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BobLenx · 03-01-2009, 04:53 PM

For the blind or otherwise reading/visually impaired lovers of books - Amazon's text-to -speech opens a new world with a new voice that now may be silenced on a book by book basis.

As for the concerns of author's - books you release in digital format can now be read by those who would not have been able to previously - since many books are not available as audio books. And if your book is available as an audio book, what is the big deal in selling someone a digital copy that costs you and the publisher nothing additional as opposed to a slightly more expensive audio book that you have to produce and physically distribute on some media format? With Amazon's TTS feature on the Kindle-2 you are apt to sell more copies than you would otherwise - not fewer.

Amazon already has their eBooks DRM protected so that only Kindles on the same account (max of six) can read them. Why on earth any petty publisher or author would care that one of those account users is blind and would need to listen to the book rather than read it is it beyond human comprehension. And as for those of us who can read, what do you care if we choose to have that techy voice ready us part of a book while we are making dinner or doing the dishes. We paid you for the book didn't we? Get a life!!!

If I ever go to buy a book from Amazon for my Kindle and see a note that text-to-speech has been disabled on this digital edition at the request of the publisher or author, I will not purchase it but will get a copy from the library or borrow it from a friend who has the hardcopy book. You aren't going to shut out the disabled on my dollar!

Bob

03-01-2009, 04:53 PM	#16
BobLenx Connoisseur Posts: 78 Karma: 308 Join Date: Jan 2008 Device: Sony505 K2 K3	For the blind or otherwise reading/visually impaired lovers of books - Amazon's text-to -speech opens a new world with a new voice that now may be silenced on a book by book basis. As for the concerns of author's - books you release in digital format can now be read by those who would not have been able to previously - since many books are not available as audio books. And if your book is available as an audio book, what is the big deal in selling someone a digital copy that costs you and the publisher nothing additional as opposed to a slightly more expensive audio book that you have to produce and physically distribute on some media format? With Amazon's TTS feature on the Kindle-2 you are apt to sell more copies than you would otherwise - not fewer. Amazon already has their eBooks DRM protected so that only Kindles on the same account (max of six) can read them. Why on earth any petty publisher or author would care that one of those account users is blind and would need to listen to the book rather than read it is it beyond human comprehension. And as for those of us who can read, what do you care if we choose to have that techy voice ready us part of a book while we are making dinner or doing the dishes. We paid you for the book didn't we? Get a life!!! If I ever go to buy a book from Amazon for my Kindle and see a note that text-to-speech has been disabled on this digital edition at the request of the publisher or author, I will not purchase it but will get a copy from the library or borrow it from a friend who has the hardcopy book. You aren't going to shut out the disabled on my dollar! Bob Last edited by BobLenx; 03-01-2009 at 05:01 PM.