Comments on: Federation of the Blind Pushes Back Against Authors Guild

By: Hilcia

Hilcia — Sat, 21 Feb 2009 18:06:03 +0000

Good for the National Federation for the Blind! What a ridiculous argument, position to take…
Funny, when I received notice that my Kindle order was upgraded to the 2.0 and that it had the Text to Speech feature, the first thing my husband and I commented on was how great this feature is for the Blind… and wished that they had expanded the Text to Speech to the Menu for easier access for them. INCREDIBLE!

By: the robot voice of the Kindle 2 « Collection Developments @ Sno-Isle

the robot voice of the Kindle 2 « Collection Developments @ Sno-Isle — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 18:51:20 +0000

[...] the flip side, the National Federation for the Blind is a big supporter of the Text-to-Speech feature of the Kindle 2, specifically addressing the Authors Guild claims in [...]

By: Angie

Angie — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 14:37:52 +0000

And another Good For Them. [nod] This whole thing is ridiculous, and I hope the National Federation of the Blind brings the Author’s Guild enough bad publicity to get them to drop this issue. Maybe being chased off with their collective tail between their legs will make them stop and think next time before they issue any public statements.

Angie

By: Deb Kinnard

Deb Kinnard — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 22:54:42 +0000

I’m not a member, but in my opinion Author’s Guild should have picked their battle. Royalties is where they should have drawn their line in the sand, and rightly so. Maybe they only go to bat against an easy pitcher.

How’s that for metaphor souffle?

By: kirsten saell

kirsten saell — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 20:27:02 +0000

Good for them.

Now when the author’s guild starts telling authors they’re getting ripped off by the “standard” 6-8% NY royalty on ebooks, I’ll stand up and applaud them. Funny, that would probably put a lot more dollars in authors’ pockets than quibbling over whether TTS constitutes audio rights or not.

By: Gemma

Gemma — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 18:11:26 +0000

Good for them.

The key point is that reading aloud in private is the same whether done by a person or a machine, and reading aloud in private is never an infringement of copyright.

I love it when someone can summarize an argument so beautifully.