OverDrive is the First to Get Harry Potter eBooks

It might still be impossible to buy a Harry Potter ebook, but today I learned that you will soon be able borrow one from the library. OverDrive announced today that they counted a coup on their competition. They're now the worldwide distribution partner for Pottermore, and they will be making the HP ebooks and audiobooks available to all 18,000 partner libraries.

Note, though, that this deal only covers libraries; Overdrive's retail partners won't be involved. But on the upside the content will be available fairly soon.

This is a smart move on the part of Pottermore; it's going to tide over the obsessive fans until the ebookstore launches. But there's still no word yet on when that will happen. I'm still waiting to hear back from Pottermore on their launch plans; I will update this post with their response.

The Pottermore ebookstore was supposed to launch last October but has been indefinitely delayed. If and when the Pottermore ebookstore opens, it's going to support multiple ebook formats (including Kindle, Epub) and be the only place to buy HP ebooks and audiobooks.

This is also good news for OD; The last several times they've been in the news all involved publishers cutting ties, raising prices, or otherwise restricting your access to library ebooks.

About Nate Hoffelder (11274 Articles)
Nate Hoffelder is the founder and editor of The Digital Reader: "I've been into reading ebooks since forever, but I only got my first ereader in July 2007. Everything quickly spiraled out of control from there. Before I started this blog in January 2010 I covered ebooks, ebook readers, and digital publishing for about 2 years as a part of MobileRead Forums. It's a great community, and being a member is a joy. But I thought I could make something out of how I covered the news for MobileRead, so I started this blog."

4 Comments on OverDrive is the First to Get Harry Potter eBooks

  1. Well I am glad. I was worried that since it was going to be sold just through potter more, libraries would not get them.

  2. Doesn’t do anything for a lot of people. I have no idea where to get to a library that supports Overdrive…

  3. OverDrive isn’t just a library service. They operate an e-bookstore service called MIDAS (eHarlequin is a MIDAS site). MIDAS had already been announced as the e-bookstore service for Pottermore. So of course OverDrive’s going to be the first to get the Harry Potter e-books. They’re going to be the *only* distributor for Harry Potter e-books, at least initially.

    The [welcome] announcement was that OverDrive would *also* be making the e-books available for library lending through OverDrive’s Content Reserve service. It’s probably reasonable to assume that the e-books will be made available through MIDAS and Content Reserve at the same time.

    My question is… it’s been strongly implied that the HP e-books sold through MIDAS would be DRM-free. Content Reserve is pretty much tied to Adobe DRM for e-books, because Adobe DRM understands expiration dates. So will the HP e-books from the library be DRMed?

    Also: Amazon doesn’t handle Adobe EPUB and instead provides library e-books out of its own catalog, but they won’t have Harry Potter e-books in their catalog. Will Kindle users be able to borrow Harry Potter e-books?

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  1. Pottermore to Open in April (eBookstore, too) - The Digital Reader

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