US DOJ Says Kindle In Classroom Hurts Blind Students

angry tapir writes "Three US universities will stop promoting the use of Amazon.com's Kindle DX e-book reader in classrooms after complaints that the device doesn't give blind students equal access to information. Settlements with Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Pace University in New York City and Reed College in Portland, Oregon, were announced Wednesday by the US Department of Justice. The National Federation of the Blind and the American Council of the Blind had complained that use of the Kindle devices discriminates against students with vision problems."

Comments

Hmm, this seems illogical.

[tivoKlr]

How does the kindle discriminate against the blind any more than, say, A BOOK?

Re:Hmm, this seems illogical.

[Anonymous Coward]

As a partially sighted person[1] I'm trying to figure this out...hang on...um...uh..nearly there...uh...no.

Nope sorry, no idea. Still I'm sure The National Federation of the Blind and the American Council of the Blind are patting themselves on the back for holding back the majority of students while in no way impacting any partially sighted or blind student in any way what-so-ever. Good for them!

[1]: I have partial sight in my right eye due to several holes in my retina, one of which is directly in the center of my vision.

Re:Hmm, this seems illogical.

[Soilworker]

books company didn't stop releasing books in braille after the kindle release, blind student still can buy them.

How is it a unfair advantage ? I should always wear something that cover my eyes because it's unfair for them if I can see with my two eyes ?

Re:Hmm, this seems illogical.

[iamhassi]

"How does the kindle discriminate against the blind any more than, say, A BOOK?"

Simple: by forcing Amazon to come out with a new device that caters more to their needs, 0.3% of the population (~1 million blind vs 300 million Americans) forces the other 99.7% of the population to pay for all the hardware and software advances required for them to use the device.

Completely fair IMHO

Re:Hmm, this seems illogical.

[maxume]

I have this notion that electronic copies of books might even be more accessible, as there is no need to do any OCR; I guess if the students in question are already used to using some system that isn't compatible...

Re:Hmm, this seems illogical.

[Anonymous Coward]

Same. I don't understand what the fuck these people are thinking. I'm "legally" blind and the Kindle is great because you can set the text size. You can't do that with a book. And for fully blind people, wouldn't it be easier, rather than harder, to pipe digital text to a braille reader?

This (again, as someone who is legally blind) is just stupid people being stupid.

Re:Hmm, this seems illogical.

[davester666]

None of the university e-books have text-to-speech enabled for them, in order to preserve the jobs of human text to speech convertors.

Re:Hmm, this seems illogical.

[mabhatter654]

exactly, see here!

http://news.slashdot.org/story/09/02/28/0127236/Amazon-Caves-On-Kindle-2-Text-To-Speech

The DOJ didn't exactly stick up for Amazon when they enabled text-to-speech by default for all Kindle books.... Now they claim they can't use them because it's "unfair" to blind people.... Blind people can't read EVERY book without help.... kindle make it cheaper for the rest of us to have materials. There are SPECIAL programs and credits to convert material for blind people that schools are supposed to offer... not turn off stuff for the rest of us!!

Re:Hmm, this seems illogical.

[evil_aar0n]

Is there a law that says devices of this sort must have equal access for handicapped users?

I'm deaf. When I go to movies, I get only half of the experience of "normal" viewers because I don't get the dialog. Should I sue the producers and the theater chains because they don't caption movies for me? No. I simply wait until it comes out on DVD and watch it on my TV, with captioning enabled.

It sucks for blind people, in general. Granted, the Kindle doesn't help them. However, they've no business taking it out on the Kindle or universities that find it a useful tool. Adapt. It's what we do.

Re:Hmm, this seems illogical.

[IndustrialComplex]

Well, books can be typed in braille, the kindle cannot...

You aren't typing a fucking kindle. Sorry but this kind of bullshit is nonsense. If you have a blind student, print out a one-off Braille book.

You could probably print blind books for every damned blind student in the US for the next hundred years with the money that was wasted on even investigating this whole thing.

Re:Hmm, this seems illogical.

[mysidia]

Professors commonly use materials in class that aren't available in braille form.

But this might be because classes are normally small and I never had a blind person in my class in 4 years...

Maybe there aren't that many blind people at public universities, and dumbing down education for everyone just to make things more convenient for a small fraction of the population, is unreasonable?

I can think of a lot of accomadations that are more reasonable than globally restricting the medium that may be used in classrooms.

