[Dtb-talk] Reading Rights Coalition Denounces Random House

[Bruce Toews]

Given that the Kindle is not a fully accessible product, is the whole 
thing not misleading? It implies that turning on the text-to-speech would 
give all print-disabled people total access, which it would not.

Bruce

On Thu, 21 May 2009, Freeh,  Jessica wrote:

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> FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
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> CONTACT:
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> <Chris Danielsen
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> Director of Public Relations
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> National Federation of the Blind
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> (410) 659-9314, ext. 2330
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> (410) 262-1281 (Cell)
> <mailto:cdanielsen at nfb.org>cdanielsen at nfb.org
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> Reading Rights Coalition Denounces Random House
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> Random House Has Denied 15 Million
> Print-Disabled Americans Access to its Books
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> New York City (May 20, 2009): The Reading Rights Coalition, representing more 
> than 15 million print-disabled Americans, has denounced publishing giant 
> Random House, which has turned off text-to-speech on all of its e-books 
> available for Amazon's Kindle 2 reading service.
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> Dr. Marc Maurer, President of the National Federation of the Blind, said: 
> "When Random House turned off the text-to-speech function on all of its 
> e-books for the Kindle 2, it turned off access to this service for more than 
> 15 million print-disabled Americans.  The blind and other print-disabled 
> readers have the right to purchase e-books using this service with 
> text-to-speech enabled.  Blocking text-to-speech prohibits access for 
> print-disabled readers and is both reprehensible and discriminatory.  We urge 
> President Obama, whose e-books are now being blocked from over 15 million 
> Americans, to either demand that access be restored or to move to a publisher 
> who does not engage in discrimination."
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> Dr. Cynthia Stuen, Senior Vice President of Policy and Evaluation for 
> Lighthouse International, said: "Having the technology available to give 
> people with impaired vision and other print disabilities equal and timely 
> access to the printed word should be celebrated and encouraged in a civil and 
> just society for all."
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> Andrew Imparato, President and Chief Executive Officer for the American 
> Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD), said: "Random House is 
> callously disregarding the right of American consumers with disabilities to 
> get access to the same content at the same price at the same time as everyone 
> else.  Random House's decision to turn off the feature that makes this 
> content accessible to millions of print-disabled Americans is a bad business 
> decision with real human consequences and it must be corrected immediately."
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> Mitch Pomerantz, President of the American Council of the Blind, said: "The 
> recent action by Random House disabling text-to-speech on e-books is the 
> latest and most egregious discriminatory action against the nation's 15 
> million print-disabled individuals.  Random House either doesn't care or 
> doesn't understand the impact this will have on those who would otherwise 
> have equal access to books and other printed materials in the same manner as 
> our non-disabled peers.  We must work collaboratively to do everything 
> possible to assure such access for this growing constituency."
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> James Love, Director of Knowledge Ecology International (KEI), said: "KEI is 
> disappointed that Random House is turning off text-to-speech on its Kindle 2 
> e-books. In a world where access to knowledge is central to everything, 
> Random House certainly understands this action will isolate and marginalize 
> many persons with reading disabilities."
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> K. Eric Larson, Executive Director and CEO of National Spinal Cord Injury 
> Association, said: "All Americans have the right to equal access and many 
> people living with paralysis use text-to-speech capabilities in order to gain 
> that access.  Our members are also consumers and "turning off" text-to-speech 
> means that some will not buy books they would otherwise purchase."
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> John R. Sheehan, Chairman of the Xavier Society for the Blind, said: "The 
> Xavier Society for the Blind is committed to the notion that ALL books should 
> be accessible to all people. When a book about Mother Teresa is among those 
> whose text-to-speech functions have been disabled, we fear that we are seeing 
> the beginning of a blanket cut-off of a function that should be open and 
> available to all, especially (but not exclusively) to those with visual 
> impairments or other problems that limit access to printed materials."
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> When Amazon released the Kindle 2 e-book reading service on February 9, 2009, 
> the company announced that the device would be able to read e-books aloud 
> using text-to-speech technology.  Under pressure from the Authors Guild, 
> Amazon has announced that it will give publishers the ability to disable the 
> text-to-speech function on any or all of their e-books available for the 
> Kindle 2 service.  Random House is the first publisher to turn off 
> text-to-speech on all of its e-books and thus deny the rights of 
> print-disabled people across America.
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> The Reading Rights coalition includes the blind, people with dyslexia, people 
> with learning or processing issues, seniors losing vision, people with spinal 
> cord injuries, people recovering from strokes, and many others for whom the 
> addition of text-to-speech on the Kindle 2 promises for the first time easy, 
> mainstream access to over 270,000 books.
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> For more information about the Reading Rights Coalition, please visit 
> <http://www.readingrights.org/>www.readingrights.org.  To sign our petition, 
> go to 
> <http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/We-Want-To-Read>http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/We-Want-To-Read. 
> If you are an author who supports our cause, please send your contact 
> information to <mailto:readingrights at nfb.org>readingrights at nfb.org.
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