Quote:
Originally Posted by sirbruce
A braille, audio, large format, etc. version of the book may be more expensive to produce than a print version.
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The Kindle's read-aloud technology allowed blind people to listen to ebooks at no extra cost (obviously they owned the ebook in the first place). It may not have been high quality reading, but it was better than nothing. The writer got access to a larger market and didn't have to pay a cent for it.
As I understand it, some publishers fought against that on the basis that, rather than simply being an accessibility technology, any book that was read-aloud magically turned into an audio book. Since that would normally qualify as a separate product, blind people should be forced to pay for the audio book instead (and if that doesn't exist, too bad).
Now to me that makes about as much sense as saying that reading with glasses magically turns the book into a large print edition, and so people with glasses should be forced to buy the large print book instead.
Or that listening to music with a hearing aid magically turns it into the extra loud edition (which would naturally be extra expensive). Just so that recording artists can also cash in on this gimmick.
Oh, and by the way, if you picture the characters in your head, you're illegally infringing on the movie rights.
Maybe this new law goes too far the other way, but that's probably because people tend to get angry when someone tramples on the disabled in a callous quest for profits. The publishers managed to piss of everyone with the slightest sense of decency, and now they're reaping the whirlwind.