Quite frankly, I'm happy if people read my book-no matter how they end up reading it.

That is something I wholeheartedly agree with. :)

I only bring up NY versus e because many of the arguments I’ve seen from people who insist TTS damages authors, revolve around the fact that, sale for sale, audiobooks put more money in traditional authors’ pockets than ebooks do.

It stands to reason, though, that a higher royalty on ebooks, paired with a low price that would have more people able to purchase (because frankly, if I were vision-impaired and had to choose between four TTS-enabled ebooks or one audiobook, I know where my money would be going), would neutralize or even reverse any potential monetary loss. I want as many readers as possible to have affordable, legal access to my books. I want to make money. I’m having serious trouble finding a relevant downside to TTS.

I’ve never purchased an audiobook. Never had the desire to. But if I did have the desire to, the prices would certainly put severe limitations on the number of them I could purchase. Asking vision-impaired/learning disabled people to pay those kinds of prices or wait indefinitely on someone else’s charity, is deeply unfair. Especially when TTS itself is no more inherently infringing than a VCR. Arguing that a tool like TTS shouldn’t be available because it might be used for infringement is like saying kitchen knives should be banned because people are sometimes stabbed with them.

I would still argue that even a computer with AI equivalent to a human reading a book aloud could still not be considered any different than a human doing the same thing-it might be a performance, and it might be transformative, but infringement would still depend on whether the AI was reading to a single person or small group in privacy, or delivering its rendition to large numbers of people.

Yeah, consider that proviso added on to what I said, with agreement. I’m just trying to say the doomsday scenario is set at the point where there are machines smart enough to be also writing our books, at which point authors have a bigger problem than Kindle TTS rights.

And–let’s set aside the NY versus e-published author thing–I’m NY published, and I don’t think TTS infringes. Neil Gaiman is NY published, and he doesn’t think TTS infringes. (Neil Gaiman is much cooler than I am, so I realize the inherent arrogance of pairing us like that.) How many NY-published authors really have an opinion or (even) care?

Quite frankly, I’m happy if people read my book–no matter how they end up reading it.

Frankly, I find the opposition to TTS surprising – and perhaps, bizarre – because it's akin to having a person arguing an ebook device shouldn't have a Font Size function because it's infringing on author's Large Print rights.

It’s akin to telling a reader he can’t wear glasses when reading, because the words are transformed when they pass through the lenses.

Sorry guys, this cannot be done by computer. Not now. Not in five years. Not in twenty years. This can't be done by computer until the computer understands the book it's reading, which it won't do until we have artificially intelligent computers. We don't. We aren't even freaking close.

I would still argue that even a computer with AI equivalent to a human reading a book aloud could still not be considered any different than a human doing the same thing–it might be a performance, and it might be transformative, but infringement would still depend on whether the AI was reading to a single person or small group in privacy, or delivering its rendition to large numbers of people.

This whole thing is ridiculous. I have no objection to avarice (gimme gimme gimme)–but I think in this case it’s misguided and ultimately self-defeating. Ebooks are still a largely untapped market, but that’s changing, and I’d rather get behind a form of publishing that sells a book that can be accessed by a broad readership for an often very reasonable price and puts a tidy percentage in my pocket, than one whose growth will always be limited by the high costs of production. Again, I assert that if NY authors were making 40% off every ebook they sell, these objections would likely go away–especially since ebooks often cost so much less and are therefore more accessible to readers with limited budgets.

If we’re to consider people who need their books read to them–those with vision impairments, severe dyslexia, etc–authors would be so much better off if they pushed for a better royalty on ebooks and forgot all this TTS nonsense. Audio books are expensive, and charities simply cannot keep up with demand. That leaves those readers either waiting (sometimes forever) for the books they want to be converted by a charity, or purchasing enormously expensive audiobooks. I’d rather have a blind person purchase every one of my books in digital (mmm, money….) than have them buy only one in audio because of money constraints, or a charity’s audio version, for which I get no royalty at all.

And still, even if the technology was perfect, I still can’t say I’d have any real objection to it. Like VCRs, as long as the technology is used in non-infringing ways, it’s fine by me. Once that ebook is in the reader’s hands and their money is in my pocket, they can consume it any way they want–change the text to purple Wingdings, make it three inches high, have their significant other read it aloud. Or if the technology exists, have their computer sing it in vibrato, or transform it into electrical impulses and complex proteins and jack the whole thing directly into their brains. Makes no difference to me, because the ebook they purchased is still only an ebook. Text in digital form.

