmarr Posts: 7,216 Karma: 6000059 Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Monaco-Menton, France Device: sony	My Tech partner, Tony (he's Mr member tonyszmuk), would know more; but I believe there is a DRM opt-out option at Kobo. We're strongly opposed to DRM and our entire catalogue there (always of 120 titles or more) should be DRM-free, as they are at Amazon, etc, and our own online store. If anyone discovers a DRM hiccup on any of our titles, just let us know. As you'll see in a notice on the front page of the bookstore section of our website (link below), we will immediately replace any ebook of ours that carries store-imposed DRM padlocks against our will with a DRM-free copy and with our compliments; no questions asked, but we would like to know of the errant store if you care to tell us. Best wishes. Neil

03-31-2011, 05:04 AM	#6
taming Trying for calm & polite Posts: 4,012 Karma: 9455193 Join Date: May 2010 Location: Mostly in Canada Device: kobo original, WiFI, Touch, Glo, and Aura	From my very distant vantage point it looked like when Kobo did a major overhaul of the website some months back something screwy happened. Part of the website change was to make it very clear whether a book was DRM free or not. Previous to the change, the only way you knew if a book was DRM free was if it downloaded without an acsm link. After the change, the fact that it was clear on the website what versions were available and their DRM status was nice, but some books that had been drm free seemed to suddenly have it. Cory Doctorow's books are an example of that. Doctorow does not and will not sell DRMd versions, and his books were pulled (except for the PDF DRM free Gutenberg versions that are free on the site). I keep checking to see if the rest of his books come back DRM free.

03-31-2011, 11:09 AM	#8
Gardenman Wizard Posts: 1,098 Karma: 9177222 Join Date: Oct 2010 Location: USA Device: sony prs-350,Nook HD+, Kindle 2nd gen, kindle keyboard	I also only found one. That one lists the download options as Adobe DRM PDF The author is - J Hunt, Michael

03-31-2011, 11:53 AM	#9
Gardenman Wizard Posts: 1,098 Karma: 9177222 Join Date: Oct 2010 Location: USA Device: sony prs-350,Nook HD+, Kindle 2nd gen, kindle keyboard	Neil You might want to check BooksOnBoard too. Same book - Same DRM.

04-29-2011, 12:21 AM	#14
Tony Szmuk Connoisseur Posts: 61 Karma: 383712 Join Date: May 2010 Device: ,,,	Just a quick update: Finaly, all BeWrite Books' titles are now available ib the Kobo store. Enjoy!

04-29-2011, 12:49 AM	#15
J. Strnad Guru Posts: 915 Karma: 3537194 Join Date: Feb 2009 Device: Kobo, Kindle 3, Paperwhite	My book, at Kobo through Smashwords, was supposed to be DRM-free, but it says Adobe DRM. I don't know what to do about that.

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