Today in disturbing publishing news

News has broken since yesterday that Ellora’s Cave has sued Dear Author, specifically over the post DA did here, talking about the publisher’s history and how they appear to be imploding now, and basically asking WTF. EC is suing DA for defamation. Jane Litte of DA, being involved in the suit, cannot really post about it in depth. But Sarah Wendell of Smart Bitches posts about it here.

There is a great deal of WTF to be had here, in no small part because Jane Litte was reporting on Things That Actually Happened. This used to be called “journalism”. But if this suit has its way, it could now be called “defamation”.

I’m not an Ellora’s Cave author, but I do know folks who are, and who have been deeply worried about developments with that publisher. That there are EC authors who are not getting paid for the work even though their work continues to be on sale concerns me deeply. So does EC authors being afraid to speak out publicly about what’s been going on.

And now DA is being sued?

This is, in a word, bullshit. I know from following the Dear Bitches Smart Authors podcast that Jane is herself a lawyer, so she’s got background to understand the level of bullshit involved here. But I really hope that the Ohio courts will smack this down, and if Jane winds up calling for help with a legal fund, I’ll be throwing her what bucks I can spare.

ETA: I’ve been linked to! So here, if you’d like to see other links cropping up on this matter:

Her Hands My Hands stands up to join the Streisand Effect starting to spread about this.

The Digital Reader reports on the matter, including an explanation of what SLAPP is (note: Jane Litte reported a lack of anti-SLAPP laws in Ohio, which could prove to be a problem).

Vacuous Minx reports on how EC has bailed on a prior lawsuit before, and speculates on likely outcomes of this case.

And although this is a post from earlier this month, prior to news of this lawsuit, Writer Beware reported on the EC implosion and warned writers off of submitting new work to them.

Pete Morin has a link off to the actual complaint filed. Which I have now read, and it’s interesting to note that EC is specifically stating that the assertions that EC authors aren’t getting paid are false, and they seem to be trying to make a case for the DA post being a cause for EC authors having a panic rush–rather than oh, say, EC authors themselves reporting that this shit is going down and DA’s post reacting to that.

The Passive Voice has a post up also linking to the complaint, and some analysis of what will be happening now both in the post and in the comments.

More links as I find ‘em, folks.

Mirrored from angelahighland.com.

Today in disturbing publishing news

News has broken since yesterday that Ellora’s Cave has sued Dear Author, specifically over the post DA did here, talking about the publisher’s history and how they appear to be imploding now, and basically asking WTF. EC is suing DA for defamation. Jane Litte of DA, being involved in the suit, cannot really post about it in depth. But Sarah Wendell of Smart Bitches posts about it here.

There is a great deal of WTF to be had here, in no small part because Jane Litte was reporting on Things That Actually Happened. This used to be called “journalism”. But if this suit has its way, it could now be called “defamation”.

I’m not an Ellora’s Cave author, but I do know folks who are, and who have been deeply worried about developments with that publisher. That there are EC authors who are not getting paid for the work even though their work continues to be on sale concerns me deeply. So does EC authors being afraid to speak out publicly about what’s been going on.

And now DA is being sued?

This is, in a word, bullshit. I know from following the Dear Bitches Smart Authors podcast that Jane is herself a lawyer, so she’s got background to understand the level of bullshit involved here. But I really hope that the Ohio courts will smack this down, and if Jane winds up calling for help with a legal fund, I’ll be throwing her what bucks I can spare.

ETA: I’ve been linked to! So here, if you’d like to see other links cropping up on this matter:

Her Hands My Hands stands up to join the Streisand Effect starting to spread about this.

The Digital Reader reports on the matter, including an explanation of what SLAPP is (note: Jane Litte reported a lack of anti-SLAPP laws in Ohio, which could prove to be a problem).

Vacuous Minx reports on how EC has bailed on a prior lawsuit before, and speculates on likely outcomes of this case.

And although this is a post from earlier this month, prior to news of this lawsuit, Writer Beware reported on the EC implosion and warned writers off of submitting new work to them.

Pete Morin has a link off to the actual complaint filed. Which I have now read, and it’s interesting to note that EC is specifically stating that the assertions that EC authors aren’t getting paid are false, and they seem to be trying to make a case for the DA post being a cause for EC authors having a panic rush–rather than oh, say, EC authors themselves reporting that this shit is going down and DA’s post reacting to that.

The Passive Voice has a post up also linking to the complaint, and some analysis of what will be happening now both in the post and in the comments.

More links as I find ‘em, folks.

