MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - USA, Canada and the EU attempt to kill treaty to protect blind people's access to wri

Elfwreck · 05-31-2009, 07:53 PM

The issue here isn't "publishers have/don't have the right to choose their customers." The issue is that businesses (in the US) don't have the right to decide not to make their business accessible to those with disabilities--you can't own a restaurant on the 2nd floor and say, "I don't need an elevator because I don't serve people in wheelchairs. Anyone who can't climb stairs isn't my target demographic and I don't mind losing their business."

Businesses in the US are not allowed to discriminate on the basis of race, gender, nationality, religion, or disability (and sometimes, depending on state, various other categories). They ARE allowed to discriminate on the basis of language use--a business can say "we only serve people who speak English." Or Spanish. Or whatever. They are allowed to discriminate on the basis of income. They are allowed to discriminate on the basis of education, or criminal record, or zodiac sign, if they care to.

But not disability. A store in the US may not say, "I only sell picture-art, and therefore have no blind customers, and therefore seeing-eye dogs are not welcome in my store." Certainly, he cannot say, "I don't want any customers in wheelchairs and therefore I am not going provide ramps to my door; that would cost too much for customers I don't care about."

Publishers have certainly had plenty of opportunity to provide large-print, braille or audiobooks for visually disabled customers. For the most part, they don't bother. A percentage of the most popular books get audio versions; other than that, publishers have decided it's not worth their money to provide works for the blind.

And now it's being taken out of their hands. Claiming "but there's no incentive for them to develop these works!" is meaningless... if they had a financial incentive, they'd already be developing them.

This is not about making ebooks available for "people who otherwise wouldn't have access"--like people who don't read the original language, or people who don't have a Kindle. This is about not discriminating against people with disabilities, who have such a small market share that businesses are often happy to deny them access in order to save on business costs.

Publishing houses should be happy they're not being required to produce an audio/ebook version for visually impaired customers for every title they make, and offer it the same amount of shelf/web space they have for every other title.

05-31-2009, 07:53 PM	#53
Elfwreck Grand Sorcerer Posts: 5,187 Karma: 25133758 Join Date: Nov 2008 Location: SF Bay Area, California, USA Device: Pocketbook Touch HD3 (Past: Kobo Mini, PEZ, PRS-505, Clié)	The issue here isn't "publishers have/don't have the right to choose their customers." The issue is that businesses (in the US) don't have the right to decide not to make their business accessible to those with disabilities--you can't own a restaurant on the 2nd floor and say, "I don't need an elevator because I don't serve people in wheelchairs. Anyone who can't climb stairs isn't my target demographic and I don't mind losing their business." Businesses in the US are not allowed to discriminate on the basis of race, gender, nationality, religion, or disability (and sometimes, depending on state, various other categories). They ARE allowed to discriminate on the basis of language use--a business can say "we only serve people who speak English." Or Spanish. Or whatever. They are allowed to discriminate on the basis of income. They are allowed to discriminate on the basis of education, or criminal record, or zodiac sign, if they care to. But not disability. A store in the US may not say, "I only sell picture-art, and therefore have no blind customers, and therefore seeing-eye dogs are not welcome in my store." Certainly, he cannot say, "I don't want any customers in wheelchairs and therefore I am not going provide ramps to my door; that would cost too much for customers I don't care about." Publishers have certainly had plenty of opportunity to provide large-print, braille or audiobooks for visually disabled customers. For the most part, they don't bother. A percentage of the most popular books get audio versions; other than that, publishers have decided it's not worth their money to provide works for the blind. And now it's being taken out of their hands. Claiming "but there's no incentive for them to develop these works!" is meaningless... if they had a financial incentive, they'd already be developing them. This is not about making ebooks available for "people who otherwise wouldn't have access"--like people who don't read the original language, or people who don't have a Kindle. This is about not discriminating against people with disabilities, who have such a small market share that businesses are often happy to deny them access in order to save on business costs. Publishing houses should be happy they're not being required to produce an audio/ebook version for visually impaired customers for every title they make, and offer it the same amount of shelf/web space they have for every other title.