A lot of people seemed upset with iBooks Author’s EULA after Apple’s announcement of the program. Basically, it gives content creators the ability to distribute free books in just about any way they’d like, but specifies paid books are only available though the iBooks store. The author of this article brings up some good points:
Folks are calling the software “Author” but its real name is “iBooks Author”. That kind of sums it up. This is software designed to help you author books for iBooks.
Apple isn’t giving us a new piece of software to create enhanced eBooks. It’s giving us an easy way to create great looking iBooks for sale in the iBooks store.
The author also points out that while the EULA limits your rights to sell iBooks through other avenues, it does not claim any ownership over the actual content of your work.
In addition, if you want to give your book away you can use Apple’s tools to produce a book that you distribute any way you want. I don’t have those rights when I write for any other publisher.
