A problem I see with the wording of your proposal is that a publisher could issue, say, an .epub edition with DRM, and then argue that this meant the DRM-free .epub edition that had been published for the disabled could no longer be distributed. Also, as a lifetime library reader, I’d like to see greater distribution of e-books in libraries before an “either it’s commercially available or it’s available for the disabled” situation is put into place. If, for example, Bookshare.org distributed all of its electronic texts as .epub editions, and if Simon & Schuster said, “No, you can’t distribute our books any more, because we have commercially published those books in .epub format,” the chances of me actually being able to get my hands on those e-books at a library would be practically nill.

So what it comes back to is the lesson that TeleRead was founded to emphasize: the need for greater availability of e-books through the library system.

Thanks for clarifying that point. I believe it was an unfortunate choice that the copyright clause was worded the way that it was. It has had the net effect of downgrading the importance of persons with disabilities as a viable market for audiobooks and ebooks.

In response, I have formulated a new copyright clause that would encourage publishers to address the needs of persons who have different reading needs than the majority. It would shift the responsibility for reaching all members of the public back towards the publisher, which is where it belongs. You can read this, and a few other essays in this vein, at my site.

Mr. Martinengo, I know that I don’t need to explain this to you, but for the sake of others reading this thread, who might not be aware of this, the reason that the blindness community developed a special format for the blind is
because there’s a U.S. copyright clause that allows organizations to publish books in special formats for the blind without permission from publishers. This copyright clause does not allow organizations to publish books for the blind in formats that are ordinarily used by the sighted. Hence the need for a special format. To cite one example, Bookshare.org could not legally continue to operate if it distributed its book in epub format, but it can legally distribute its books in DAISY, since that format is only used by the blind and by other print-impaired readers.

Here’s the copyright clause in question. As it says, such books may “not be reproduced or distributed in a format other than a specialized format exclusively for use by blind or other persons with disabilities.”

I agree that DAISY is a niche format that won’t be of much use to most publishers, but I think there are a few publishers who might want to make a special effort to reach blind readers, in the same way that they might want to reach other niche audiences. In any case, this tool is wonderfully helpful to organizations for the blind, who now have an easy way to translate documents into DAISY for their readers.

Bill Gates spoke to the audience, and his comments were recorded, along with the rest of the meeting, and posted as audio files on the DAISY website (not sure if they are still there somewhere).

The funny thing is, when I listened to big Bill’s comments a few times, it really seemed like he was questioning why you would want a ’special’ format such as DAISY at all. It didn’t sound like he was in favor of a format focused on people with disabilities, just one good, accessible document format (like, say, Microsoft’s… but that’s his job).

If you look at the technical specs, many ideas from DAISY were incorporated into epub, and I believe this is acknowledged by the IDPF. Given that, it would seem to make more sense to encourage publishers to use epub than to ’save as DAISY’, which is always going to be a niche format.