Hachette Group Supports Text-to-Speech on E-books
Printer-friendly versionHachette Book Group statement on Text to Speech functionality (July 2, 2009)
Hachette Book Group (“HBG”) is willing to support Text to Speech functionality more widely for the titles they publish in digital book format. “We have a primary duty to respect our authors’ wishes,” said Chairman and CEO David Young. “If our authors do not object,” he continued, “then, based on the current technology, we would not take issue with the availability of this functionality for the vast majority of our books, excluding 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.
Text to Speech 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.
HBG has a long history of working closely with the disabled community – including, most recently, entering an extensive partnership with BookShare, the world’s largest online library for people with print disabilities, to make thousands of HBG titles available to members of that community. HBG has been a longtime supporter of the Association of American Publishers’ extensive work with disabilities advocates on behalf of the industry. In addition, HBG received the American Foundation for the Blind’s Helen Keller Award in 2004 in recognition of the company’s support of and service to the visually impaired.
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