By February24th in a op-ed piece, Roy Blount Jr., president of the Author’s Guild, proclaimed the Author’s Guild opposition citing the copyright law
which grants those rights to the individual author. By offering the e-book with an audio
function, Amazon was infringing upon the individual’s copyrights.
February 27th saw Amazon announce the fact they would adapt the Kindle in an
effort to include a way to turn off the text-to-speech option on individual
titles. That did not prove to be the end
of the strife that followed the release of the Kindle 2. A good chronological telling of the events
that followed the February release of the Kindle 2 is told by Daniel
Fyre in the “Braille Monitor.” In
essence the National Federation of the Blind decided to get involved. They formed the Reading Rights Coalition
which would stop the Authors Guild from trying to eliminate the text-to-speech
function of the Kindle 2.
According to a 2012 how to piece
by Matt Skaggs offered by “Salon,” an online magazine
which is part of the Salon Media Group the text-to-speech function of
Kindle is offered only for titles that the author has granted those rights.
I have to say I do agree with the Authors Guild. In my view that audio version is a derivative
piece of work and ought to be covered by copyright. Using Skaggs’ directions to turn on the
text-to-speech function, I wonder how a person with a sight impairment could find
the way to the text-to-speech operation.
Certainly something easier or more accessible needs to be created for
the visually-impaired. I have not done
any further research as to what is available other than audio books offered by
libraries.
And I do know there are free
text-to-speech apps available. I
have not tried them and cannot attest to their usability.
Part of the National Federation of the Blind Association’s
argument for Kindle’s text-to-speech function was the accessibility of newly
published books. For Vermont
residents members of Vermont
There are many perspectives to this text-to-speech
application on Kindles and all are understandable. Each viewpoint set forth by
the representatives of authors, the visually-impaired and Amazon presents a reasonable side to the
debate.
Resources:
Ann Marie,
ReplyDeleteI have to say that I agree with you on this topic. There must be better ways out there to help the visually impaired. If the Kindle has this option it should be because they are paying for the extra copyrights of those books in audio format.