Some folks have no sense of adventure

I'm talking about the Author's Guild, which cried foul when Amazon unveiled the Kindle 2, saying that it would undermine the audio books market with its text-to-speech function. (Because of course we all know there is no difference between a book eloquently read by a rich human voice and an artificial computerised one.) I think the Author's Guild would make reading aloud to children a violation of rights if possible. If for no other reason, the innovation is great for those with low vision. Now Amazon, although maintaining their text-to-speech functionality is legal, is caving in to a degree by allowing rights holders to determine whether their books will have the capability of speech or not. I guess it's a win-win situation, but I hope they indicate on the Kindle store site so people can choose books based on whether they want text-to-speech or not. I'd really like a Kindle 2 and this functionality is important to me.

Amazon agrees to cripple the Kindle 2

Thanks to jdscott50 on Twitter for the link.