[nfb-talk] The Kindle Swindle

Jim Marks blind.grizzly at gmail.com
Tue Mar 3 00:00:40 UTC 2009


Amazon was pretty crafty.  Amazon probably knew that authors and publishers
might object to the inclusion of a test-to-speech feature in the Kindle 2.
Their solution --- to let authors and publishers block TTS --- shifts the
responsibility back to authors and publishers.  But there's a lot more to
this issue than real or imagined threats to markets.  We are seeing e-books
for the mainstream grow in popularity.  Educational institutions are
adopting e-books, and these e-books exclude blind and other people with
print disabilities.  We are headed more and more into a fight for our lives
as blind people because the right to access information on equal footing
with others in society is basic to being a part of society.  Information is
power, and blind people cannot function without the power information
brings.  I think this is a very big deal.  Somehow, we've got to strike a
balance between copyrights and access by people with disabilities.  While
the Kindle 2 isn't designed for blind people, what happens with it reveals
what's at stake and what the future holds for us.


-------
Jim Marks
blind.grizzly at gmail.com
 
-----Original Message-----
From: nfb-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:nfb-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
Behalf Of Joel Zimba
Sent: Monday, March 02, 2009 3:25 PM
To: NFB Talk Mailing List
Subject: Re: [nfb-talk] The Kindle Swindle

Actually, it is different.
Have you noticed that you don't get a free copy of the audio book when 
you buy the print book? 

I think the guild is correct in seeing synthetic speech as potentially 
destroying the audio book market.  Not this year, but in 5 years, I 
think it is perfectly reasonable.

If you read the actual statements from the Author's Guild, rather than 
the news headlines and NFB statements taken out of context, you will see 
that they understand the implications for the livlihood of authors and 
want to protect that. 

There is even a very eloquent response to the NFB statement on the 
subject, showing just  how a few sentences were taken out of context.

Joel


Brian Miller wrote:
> How in the world can the Writer's Guilde make the case that a syntehsized
> speech program constitutes a performance that would in essence require a
> mechanical reproduction lisence to play?  
>
> This is really taking royalty protection to an absurd level.  One should
pay
> for the access to the content, not the format of that content.  Is this
> really any different than someone taking a written copy and reading it
> aloud?  
>
> Brian M
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: nfb-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:nfb-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
> Behalf Of Michael Bullis
> Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2009 6:18 AM
> To: 'NFB Talk Mailing List'
> Subject: [nfb-talk] The Kindle Swindle
>
> This from today's New York Times.
> Mike Bullis
>
> OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR. The Kindle Swindle?. 
>  
> By ROY BLOUNT Jr.. Roy Blount Jr. is the author, most recently, of
'Alphabet
> Juice. BEING president of too many well-meaning organizations put my
father
> into an early grave. The lesson in this was not lost on me. But now I am
> president of the Authors Guild, whose mission is to sustain book-writing
as
> a viable occupation. This borders on quixotic, given all the new ways of
not
> getting paid that new technology affords authors. A case in point:
Amazon's
> Kindle 2, which was released yesterday. 
>  
> The Kindle 2 is a portable, wireless, paperback-size device onto which
> people can download a virtual library of digitalized titles. Amazon sells
> these downloads, and where the books are under copyright, it pays
royalties
> to the authors and publishers. 
>  
> Serves readers, pays writers: so far, so good. But there's another thing
> about Kindle 2 -- its heavily marketed text-to-speech function. Kindle 2
can
> read books aloud. And Kindle 2 is not paying anyone for audio rights. 
>  
> True, you can already get software that will read aloud whatever is on
your
> computer. But Kindle 2 is being sold specifically as a new, improved,
> multimedia version of books -- every title is an e-book and an audio book
> rolled into one. And whereas e-books have yet to win mainstream
enthusiasm,
> audio books are a billion-dollar market, and growing. Audio rights are not
> generally packaged with e-book rights. They are more valuable than e-book
> rights.
> Income
> from audio books helps not inconsiderably to keep authors, and publishers,
> afloat. 
>  
> You may be thinking that no automated read-aloud function can compete with
> the dulcet resonance of Jim Dale reading 'Harry Potter' or of authors,
ahem,
> reading themselves. But the voices of Kindle 2 are quite listenable.
There's
> even a male version and a female version. (A book by, say, Norman Mailer
on
> Kindle 2 might do a brisk business among people wondering how his prose
> would sound in measured feminine tones.) 
>  
> And that sort of technology is improving all the time. I.B.M. has patented
a
> computerized voice that is said to be almost indistinguishable from human
> ones.
> This voice is programmed to include 'ums,' 'ers' and sighs, to cough for
> attention, even to 'shhh' when interrupted. According to Andy Aaron, of
> I.B.M.'s Thomas J. Watson research group speech team: 'These sounds can be
> incredibly subtle, even unnoticeable, but have a profound psychological
> effect. It can be extremely reassuring to have a more attentive-sounding
> voice. 
>  
> When I read that quotation, it hit me: Hey, I know Andy Aaron. Years ago,
he
> said he was working on some sort of voice simulation, and asked to work my
> Southern accent into the mix. I don't remember whether we got around to
that
> or not, and this new I.B.M. software is designed, at any rate, not for
audio
> books but for computer help lines. So no part of my voice is competing
with
> my own audio books yet. But people who want to keep on doing creative
things
> for a living must be duly vigilant about any new means of transmitting
their
> work. 
>  
> What the guild is asserting is that authors have a right to a fair share
of
> the value that audio adds to Kindle 2's version of books. For this, the
> guild is being assailed. On the National Federation of the Blind's Web
site,
> the guild is accused of arguing that it is illegal for blind people to use
> 'readers, either human or machine, to access books that are not available
in
> alternative formats like Braille or audio. 
>  
> In fact, publishers, authors and American copyright laws have long
provided
> for free audio availability to the blind and the guild is all for
> technologies that expand that availability. (The federation, though,
points
> out that blind readers can't independently use the Kindle 2's visual,
> on-screen
> controls.)
> But that doesn't mean Amazon should be able, without copyright-holders'
> participation, to pass that service on to everyone. 
>  
> The guild is also accused of wanting to profiteer off family bedtime
> rituals. A lawyer at the Electronic Frontier Foundation sarcastically
warned
> that 'parents everywhere should be on the lookout for legal papers haling
> them into court for reading to their kids. 
>  
> For the record: no, the Authors Guild does not expect royalties from
anybody
> doing non-commercial performances of 'Goodnight Moon. If parents want to
> send their children off to bed with the voice of Kindle 2, however, it's
> another matter. 
>  
>  
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