As many of you know, we are engaged in a campaign to obtain access
for the blind and others with print disabilities to e-books available
for Amazon's new Kindle 2 e-book reader. The new reader, which Amazon
is working to make fully accessible to the blind, has the ability to
use text-to-speech to read these e-books aloud; but under pressure
from the Authors Guild, Amazon has announced that authors and
publishers will be allowed to disable the text-to-speech function.
The National Federation of the blind has joined with over twenty
other organizations to create the reading Rights Coalition, which has
set up an on-line petition to urge the Authors Guild and Amazon to
reverse course. Please read and sign the petition here:
<http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/We-Want-To-Read>http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/We-Want-To-Read
Please note: If you are using screen access technology, the first
three fields on the form to sign the petition may not be announced.
They are, in order: (1) a drop-down menu from which to select your
prefix (Mr., Mrs., etc.); (2) an edit field for your first name, and
(3) an edit field for your last name. the rest of the fields should
announce themselves as you tab to them. If you still have trouble
filling out the form, please send the following information to
<mailto:readingrights@xxxxxxx>readingrights@xxxxxxx and we will be
happy to sign on your behalf. You will need to send us your name,
address, e-mail address, and any personal comments you would like to
make about this issue. Thank you so much for your participation in
this critically important effort.
Sincerely:
Chris Danielsen
Director of Public Relations
National Federation of the Blind
P.S. Once you have signed the petition, please be sure to forward the
link to all of the contacts in your address book that you believe
will support us in this cause.
