Protests Against The Authors Guild For Forcing Amazon To Disable Kindle TTS
from the freedom-to-innovate dept
We were surprised and disappointed when Amazon gave in to the Authors Guild's baseless claim that the TTS somehow violated its copyrights. It looks like a lot of others are disappointed as well. A group is now organizing a protest against the Authors Guild for trying to determine whether or not Amazon was allowed to innovate. As the EFF notes, "The publishing industry shouldn't have veto power over new technology." If you're in New York City, you should look into the details of the protest on Tuesday.
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Filed Under: authors guild, innovation, kindle, protest, tts
Companies: amazon, authors guild
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Imagine if one of your hardcover books on which you previously made $.61 when it sold for $24.95, now sells on the Kindle for just $9.99.
Do your homework!
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Re:
Can you point out where, in copyright law, there's a separate "reading aloud" right? If not... then, you are wrong.
Bad enough they have taken a huge pay cut on Kindle ebooks, now they are expected to give up all their audiobook royalties too?
First of all, this does not give up all audiobook royalties (nice try, though!). Audiobooks are derivative works, because they are recorded (in fixed form). Having a computer read aloud is not a derivative work because it's not in fixed form.
Finally, you are not granted a right to a stream of income. I'm not sure why you think you have.
Do your homework!
I did. You, however, obviously have not.
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Re: Author Renegotiation
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One, Microsoft Sam (or kindle equivalent) reading a book is nothing close to an Audio Book. Not only that, but having a computer scan the words and synth a voice to read a book costs the Author absolutely nothing. No extra work on their part, so why should they get paid? Audio books, on the other hand, require actors, studio time, etc.
I'm sick of the entertainment industry and their entitlist attitudes thinking that they should get paid 15 times for one act of creativity. It's disgusting.
Two, The books on the kindle are *over-priced* at $9.99, seeing as they cost $0.00 to reproduce. I would venture to say since they do no extra work for putting a book in ebook format, getting any money at all would be a bonus.
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This issue becomes far bigger as technology advances. It reminds me of Google Books' balls in going and just taking content until someone says "um, hey, now, did you notice that isn't yours?" You can't just release content in different forms until someone tells you to stop.
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GET REAL.
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Audiobook royalties: I haven't heard the kindle's computer voice reading the books, but I can imagine it does character voices, proper inflection, carry emotion with the words. Plus it isn't a celebrity voice. Audiobooks are only worth anything if it is more than just the words being read out loud.
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No!
Authors don't take any pay cut from Kindle versions. Amazon is selling most of them at a loss. The publishers set the same price for Kindle version that they do for print versions, and Amazon has to pay.
Before spouting nonsense, take a look at a Kindle book on Amazon... See that "Digital List Price"? That's the price on which the royalty is based... See how it's the same as the print price?
TTS is *vastly* different than an audiobook. If you'd ever listened to them both, you'd know that. People who like audiobooks aren't going to be satisfied with TTS.
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Re: No!
I do agree though in one sense. I mean, the authors guild did agree that the chances are that someone is going to listen to the TTS are slim, however, if the tech keeps progressing...it's only a matter of time before the quality does get good enough to compete with the audiobook market.
Legally, this is a no-brainer. However, I do see the point of the author's guild in a sense of where this could potentially go if left unmentioned.
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Re: No!
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sigh
Hmm, whatever happened to those "criminal interference with a business model" lawsuits? If there were ever a legitimate reason for one, now is the time for Amazon to fire it off. "One-click" lawsuit launcher, lol.
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Today, we gather to mourn the loss of robotic voices everywhere
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I don't think TTS is a threat
TTS is not an audio book and vice versa.
Comparing cost of print books to electronic ones is disingenuous. There aren't any printing costs, shipping costs, warehouse/inventory space etc. So a $24.95 print book vs. a $9.99 is probably a significant *increase* in profit for the publisher.
