Meanwhile, please trust David and me. From an accessibility perspective, the Kindle Basic is a mess without doubt. First, the TTS interface is more complicated than it should be for the blind. I’ve described if you things Amazon could do to remedy this. Second, Amazon itself has conceded that the interface is not appropriate for sighted users. What about seeing people with dyslexia and other problems who could benefit from TTS? Or exercisers or commuters? Don’t we want to get kids both moving and exercising? Third, the Kindle is a disaster for certain people who are not blind but who suffer from visual impairments. I can jump up and down and swear that’s true based on personal experience. I’m not low vision, but I do have a contrast sensitivity issue, and if Amazon is doing such a great job, why must I use Calibe to boldface the books I’m reading to enjoy them to the max? Why should we need more data points, except to further establish ways in which Amazon isn’t serving users?

My intention here is not to bash Amazon – in fact, the opposite. The more knowledgeably it can address the Kindle’s accessibility shortcomings, the more comprehensively it can correct them and sell more hardware and books and earn well-deserved goodwill.

(Speech recognition-related glitches corrected.)

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Thanks, Kathy! Tell us about your challenges using the iPhone and other devices, including a Kindle if you own one. How could they better help you with decent text to speech and otherwise?

I myself am sighted, but I suspect that much-improved speech recognition as well text to speech can help blind people. Speech recognition would be good in terms for stuff ranging from email (on tablets, phones, etc.) to making notes in books (on lots of devices, including Kindles when they finally got the processing power–which they lack now). I myself use my iPad’s speech recognition constantly for dictating email. But in my opinion the accuracy probably is not good enough yet for blind people—maybe I’m wrong about that. At any rate, I constantly have to fix errors.

Dragon speech recognition on my desktop is a bit better. I’m about to install the latest version.

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I have been totally blind all my life, and a computer user since 1984. I do not need to be able to speak to inaccessible devices; I need them to speak to me. Even with my iPhone, I rarely use Siri.

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I am sympathetic with David F, but it would be presumptive to think that I could put myself in his place: I have eyes that more or less work okay, have previous experience with VoiceView on the Kindle Paperwhite (as well as familiarity with Kindle interfaces from K1 on), VoiceOver and TalkBack. I have owned several Bluetooth headsets and speakers and used BT for file sharing, networking, etc. I have a hobby of exploring accessibility features whenever I get a new gadget or a new reading app. I cannot put all of that aside. For me, Kindle was easy and intuitive to set up for VoiceView. One data point, but assuredly an outlier. I don’t count.

David F, from what I can gather from his post, started with little of this, so of course it would be frustrating. Too much to take in. I get it. I wish I could help, it is frustrating to read about his frustration. But again, it is one data point.

(Will you be following up with him to report on his progress or lack thereof?)

Before concluding ‘things are a mess’, we need many more data points representing the people Amazon hopes to target with this device. It is curious that NFB has not reviewed it after a couple of months, given the press releases touting their cooperation with Amazon. Maybe there are NDAs involved.

I love TTS, but am skeptical that 1) Amazon will restore ‘traditional’ TTS to Kindle, and 2) that many people would care if they did.

As for audiobooks on the Kindle, the experiment failed: it was the worst audiobook player ever, even in its day. I tried to love it, and just could not.

Amazon devices combined probably account for less than 10% of Audible’s overall consumption; dedicated Mp3 players, computers, and tablets combined about the same; leaving ~80% for smartphones. Obviously these are wild ass guesses on my part, but it would explain why the Audible player on Fire devices is manifestly inferior to the Audible apps for iOS, Android, and Windows (even ‘failed’ Windows Mobile 10!).

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But unlike them, Amazon is now well-positioned to sell Kindles into K-12 market, as they now have the required compliance with ADA, and have made peace with advocacy groups like NFB.

Accessibility features were (and are) available on Kindle Keyboard (via ‘Voice Menus’) but the earliest touchscreen Kindles were not powerful enough to implement a screen reader. But every Kindle from Voyage has been, specifically they all have 512MB RAM needed to keep voice data in memory for fast voice response while maintaining good overall responsiveness.

While there may be issues with the current VoiceView implementation, there is every reason to expect that Amazon will address these:

“The new Kindle has not yet undergone evaluation from the National Federation of the Blind, but the association’s director of communications Chris Danielsen said the NFB regularly meets with Amazon for the improvement of accessibility in e-book readers, particularly for educational purposes.”

