Shut Up, Kindle
by John Paczkowski
Posted on February 27, 2009 at 4:55 PM PT
Rather than argue with the Authors Guild over the text-to-speech feature of its new Kindle 2 e-book reader, Amazon is modifying the device’s software to make it optional. Authors and publishers will now be able to decide if they want the function enabled or not on titles for which they own the rights. Amazon (AMZN) announced the move in a statement released late Friday afternoon, in which it also said it believes the Kindle’s text-to-speech function to be legal:
Kindle 2’s experimental text-to-speech feature is legal: no copy is made, no derivative work is created, and no performance is being given. Furthermore, we ourselves are a major participant in the professionally narrated audiobooks business through our subsidiaries Audible and Brilliance. We believe text-to-speech will introduce new customers to the convenience of listening to books and thereby grow the professionally narrated audiobooks business. Nevertheless, we strongly believe many rightsholders will be more comfortable with the text-to-speech feature if they are in the driver’s seat.
Therefore, we are modifying our systems so that rightsholders can decide on a title by title basis whether they want text-to-speech enabled or disabled for any particular title. We have already begun to work on the technical changes required to give authors and publishers that choice. With this new level of control, publishers and authors will be able to decide for themselves whether it is in their commercial interests to leave text-to-speech enabled. We believe many will decide that it is.
The move comes on the heels of a meandering New York Times editorial in which Roy Blount Jr., president of the Authors Guild, argued that the Kindle’s roboticized nondramatic book readings are a threat to the audio book market.
Comments
DRM is stoopid.
Posted by Dave Barnes at February 27th, 2009 at 7:20 pmIt does not do what the luddites (e.g., Roy Blount) desire.
Just pathetic, Amazon, pathetic. I can’t believe they caved to the luddites. Someone needs to inform Mr. Blount the majority of books being published today don’t have audio book versions or many of those that do only offer abridged ones.
But hey, no problem, charging people twice or what the heck, three times for the same book will make us more money. The publishers are quickly on their way to treating their best customers worse than the record industry.
A recipe for disaster once books be they audio or text start hitting the P2P networks.
Posted by Ted Todorov at February 28th, 2009 at 9:36 pmThere is no truth to the rumor that parents would have to join AFTRA as reading to kids would be considered as a performance, and be paid out of kids piggy banks.
The Authors Guild has decided that it will not interfere with people’s right to move their lips when they read.
The Guild is also deciding whether or not to charge an extra fee if people read the same book twice.
This whole thing has an RIAA feel to it, don’t you think? DRM was a failure for the music industry, and this just seems like a replay of it.
If publishers want to sell e-books (and they do), they will allow their content to be expressed in this way. For years, blind readers have purchased scanners to do this very thing for them. Not every book has an audio audience that can justify itself. This is a marvelous way to address those issues, and another benefit for keeping content digital and flexible.
After all, what could be better than having a computer reader rather than a human one who exhales environment-destroying CO2?
Posted by Joe Webb at March 1st, 2009 at 9:31 am