Mirrored from angelahighland.com.

B&N and Kobo stomping on user ability to download books

I’ve been noticing lately that Kobo has been stomping on the ability to download certain books from user libraries–and at first I thought this was simply a passing glitch. But then I started noticing it happen on books where it was particularly puzzling, i.e., releases from Tor.com. Which are DRM-free and which should not have any restrictions whatsoever upon them.

I saw this happen when I tried to pre-order John Scalzi’s Lock In, and when I sent Kobo’s CS people cranky mail about this, they told me something that made no damn sense whatsoever: that because the book was in epub3 format, that meant I couldn’t download it. I’d also noticed it happen on a free book from Tor–Mary Robinette Kowal’s “Lady Astronaut of Mars”.

Reasons why this made no damn sense:

1) A book’s format does not dictate whether you can download it. All downloading is is copying data from point A to point B. If there’s something that’s getting in the way of the data moving, that’s DRM or some other form of restriction.

2) I was able to go over to my B&N account, go find Kowal’s novelette, and download the exact same thing in the exact same format with no problems whatsoever.

So I sent Kobo additional cranky mail about this, and was told that if I wanted the book in another format, then I should complain to the publisher. And that pissed me off because the CS person didn’t understand that I wasn’t complaining about the format–I was complaining about the inability to download the thing onto my computer so that I could keep a backup copy of it around. Which I should have been able to bloody well do as I wished, because it had no DRM on it.

Meanwhile, though, B&N has trumped Kobo completely on this, because according to this post on The Digital Reader, now B&N has removed download links for ALL books in user accounts. Apparently, they’re stopping support for sideloading, according to what the poster was told in tweets.

And this just makes me crankier. Dammit, B&N, I started buying ebooks from you because Amazon was pissing me off. And Kobo, I started buying books from YOU because B&N was pissing me off, and additionally, because I wanted to support moves to partner up with independent bookstores.

But if BOTH of you are going to start denying users ability to download their damn books, all this is going to do is drive me off to find out whether Google Play will let me do this. And it’ll make me way more interested in buying books directly from publishers and from authors as often as possible.

Dammit, all I want to do is buy books, keep master copies on my computer, and put them on devices to read when I want to. This should not be difficult.

And yet.

Mirrored from angelahighland.com.

B&N and Kobo stomping on user ability to download books

I’ve been noticing lately that Kobo has been stomping on the ability to download certain books from user libraries–and at first I thought this was simply a passing glitch. But then I started noticing it happen on books where it was particularly puzzling, i.e., releases from Tor.com. Which are DRM-free and which should not have any restrictions whatsoever upon them.

I saw this happen when I tried to pre-order John Scalzi’s Lock In, and when I sent Kobo’s CS people cranky mail about this, they told me something that made no damn sense whatsoever: that because the book was in epub3 format, that meant I couldn’t download it. I’d also noticed it happen on a free book from Tor–Mary Robinette Kowal’s “Lady Astronaut of Mars”.

Reasons why this made no damn sense:

1) A book’s format does not dictate whether you can download it. All downloading is is copying data from point A to point B. If there’s something that’s getting in the way of the data moving, that’s DRM or some other form of restriction.

2) I was able to go over to my B&N account, go find Kowal’s novelette, and download the exact same thing in the exact same format with no problems whatsoever.

So I sent Kobo additional cranky mail about this, and was told that if I wanted the book in another format, then I should complain to the publisher. And that pissed me off because the CS person didn’t understand that I wasn’t complaining about the format–I was complaining about the inability to download the thing onto my computer so that I could keep a backup copy of it around. Which I should have been able to bloody well do as I wished, because it had no DRM on it.

Meanwhile, though, B&N has trumped Kobo completely on this, because according to this post on The Digital Reader, now B&N has removed download links for ALL books in user accounts. Apparently, they’re stopping support for sideloading, according to what the poster was told in tweets.

And this just makes me crankier. Dammit, B&N, I started buying ebooks from you because Amazon was pissing me off. And Kobo, I started buying books from YOU because B&N was pissing me off, and additionally, because I wanted to support moves to partner up with independent bookstores.

But if BOTH of you are going to start denying users ability to download their damn books, all this is going to do is drive me off to find out whether Google Play will let me do this. And it’ll make me way more interested in buying books directly from publishers and from authors as often as possible.

Dammit, all I want to do is buy books, keep master copies on my computer, and put them on devices to read when I want to. This should not be difficult.

And yet.

Mirrored from angelahighland.com.