[bksvol-discuss] Re: Thoughts About Quality Ratings
- From: "Kaitlyn" <kaitlyn@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sun, 14 May 2006 19:00:41 -0700
HI Monica,
You said, I think that if Bookshare wants better quality control, it will
need to be very clear on what is acceptable. I think Bookshare will also
need to provide their tool during the submission process to rate the quality
for the submitter and possibly make arrangements for submitters to purchase
proper tools at a group discount rate so that everyone can submit perfect
scans. Until then, you will continue to see scans with the wrong rating and
lots of poorly scanned books entering the collection, especially from people
who aren't on the volunteers list.
When you upload a book after validating you do get a rank spelling kicked
back from the system along with an adult content number.
The last book you did of mine I did read through so in the spirit of things
it was validated. I have validated a couple of my books but in general I
submit them and let another member do the validating.
It is true that there are some differences in K1000 and OpenBook and also
between Finereader and Scansoft. There is also differences in skill levels
of the end users. At this time I know when you purchase Kurzweil you get a
$25 discount when you join bookshare. I am not sure how much the
manufacturers of Kurzweil and Openbook would be to giving discounts since
both are adaptive and a limited market compared to Finereader and Scansoft.
Maybe something could be worked out with the later two since these are mass
marketed programs and might be in a better position to discount the
software.
One other approach might be is to start working toward state agencies to
include scanning software with systems that are purchased for clients. IT
still comes down to funding where at the low end scanning software starts at
about $500 to $1,000.
I would like to see some stronger guidelines on the ratings. I was real
unsure when I first started as a volunteer here on how to rate a book. I was
a volunteer for about six months before earning enough credits for a
membership so didn't have an idea of ratings until I was able to download
some books from the general library and see.
OH, And, Happy Mother's Day to all the wonderful mothers out there:)
Katie Hill
Kaitlyn@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
You, who are thirsty, come hither: if, by chance, the fountain
fails,
The goddess has, by degrees, prepared the everlasting waters.
translation by fulcanelli of an inscription on the
statue of maitre plerre, which stood on the parvis of
Notre-Dame-de-Paris until its removal in 1748
-----Original Message-----
From: bksvol-discuss-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:bksvol-discuss-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Monica Willyard
Sent: Sunday, May 14, 2006 2:30 PM
To: bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [bksvol-discuss] Thoughts About Quality Ratings
>I have seen several comments from Jill and others about submitters
>not caring about the quality of books they submit. There are two
>issues that aren't being accounted for when these comments are
>made. Because of them, I feel both hurt and offended by the comments.
>First, those of us who are not fortunate enough to have K1000 have
>no way to rank spelling. We who use Openbook cannot easily see what
>our accuracy rate is. We also do not have the same ability to
>control brightness or rescan pages with a different OCR engine like
>K1000 users do.
>Second, Bookshare's instructions for both submissions and
>validations are vague about which quality rating to apply to a
>scan. When I started out here in January, my scans looked pretty
>good to me, and I rated a few as excellent. Then I got to see some
>of Katie's scans and realized that mine aren't so excellent after
>all. No one told me how to rate my scans during my first several
>submissions. It was a subjective call for me, and I had little to
>compare my work to since books in the collection have been cleaned
>up and validated. I think it is unfair to say that the submitter
>doesn't care about producing good scans when not all tools are
>created equal and the criteria for ratings isn't definite or clearly
explained.
I think that if Bookshare wants better quality control, it will need
to be very clear on what is acceptable. I think Bookshare will also
need to provide their tool during the submission process to rate the
quality for the submitter and possibly make arrangements for
submitters to purchase proper tools at a group discount rate so that
everyone can submit perfect scans. Until then, you will continue to
see scans with the wrong rating and lots of poorly scanned books
entering the collection, especially from people who aren't on the
volunteers list.
Monica
Visit my blog at: http://plumlipstick.livejournal.com
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