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I'm protesting
Frak it, I don't need an optional machine that can turn off my rights remotely.
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Product in search of a market.
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Leave Them A Message On Their Web Page Here
http://www.authorsguild.org/inform_us.html
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Speaking of DRM-free, Amazon does have an awesome MP3 store that is DRM-free with a large selection and often good prices. It would be nice if they had the same thing with books.
On the note about Amazon, I recently came across an interesting table that details the discounts on Amazon.
It is at http://www.uberi.com
Maybe someone will find it useful too.
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I completely agree. Amazon's MP3 store is fantastic. From day one the products were DRM-free.
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And I thought I needed to get a life.
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Association of Blind Citizens To Webcast Authors Guild Protest
The Association of Blind Citizens, ABC, will produce a live webcast of
the Reading Rights Coalition, RRC, protest being held at The Authors
Guild in New York City. The webcast will begin on Tuesday April 7th
between 11:45 A.M. and 12:00 P.M. EDT
Listeners around the world can access the web page:
http://blindcitizens.org/live
which has information and links for listening to the live event. It
is recommended that you access this web page prior to the event so
that you can install the Talking Communities conference web browser
component in advance. A flash based and mp3 stream may also be
available at the above web address.
The Reading Rights Coalition is a joint effort made up of 27
organizations representing upwards of 15 million Americans who are
blind or otherwise unable to readily use traditional print. RRC
organizations and members will collectively protest the discriminatory
separate but not equal stance of the Authors Guild as it relates to
Ebooks and the Amazon Kindle 2 text to speech audio feature.
"The water company does not charge separate rates for the use of water
depending on whether the consumer is drinking it or using it to wash
dishes; it simply
charges for the amount of water used. By the same token, an e-book is
not inherently visual or aural, and to claim that reading it either
visually or aurally
should cost a different price is discriminatory."
http://readingrights.org
The RRC web site, above, has in depth information regarding the
protest, an electronic peitition, and other background and resource
material.
The board of directors of ABC, as well as all RRC organizations
collectively, encourage you to sign the online petition, attend the
protest in person or virtually, and sign up on the RRC web page to
receive action alerts and updates.
Contact:
Mika Pyyhkala
Vice President
Association of Blind Citizens
Google Voice/SMS: (617) 202-3497
pyyhkala@gmail.com
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The issue is not about the authors making more money from ebook sales, it is simply to ensure that they do not lose their right to make money from spoken versions of their work. If the precedent is set now, then in twenty years' time when you *can* make your Kindle speak with the voice of Jim Dale or Rob Ingles, and standalone audiobooks die out because people can buy two formats for the price of one, authors - most of whom do *not* sell books in their millions like JK Rowling - won't have a leg to stand on wand will lose a substantial source of income. I don't know about in the US, but in the UK publishers are legally required to make available 'accessible' formats of all their titles for the visually impaired, and usually licence popular books for the RNIB to convert for a nominal fee as well (the fee being there to make sure that the transaction is legal), so the ABC argument doesn't really stand up, either (this may be a stupid question, but why would a blind person want to buy an ebook over an mp3 anyway?).
The whole concept of royalties is that the more popular a book is, and the more people want to buy your words in the order that you put them down on paper, the more money you, as the creator of the work, get. Allowing the Kindle the 'reading aloud' rights (which do exist - they're called 'single voice reading rights'. Ever heard a book serialised on the radio? Paid money to see someone read poetry on stage? Any reading aloud done for profit is subject to royalty fees) without raising any queries would open up a whole can of worms as to what an author can or cannot expect to get paid for in future. As long as the rights are listed and sold separately to Amazon(probably, for now, the most obvious thing to do would be to sell them for a nominal fee as part of an ebook 'bundle' since the text-to-speech feature is still pretty basic) there is no problem; it's only when spoken and written versions of someone's work become legally inseparable that the problem arises. This is especially true if it's resulting in increased profits for the retailer that don't trickle down to the author.
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