Fictionwise starts selling secured for Mobipocket users

By Planet eBook Editor
March 28, 2002

Popular eBook store Fictionwise has officially changed its policy of distributing all it eBooks without copyright protection. From today the company will sell some eBooks in what it calls a "Secure Mobipocket" format. The move means that the company is now able to stock many national best-sellers -- eBooks that the publishers would not allow Fictionwise to sell for fear that they would be copied and illegally shared between readers.

The move is interesting too in that the company has supported Mobipocket's DRM solution over the more widespread Microsoft Reader or Adobe Acrobat eBook Reader-based systems. The new Mobipocket software for viewing the Secure Mobipocket format eBooks runs on can only be viewed on PalmOS, WinCE, Pocket PC, Franklin eBookman and Symbian OS devices.

Unsecured eBooks -- or what Fictionwise now calls MultiFormat eBooks -- are still available in eight different formats. Existing Mobipocket users interested in buying content from Fictionwise will be required to download and install the new secure version as well as register for a Mobipocket Personal ID.

Here's a sample of the kind of secure content now available: