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Old 09-01-2013, 09:14 PM   #68
taosaur
intelligent posterior
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The audio capabilities of eInk devices is rather a side issue from whether it's acceptable or advisable for publishers to block TTS on copyright grounds. There are plenty of devices with TTS-capable hardware and software on board--most of us probably have one in our pockets--and blocking TTS on those devices is absurd.

Personally, I do value TTS. My only disability is myopia, but I suppose I do use it as an accessibility feature insofar as it lets me take off my glasses or contacts (usually at bedtime). More often I have an audiobook for bedtime listening, but I listened to about half of C.J. Cherryh's Foreigner series via Google Play Books' cloud-assisted TTS. We're talking about a series riddled with proper nouns in a made-up alien language, and with a couple exceptions I found the GPB voice's pronunciations preferable to the narrator on the last audiobook in the series. The TTS did a solid job setting dialogue off from narration, too.

As others have said, it's not even close to an audiobook performance, just a serviceable method of reading the text. And obviously, based on replies here, many readers won't even grant it that much.
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