[infoshare] Keep the books talking
- From: "Maria" <malyn87@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "Info" <infoshare@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sun, 3 Jun 2007 07:04:26 -0400
Hi folks,
Below is an article which should be of interest to all. Please read.
Maria
Subject: [SeeingHearts] FYI Keep The Books Talking
Date: Thu, 31 May 2007 15:39:15 -0400
Keep the Books Talking
Congress should fund the digitization of a vital audio library for the blind.
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
A HALF-MILLION Americans stand in danger of losing their public library. They
are
the nation's blind, and their library is Talking Books, through which the
National
Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped of the Library of
Congress
(NLS) provides 500,000 Americans with free audio recordings of about as many
books.
Unlike the "books on tape" that are sold at retail bookstores, these recordings
are
unabridged, extensive and diverse -- and are designed for people who have no
other
way of reading print.
Unfortunately, today's Talking Books technology is ready to meet its maker.
The program
currently uses half-speed audiotapes that patrons listen to on special devices.
These
tape players, like the Talking Books record players that preceded them, are
obsolete,
and are no longer even being manufactured. To bring the program into the 21st
century,
the NLS hopes to digitize its entire library and create new players. It has
spent
17 years researching, building and testing new products, and it is ready to
manufacture
a fully accessible flash-drive player. The Library of Congress has asked
Congress
to appropriate about $76.4 million to produce the players and digitize thousands
more books.
A forthcoming Government Accountability Office report, however, may derail the
NLS's
plans. In a draft version of the report completed several weeks ago, the GAO
faulted
the NLS for not considering existing commercial products such as CD players and
iPods
instead of creating a new device. This sounds like a reasonable concern, given
tales
of exorbitant government spending on $792 doormats and $400 hammers. But
creating
special, noncommercial players is crucial to the continued existence of Talking
Books.
Commercially available products, which often use visual screens and are not
labeled
in Braille, are not accessible to the visually impaired. More important, to
comply
with U.S. copyright law, Talking Books can record and distribute only audio
books
that cannot be played by commercial devices.
Should the GAO keep this misguided criticism in its final report, lawmakers
should
not be swayed by it. Instead, Congress should fully fund Talking Books'
digital upgrade,
a project that will grant many disabled Americans the same literary access
afforded
to the sighted.
SOURCE: Washington Post
**Thanks to our friends at Mitsubishi Electric America Foundation for sending us
this article**
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