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.
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