Hatchette takes stand on text-to-speech functionality of ebook readers…kind of

Jul 03 2009

In an article posted on Publishers Weekly yesterday, Hatchette Book Group released a statement trying to clarify its position on text-to-speech functionality of ebooks – a hot-button issue after the Authors Guild objected to the feature on the Kindle. The main argument for their objection was that TTS infringed on the copyright of audio books.

The argument against text-to-speech is ridiculous and only goes to show how outdated our copyright laws really are. I’m not going to re-hash my reasons for taking this stand, but you can read what I wrote earlier on this post Amazon caves to pressure on Kindle 2 text-to-speech feature.

As far as Hatchette goes, they didn’t really take a stand on TTS other than towing the same line as Amazon:

Hachette pretty much follows the Amazon position, saying that unless its authors object, it has no issue with adding TTS for the vast majority of its books. The only exceptions, HBG said, would be for “books that fall within our audio publishing program or specialized circumstances like memoirs, where the author or character’s voice is an artistic element of the work. Under such circumstances HBG reserves the right to request that the functionality be disabled.”

Way to take a firm stand (snark)! Even under the circumstances they mentioned, like a memoir or other work where the voice is an artistic element of the work, TTS would hardly take away from those types of audio books. Why? Because TTS is not designed to be an ‘artistic expression’ of any kind, rather, it’s supposed to help those who may have a hard time with the text for whatever reason.

After taking such a miserable stand on the TTS issue, Hatchette has the audacity to say this:

Hachette further noted that TTS “technology is likely to be a feature on an increasing number of devices in the coming months, and HBG recognizes the value of such functionality to individuals with impaired vision or similar disabilities.”

TTS is valuable to people with disabilities unless the author objects, right? Or until the audio book is considered a ‘work of art’ and can’t be threatened by a computer-generated voice, right? I find it inconceivable that a large publisher like Hatchette can pick and chose the types of works that would be fair to use TTS, and works that wouldn’t.

As I mentioned earlier, cases like this represent a good reason why the US needs to totally re-write and update our copyright laws to specifically address issues of emerging technology, such as TTS. Until then, publishers and large corporations like Amazon will continue to dictate their own skewed interpretation of copyright and then enforce it on an unsuspecting public.

In other words, something needs to change, and fast!

One Response

I tried using my mac’s ‘text to mp3′ to do the computer speaking voice within my Youtube video. Trust me, speech synthesizers work great, you should use them too! One problem I had was when it tried to pronounce some ‘fake’ words like ‘woosh’, but with practice it’s easy

nicaragua tv 2/17/2010 2:27 pm