Scribd goes subscription only

According to a letter sent to content providers earlier this week, Scribd, an online ebook service, is retiring its retail store in favor of its subscription service. Scribd offers over 1 million books, audio books and comics; the comics section launched earlier last year and was a quick success. According to the letter:

Thank you for being a valued partner to Scribd. 

Our goal is to connect readers to your content in a meaningful and sustainable way. 

Scribd’s subscription service continues to see dynamic growth, and we have decided to focus our resources on innovating and expanding this exciting channel.  

Consequently, we will be closing the Scribd retail store, effective Monday, November 16.  We encourage all publishers that had ebooks previously available in the Scribd retail store to join our subscription service. 

 Additional details about the decision can be found below.

• No impact on subscription service: Titles available through Scribd’s subscription service will not be impacted, except for the removal of the retail purchase option.
• BookID – Copyright Protection System:  BookID, Scribd’s copyright protection system, remains the best way to minimize unauthorized uploads to Scribd’s document sharing service.  To continue to participate in BookID, please deliver files and metadata to Scribd as you did while the retail store was operating. Participation in Scribd’s subscription program is not required for participation in BookID.
• Availability of purchased ebooks: Scribd users who previously purchased ebooks through the retail store will still be able to access their purchased ebooks via their Scribd accounts. 
• Titles previously available in the retail storefront: Scribd users who search for or land-on web pages with titles previously available in the retail storefront will see a cover image with a banner across the cover that says “Unavailable”. Content previews will not be supported for “Unavailable” titles.

While the service, launched in 2013, has been a success, sometimes too successful, as they had to remove romance books from it’s all you can eat service because readers just went through too many of them.

Scribed offers graphic novels from a variety of publishers, including Marvel Boom, IDW, Dynamite Valiant and more.