If the kindle is to be banned on this basis, then this must apply to other eBook readers too, and other electronic media, such as the use of web/internet-based sites as resources.

Sorry folks, all professors with a "class web page" must now turn these off, since blind and quadroplegic folken can't surf the web anyways.

No actual art can be displayed in 'visual arts appreciation class', to ensure blind people have a fair shot at an A.

And... also, no actual music will be allowed in music appreciation class, to ensure equal access by deaf people.

Re:Hmm, this seems illogical.

[MikeFM]

My sister has cerebral palsy so I do realize that disabilities can be a major issue. However, I have frequently been frustrated by disabled people that feel entitled and even more by organizations that are unreasonable in their demands. I can totally see asking Amazon to make sure the Kindle has support for reading aloud or via touch terminal but asking for people not to use the device seems completely crazy. So what if a blind deaf quadapalegic can't use the device - so nobody can? My sister would be hard pressed to use any device so I should just sue to have laptops, ebooks, iPods, motor vehicles, soda machines, etc removed? I have a grudge I admit. I've had handicapped people come in and complain that somebody was parked to close to the line of the handicapped space at my store even though there were six other spaces equally good for their needs right there. People who complain that their one-of-a-kind five foot wide wheelchair has trouble getting to the bathroom. They aren't asking for help, which would be reasonable, but instead are just bitching. I'm not unfamiliar with the issues and make an effort to keep things friendly but you literally can't make things perfect for everyone. I get tired of people yelling and threatening lawsuits at every little thing.

Re:Hmm, this seems illogical.

[MikeFM]

Blind users should sue publishers that disable text to speech. They are the bastards to blame.

I don't understand

[93 Escort Wagon]

Okay, I do understand the technicalities regarding why they say the Kindle is not as accessible to blind students as it is to sighted students. But what I don't get is - how is it different from the status quo? Blind students can't read regular textbooks already. What is it we can do for them with a printed textbook that we can't do with an electronic textbook?

And don't bring up braille, since that is a separate edition that has to be produced (and is thus independent of whether the "normal" book is on paper or electronic).

Somebody please tell the DOJ

[Vinegar Joe]

That Harrison Bergeron is a warning........not a fucking "how-to" manual.

http://www.tnellen.com/cybereng/harrison.html

Re:Amazon should love this precedent

[m.ducharme]

So, all Amazon needs to do is turn back on the text-to-speech feature...

DOJ in classroom...

[Dog-Cow]

The DOJ in the classroom hurts everyone.

Lowest Common Denominator mentality

[syousef]

"If you can have it and I can't I'll sue" - Pretty soon kids are lucky to have access to food and clothing, let alone an education. It's a losing strategy compared to say innovating and catering to diversity. Why can't they lobby for an ebook reader that does cater to the blind. Perhaps popup braile? Instead of wasting effort sending all your kids minds back to the stone age. Doesn't have to be a Kindle either. Leave the brand names out of it.

In other news

[ChrisMaple]

There aren't any blind NASCAR drivers.

oh god

[Idimmu Xul]

maybe they can force sighted students to wear blindfolds in class in future so that the blind have equal footing

Shhhhh

[Archangel Michael]

You're talking COMMON SENSE there. If you're not careful, the agents of PC and Government interference will show up and arrest you.

Canadian Healthcare like this too

[Rene S. Hollan]

It is illegal for a resident of Canada covered by Canadian health care (say, a citizen, or landed immigrant) to pay for health care, and illegal for a health care provider to charge if they are in the "voluntary" system (which covers 99%+ of the population who can not legally pay anyway) which effectively forces almost all providers to be "in" the system. (There are specialty private clinics catering to non-citizen athletes, etc.)

This is similar to the socialized medicine systems in Cuba and North Korea (but, not, for example, the U.K. and other places with "two tier" socialized health care systems).

The argument is exactly this: it is unfair for some to have what others do not, even if they can pay for it.

This has some interesting effects: When I displayed my American-born son's American passport, he was seen in the clinic ahead of any Canadians who were there ahead of him. See, non-covered persons must pay, and pay more than the clinic receives from the government, so they get first dibs while Canadians wait in line.

Re:Ebooks not the problem, kindle navigation is

[spun]

No, it isn't more accessible. Without navigation, it is completely inaccessible. But the fix is very easy: tie the user interface into the text-to speech application that already exists on the device. This publicity will ensure that happens in a very timely fashion.