If Commander Data reads a book aloud to Captain Picard, is he in violation of copyright simply because he's a machine?

Ha. :-)

And the font-size/Large Print right analogy is a really good one.

I suspect that most author's will not share that point of view.

I’m an author–published in ebooks only, so far–and I share the point of view that TTS is not a derivative audio work. IMO, TTS is to books what subtitles are to films–and I’ve never heard anyone argue that subtitles are akin to a “book of the film” and therefore should be handled as separate rights.

Also, TTS is not a performance, no matter who it sounds like. I suppose if someone hooks their Kindle to a microphone and broadcasts it over the net, that would count as a public performance, but that’s quite different from someone using it at home/in their car.

I’m very unhappy with the idea of limiting vision-impaired readers’ access to ebooks. Ebooks are already less accessible than print books (you have to have at least a computer and internet access to read them, and you can’t borrow them or buy them secondhand like you can print books)–I cringe at the idea of making them even less accessible by taking away the TTS facility.

If you sell an e-book. you’re giving the person license to display that work in private. So they can read it on their computer, or download it to a device. They can change the size of the text or render it in high contrast colors. They can even get a digital projector and send the text onto their living room wall and read it that way. I just don’t care. Those are all automated changes in display, and the devices that render them as such are devices that provide display methods, not actual content.

Another automated change in display, one that I think is implied in the ebook license, is the license to convert the text from visual information to tactile information–thus, for instance, this device here can be used to transform ebooks into braille encodings. Again, this is not actual content; it’s a way to deliver information.

TTS isn’t any different. It blindly translates e-book text into the aural equivalent. It is nothing more than a different display.

Audiobooks, on the other hand, are a lot more, and here’s why: The person reading the audio book UNDERSTANDS what is written on the page, and PERFORMS the reading because of it. That’s the transformative part of an audio book: The story is being run through someone else’s brain, and it takes on an additional cast that you could not get anywhere else. Take a step back and think about that–the reason audio books are transformative is because the person who is reading it aloud thinks about the text of the book. It is not read blindly. It is not read stupidly. It even pronounces all the words right.

Sorry guys, this cannot be done by computer. Not now. Not in five years. Not in twenty years. This can’t be done by computer until the computer understands the book it’s reading, which it won’t do until we have artificially intelligent computers. We don’t. We aren’t even freaking close.

If we ever have artificially intelligent computers–ones that can think about the text and transform it–it’s the intelligence that will make the resulting audio work transformational. The read-aloud bit . . . that’s just display.

Why did Amazon reverse themselves on this, about a week after this feature was introduced? My hunch is, someone at the company (belatedly) realized this would go to court very quickly, and that Amazon would lose. It's a slam-dunk. Read the Copyright law.

Because Amazon realised it’ll affect their working relationships with certain organisations and audiobook companies if they chose to ignore their objections.

Audible.com is a Amazon subsidiary and Amazon is looking to corner the digital audiobook market. That’s why Amazon quickly backed down when Authors’ Guild and others raised objections.

Amazon knows the digital audiobook market is one of the fastest growing fields of the digital age (its sales performance is better than the ebook market’s performance, apparently) and they don’t want to miss out on it. And they will if they overruled those objections.

The cynic in me says it’s nothing to do with copyright laws. It’s to do with wanting to protect Amazon itself.

I'd challenge anyone to come up with a technical explanation of why TTS isn't an audiobook

I suspect you’re not usually an audiobook reader (CD/digital/cassette) and haven’t used TTS much because otherwise you wouldn’t ask that or even mention Morgan Freeman.

The biggest technical difference between TTS and an audiobook: the voice actor. That’s one.

The next difference is TTS relies on a program, not an actor, to read text. Your mention of using Morgan Freeman’s voice in TTS still doesn’t make it an audiobook. He can only offer one thing to a TTS engine: his voice. Not his vocal performance, just his voice.

Already over a hundred years old, a typical TTS engine still hasn’t managed to master several issues, due to the limitations of its source-filter-recognition engine. It still can’t handle/identify technical expressions, pronunciations, emotion inflections, grammar styles, foreign words, brand names, unlisted words, heteronyms, accents, abbreviations, and certain names. And there’s the speech synthesis issue and there is a time lag when the recognition engine searches and finds a word in its vocabulary.

With all that in mind, the general recognition of Morgan Freeman’s distinctive voice will be reduced (his voice in TTS format will reveal he can’t use his voice acting ability at all).

From a reader’s point of view, TTS is severely inferior to an audiobook. Not surprising because TTS is practically a vocal transliteration of the written word. This is why TTS is seen as a reading aid.

