TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home
News & views on e-books, libraries, publishing and related topics
Robert Kingett: Young, disabled and gifted—and full of opinions on PDF and the Kindle
Friday, July 17th, 2009
Robert Kingett, a witty, gifted writer in Florida, just happens to be a high school student who can barely see.
Tomorrow in the TeleRead blog, he’ll share with us his own personal PDF hell, as well as a partial solution. I invite our friends at Adobe to reply if they’d like. Yes, I know—some of the problem is with the publishers who format and misformat Robert’s e-books. Meanwhile I can at least take heart in Adobe’s advocacy of the reflowable ePub format, which is much, much friendlier to the world’s Kingetts. Perhaps Robert’s words will inspire publishers, retailers and librarians to speed up the switch from PDF to ePub. Hello, OverDrive. I especially hope you’ll pay attention, as a major provider of e-books for public libraries.
Kingett on the Kindle
In the near future, Robert also will be writing up the Kindle. I hope that our readers over at Amazon will pay attention. You really should be willing to go to court if need to be safeguard your customers’ enjoyment of text to speech. It’s not very good PR to knuckle under to publishers and writers’ assault on fair use and accessibility for disabled people. Ideally Robert’s observations will make it worse PR. Hey, guys, read Robert, then do the right thing. Robert’s review, by the way, will cover much more than just the issue of TTS. He is not the biggest fan of the current E Ink, and he’ll explain why. That’s something to ponder amid cries for “A Kindle in every backpack.”
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Burnout, by Stephanie Osborn
SF mystery about a Space Shuttle disaster--and strange deaths on earth. Read a free excerpt at Twilight Times Books and visit Steph's Web page.
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'The Solomon Scandals' novel: Suspense, a newspaper, and a rickety high-rise
Book overview | Buy in E or P
The real Skyline collapse"Same dark zeal Hammett held for Frisco or Chandler had for Los Angeles."
Recommended by Washington City Paper and Epublishers Weekly
