[Dtb-talk] iPhone/iPad/iPod touch NLS Playback question

[David Andrews]

Greg:

Both NLWS and Bookshare are basing their approaches from the same law 
-- the so-called Chafee Amendment to the copyright law of 1996.  It 
basically says that the appropriate entities can distribute books to 
blind persons, without having to get copyright permission from the 
publisher first, if the book is in a "nonstandard" format.  The 
entity must also be a nonprofit, or government agency who primarily 
serves the blind etc.

To date most people have interpreted this law to mean that DAISY or 
BRF were specialized formats that the law called for.  You could, of 
course argue otherwise, since text is present or readily obtainable, 
however no one has challenged this interpretation.

NLS's use of encryption, and other protections is their 
implementation of the law.  The law doesn't specifically call for 
them, it just deals with the end result.

Being housed in the same parent agency as the copyright office, they 
need to be more conservative then would YOU OR I.  You can rant and 
rail against their interpretation, but they are going to do what they 
think necessary.

Dave

At 07:29 AM 5/16/2010, you wrote:
>I guess I should explain a bit more what we are asking and thinking
>about here.
>
>Daisy Bookworm and Olearia  were written primarily to support books
>from our library at ABWA as well as Vision Australia and RNZFB. They
>will read any non encrypted DAISY book. As it happens this means every
>book from every other library for the blind in the world. The sole
>exceptions are RFB&D, who we are working with to provide playback, and
>the NLS system.
>
>What we are looking into is to have the iPhone/iPad/iPod touch
>hardware authorised as playback device in the same way that the
>VictorReader Stream is authorised. That is to say that the hardware
>itself would be identified as belonging to an authorised user. In the
>case of the VictorReader Stream this is done by serial number and an
>authorisation key tied to that number. A similar thing could be done
>with the iPhone/iPad/iPod there by providing proof that the owner of
>such was an authorised user. In effect the iPhone/iPad/iPod is nothing
>more than a playback device like the Stream and could be treated the
>same way.
>
>I must admit that the status of all of this in U.S. Copyright law has
>be a bit confused to say the least. Let take a look at two
>organisations both producing copyrighted works under U.S. law:
>
>The NLS seems to be saying that it is a requirment under the law that
>books be in an encrypted format playable only on special authorised
>devices.
>
>Bookshare on the other hand says that it can provide, in many cases
>the text of the same books, in clear text requiring only that the user
>have a user name and password to download and unpack the same. Once a
>Bookshare title has been unzipped all of the text is in a human
>readable for and can be simply transformed into any number of formats
>in much the same way Braille can be back translated.
>
>So who is in the right here? it is the same book and if anything the
>Bookshare version would be even more valuable to pirates as it has the
>text of the book and not simply a recording. Both these claims can not
>at the same time be true the law either requires encryption and
>special devices or it does not.
>
>In any event there are many technical issues to solve, most notably
>the issues surrounding the playback of the audio in the NLS format and
>we may never be able to do that and preserve battery life.
>
>So to be clear here we are not asking the NLS to change the format of
>their books and we are clearly not asking or suggesting that anyone
>"share" the book with unauthorised users. Right now we are only asking
>what the process is to get a device authorised for NLS playback as
>other devices have been in the past and to what extent if any there is
>interest in the print disabled community in having such playback on
>the iPhone/iPad/iPod.
>




                         David Andrews:  dandrews at visi.com
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