If the TTS engine and its recognition engine somehow improved during next twenty years, it would still not be recognised as an audiobook because it relies on a program – not a voice actor – to read text.

In short, the voice actor is the biggest technical difference between TTS and an audiobook.

Frankly, I find the opposition to TTS surprising – and perhaps, bizarre – because it’s akin to having a person arguing an ebook device shouldn’t have a Font Size function because it’s infringing on author’s Large Print rights.

I'd challenge anyone to come up with a technical explanation of why TTS isn't an audiobook (particularly now that Jane has admitted that the performative aspect of the work isn't the point.)

TTS isn’t a book of any kind. It’s a reading tool.

Like other tools, such as VCRs and Tivo, it can be used in ways that are infringing (such as using TTS to read an ebook to a large public gathering or over a radio broadcast), and in ways that are not infringing (like plugging in your earbuds and listening in private). IIRC, VCRs were found to be not inherently in violation of copyright because the benefits of their non-infringing uses are outweighed by their potential infringing uses.

An ebook is an ebook. It’s text in digital format. That’s all. If the technology exists for computers to interpret this text in robotic voice, a facsimile of Morgan Freeman, or to the tune of a Verdi opera, it’s still, in the form it is distributed to the consumer, only an ebook.

If we’re debating the definition of transformative as it applies (or doesn’t) to TTS, doesn’t the same definition apply to teachers reading to children in the classroom? Or a conversion program that takes a PDF file and turns it into an epub file? One could argue that the act of reading itself, even in total silence and privacy, is a transformative act. Once the words leave the page and enter the reader’s brain, they become more than just the words.

Since we’re pretending the technology will evolve to the point where TTS will sound like Morgan Freeman, why not take the argument a couple hundred years further into the future. If Commander Data reads a book aloud to Captain Picard, is he in violation of copyright simply because he’s a machine? IMO, a computer’s TTS is nothing more than eyes and a mouth. It doesn’t transform the work. It reads it.

I’m an author. I’m in favor of TTS. Perhaps I would feel differently if, like many authors, I made a pathetic 6-8% royalty on my ebooks, and a larger percentage on audio. But the 30-40% I earn on each ebook I sell more than compensates me for the small fraction of readers who prefer or need to listen to their books. Either way, I’m making a decent buck off the sale. Readers have access to my work, and I have access to their dollars.

If the Authors’ Guild got off their butts and started to push for better ebook royalties for all authors, that’s a campaign I could get behind. And if they were successful, I would imagine all this TTS nonsense would likely go away, like it should.

In the meantime, there’s nothing stopping publishers from disabling TTS on specific ebooks should they wish to. In those cases, vision impaired readers will have to wait until a charity somewhere decides the book they want is worth the expense of recording or rendering in Braille, and that book will be provided at huge cost to a lot of people, including the reader–and the author will get no royalty at all.

Yup, that’s a fine solution right there. Uh huh.

It’s a book that you listen to on headphones. It doesn’t take a lawyer to identify that as an audiobook. Although evidently it does take a lawyer to explain why it isn’t one.

Robin – it doesn't take a legally-grounded analysis to show to reasonable people that Kindle's TTS books are audio books. They are books. They are audio. It's only the defenders of TTS who find themselve knotted up using copyright law to define TTS as something other than audio books.

AG’s position from the beginning has been that TTS is a violation of the author’s copyright, and therefore they have posed it as an inherently legal issue. Authors are concerned because they are being told by AG one of their legal rights is being violated. How can anything *but* a legal analysis be necessary and sufficient here?

Both Robin and I have laid out the position why, legally, TTS isn’t a) a derivative work and b) a public performance. Fixed works is actually an issue that the courts have grappled with in the digital age and it doesn’t apply to text to speech.

Why shouldn’t the consumer be important? As Robin says, the consumers rights have been eroded to a far greater degree than the authors under digital publishing.

I suspect that most author’s will not share that point of view.

Robin – it doesn’t take a legally-grounded analysis to show to reasonable people that Kindle’s TTS books are audio books. They are books. They are audio. It’s only the defenders of TTS who find themselve knotted up using copyright law to define TTS as something other than audio books.

I’d challenge anyone to come up with a technical explanation of why TTS isn’t an audiobook (particularly now that Jane has admitted that the performative aspect of the work isn’t the point.) And if your argument comes down to the definition of “fixed works” in the digital age, I’d wager that Occam’s razor, and common sense, will sway the courts.

And again, I don’t understand why Amazon and the consumer are more important here than the authors who, frankly, are behind it all