[bksvol-discuss] Re: Pirate lists and Bookshare.org
- From: "Pratik Patel" <pratikp1@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: <bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Wed, 16 Nov 2005 06:44:31 -0500
Jim,
You may also want to post this on the general bookshare list.
Pratik
Pratik Patel
Director, CUNY Assistive Technology Services (CATS)
The City University of New York
pratik.patel@xxxxxxxxxxx
_____
From: bksvol-discuss-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:bksvol-discuss-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Jim@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Wednesday, November 16, 2005 6:05 AM
To: bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [bksvol-discuss] Pirate lists and Bookshare.org
I had an interesting experience this last weekend while heading to Tunisia
to speak on building a global library for people with print disabilities
(will post a link to my talk on my blog shortly). I had heard that there
was a list that posts ebooks for blind people, and I signed up for it. I
was quickly kicked off, but not before I found out that people were sharing
Bookshare.org books freely through this list.
Now, I was aware long before Bookshare.org was created that print-disabled
people were sharing books that they had scanned. I don't have a problem
with it, whatever its legal status is. But, when someone shares a
Bookshare.org book on such a list, that's a problem. Our deal with
publishers is that we take copyright law seriously, and they give us a fair
amount of freedom to pursue our mission. Our digital rights management
strategy is designed to give our users tremendous flexibility to use the
books for each person's needs. We call it a "weak locks, strong social
pressure" model. But, it means that we have to suspend folks who we find
out have been violating our agreement with them to not share Bookshare.org
books.
Not all publishers like what we do. One person at a leading publisher has
been torpedoing the national conversation around accessible books by
claiming that we and RFB&D are dishonest. This has been only partially
successful, because we have a reputation for taking our obligations
seriously. I used to be able to claim I was not aware of Bookshare.org
books being shared illegally. No longer. And, we are obligated to take
action to police this, efforts I'd rather be spending on improving
Bookshare.org and expanding our collection.
We have been working for over a year to get access to the giant book
scanning projects being operated by Amazon and Google. Getting our hands on
these books depends on our ability to represent that we are not a conduit
for these books to be leaked out onto the Internet.
My goal is that people with disabilities all over the world have access to
books that is at least as good as that for people without disabilities. I
want your help to reach that goal. The most important help we need from you
is to respect your agreements with Bookshare.org. Don't pass our books
along to anyone else. And, please don't contribute books to Bookshare.org
from a source other than your own efforts. These parallel efforts will
probably go on, especially for people in countries that don't have laws that
provide legal options for access. But, don't pull Bookshare.org into this.
We will be significantly hampered in our efforts to build access for
hundreds of thousands of people with disabilities if we lose our reputation
for respecting our social bargain with authors and publishers.
Jim Fruchterman
President and CEO
Benetech
480 California Avenue, Suite 201
Palo Alto, California 94306 USA
+1 650 475-5440 extension 106
Fax: +1 650 475-1066
jim@xxxxxxxxxxxx
www.benetech.org <http://www.benetech.org/>
The Benetech Initiative - Technology Serving Humanity
Benetech is a nonprofit organization
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