Tor is a pretty big counterexample here. They're the largest and most awarded SciFi publisher and have been DRM-free for well over a decade now. They've also said that being DRM free hasn't been a problem for them.
They also refused to make their e-books available to libraries because they said it hurt sales. Which at least is a new wrinkle on the endless DRM debates.
Hell, if I ran a publishing company I'd remove DRM just so I wouldn't have to listen to Cory Doctorow rant about it. Having to proofread his books is punishment enough.
I hadn't heard that they limited availability, only that it was on a 4 month delay after consumer publication.
All of the big 5 publishers (including Tor under Macmillan) have incredibly bad terms for digital lending though. Wouldn't be surprised if they were doing the common thing of terminating the backcatalog on top of limiting initial access.
pretty hard to do any rigorous analysis without public sales info of all publishers, but yes I have heard that as well. their main competitor, baen also doesn't have drm
Hell, if I ran a publishing company I'd remove DRM just so I wouldn't have to listen to Cory Doctorow rant about it. Having to proofread his books is punishment enough.