Authors Guild Silent Over iBooks Text-To-Speech 187
Last year we discussed news that the Authors Guild took issue with the Kindle's text-to-speech function, claiming it was illegal for the device to read their books aloud. Amazon disagreed, but said they were willing to disable the feature upon request from rightsholders. Now, jamie notes a recent article by David Pogue at the NY Times in which he points out that Apple's free iBooks app does the same thing, yet the Authors Guild has remained silent. Quoting: "... Now swipe down the page with two fingers to make the iPhone start reading the book to you, out loud, with a synthesized voice. It even turns the pages automatically and keeps going until you tap with two fingers to stop it. Yes, this is exactly the feature that debuted in the Amazon Kindle and was then removed when publishers screamed bloody murder. But somehow, so far, Apple has gotten away with it, maybe because nobody's even realized this feature is in there." That said, the feature was certainly noticed during the launch of the iPad, so perhaps the Authors Guild has other reasons for holding their peace.
Publishers Loves Their DRM (Score:5, Informative)
Since last year the LOC has made a rule [copyright.gov] that DRM breaks are legal if readers are shut out:
Not quite the same... (Score:5, Informative)
FWIW, I had no idea the feature was there. The annoying thing is that you have to turn on Voice Over in the accessibility settings...for the entire phone. So the whole interface of the phone changes (you have to double tap buttons, etc) and it's quite annoying to have it on if it's not something you need. I guess you can turn voiceover on/off at will, but it's a decent amount of hassle.
Re:Does Apple sell books? (Score:3, Informative)
With a statement like that, you'd almost expect Amazon to be selling eBooks at a 60-to-1 ratio [boygeniusreport.com] compared to rival Apple.
Amazon owns audio book company (Score:4, Informative)
Also, fwiw, Amazon owns Audible, the largest purveyor of spoken word books (or "books on tape" as they used to be called)...
Re:so apple does not like blind people? (Score:3, Informative)
So that is why the National Federation of the Blind posted this press release [nfb.org] after the iPad's launch commending Apple for how accesible the iPad is to the blind ?
Removed? (Score:3, Informative)
feature that debuted in the Amazon Kindle and was then removed
No, it wasn't. It was disabled on select books if and only if the publisher specificially demanded it.
Not so 'future' (Score:1, Informative)
> didn't take future technology into account.
I had a BBC Master in the early 80s with a ROM chip that did plain text to speech very effectively. It could have read out books if I had them as text files so for nearly 30 years the technology has been available.
It didn't have a touch screen though.
Re:Not quite the same... (Score:2, Informative)
You can go into settings -> General -> Accessability -> Triple-click Home and set it to "Toggle VoiceOver".
So you're reading the book, you tripleclick the home button, swipe down with two fingers and it starts reading to you. Tap with two fingers to pause the reader. tripleclick home again to turn off VoiceOver.
Not something I'll probably ever use, but it works.
Re:so apple does not like blind people? (Score:5, Informative)
So why not do a simple web search before talking about something you don't actually know?
"When it comes to embedding accessibility, Apple has set the standard in recent years," - Robin Spinks, principal manager of digital accessibility at the Royal National Institute of Blind People.
"The Apple iPad is one hundred percent accessible straight out of the box... Blind individuals can glide a finger over the screen, and as they glide their fingers, the options will be spoken aloud. When the users hear an option that they want to select, they can tap their fingers on that option twice, and the option will then be selected. There is no barrier to us blind folks using the Apple iPad's touch screen." - Waldorf PC
"Even though I have pointed out some access barriers that still need to be overcome, the overwhelming majority of features and functions on the iPad are accessible. I have to applaud Apple for once again producing a tremendous mainstream device with accessibility built-in, and at no extra cost." - Darren Burton, AccessWorld
Re:so apple does not like blind people? (Score:5, Informative)
apparently the BLIND think it's pretty slick
this is the American Foundation for the Blind. ORG
http://www.afb.org/blog/blog_comments.asp?TopicID=6149&FolderID=25 [afb.org]
Yes, it's an all-touch-screen device. Yes, I've always said that touch screens and blind people don't go together -- it's suggested, usually by slightly dumb people, that I could just memorize where all the icons were and then I could touch the screen at the right spot and get the right thing to happen... Do they really think they could withdraw $100 from an ATM that way? Dial a phone?
But, the iPhone and iPad have an ingenious and delightful interface that actually makes the touch screen a pleasure to use.
There will be a proper, full-featured review of the iPad in AccessWorld soon. These are just the first impressions of a so-far-happy customer.
here's more.
http://www.afb.org/afbpress/pub.asp?DocID=aw110206 [afb.org]
Re:The guild doesn't care because it sucks so bad (Score:3, Informative)
Honestly, it wouldn't be much better than current text-to-speech. The problem isn't the computer voice...sure, its cheesy but I could get used to that. The problem is everything else. The phrasing, the intonation, the flow of the words. These are things that make TTS laughable. A database of some voice actor reading every word in the language wouldn't help this at all.