Full article: http://www.techtimes.com/articles/166571/20160623/amazon-reveals-new-80-kindle-thinner-lighter-and-with-bluetooth-audio-support-for-blind-users.htm#sthash.NBrBFijr.dpuf

Also this:
https://nfb.org/national-federation-blind-and-amazon-join-forces-improve-accessible-reading-experiences-blind-and

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The Amazon Echo might be a better choice. It is all voice driven, so should good for the blind and vision impaired. It can read some of my ebook purchases. While I only experimented a few minutes with a few books, the voice sounded OK. My first generation fire also has fair TTS, but it requires sight to set up.

In the end, I don’t think there will be one device to do everything.

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As for the possibility of a legislative remedy like the Ebook Accessibility Act, who knows for sure if the Dems will support it. But chances are far higher than with do-nothing Republicans or absolute ignoramuses like Donald Trump.

Whether the issue is the DMCA or Bono or non-ebook-related matters like taxation in general, I’m far from the biggest fan of Washington and the status quo. I wanted Bernie Sanders to win and thought that the DNC and others tilted the pool table! That said, given the existential dangers that Donald Trump poses, especially nuclear ones, and especially since I’m near D.C., well within H-bomb range, I’ll do my best to see Hillary Clinton elected.

David

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You’re fail to understand one of the most basic features of American politics. When you hear a Democrat talk about taxing the rich or protecting consumers, what they’re engaging in classic political triangulation. One message is for ordinary people, who think the party cares about them. But the real message is for those who’d be targeted by those taxes or regulation. It’s a protection racket. “Pay and we’ll write loopholes that protect you.”

That’s why, vitually without exception, Silicon Valley is pouring its money into Democrats. They’re paying for protection and, with Hillary in the White House they’ll certainly get it.

Incientally, it’s also why the Democrats pour so much hate on the Koch brothers. They’re among the few major corporate executives who oppose crony capitalism, as you can see in a book written by Charles Koch:

For an illustration of the opposite, check out how Apple, Google and others paid off Irish politicians to create a special tax-loophole, only available to giant corporations, that lets them pay taxes well under 1%. A guy barely getting by with his Glasgow grocery pays perhaps 20% in taxes on his sales to his neighbors. Apple, one of the wealthiest corporations on the planet, pays virtually nothing selling their products to those same neighbors. That is crony capitalism. Obama practiced it on a massive scale. That’s the essence of Hillary’s politics, domestic and foreign. “Pay to play,” it is called.

That’s also why the Obama administration is taking the side of Apple et al in the EU efforts, not merely to get Apple and the rest to “pay their fair share of taxes,” but to essentially pay any taxes at all. Only very silly people think today’s Democratic party is about helping ordinary people. It isn’t.

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Changing topics there’s an excellent reason parents should be pushing to see key features added to epaper readers. There are excellent reasons many may not want to have their kids using more full-featured tablets. You can find the story here:

http://nypost.com/2016/08/27/its-digital-heroin-how-screens-turn-kids-into-psychotic-junkies/

This remark in the article I find particularly revealing:

—–
There’s a reason that the most tech-cautious parents are tech designers and engineers. Steve Jobs was a notoriously low-tech parent. Silicon Valley tech executives and engineers enroll their kids in no-tech Waldorf Schools. Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page went to no-tech Montessori Schools, as did Amazon creator Jeff Bezos and Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales.

Many parents intuitively understand that ubiquitous glowing screens are having a negative effect on kids. We see the aggressive temper tantrums when the devices are taken away and the wandering attention spans when children are not perpetually stimulated by their hyper-arousing devices. Worse, we see children who become bored, apathetic, uninteresting and uninterested when not plugged in.
—–

“Buy our addictive stuff for your kids, cripple their minds and perhaps even push your schools to buy our stuff. But we’re keeping our kids away from them.” That’s what Silicon Valley billionaires are saying.

That illustrates an interesting cultural shift that’s only just began to be noticed. Very wealthy people used to retain an interest in their own countries and the well-being of its people. Now they don’t. They sneer at that as nationalism. They import ill-suited immigrants to drive down labor costs. And they send their work wherever in the world the labor is cheapest. In short, they maximize their already great wealth at the expense of their own citizens. Indeed, with them, being a citizen of a country is sneered upon.

That’s why Steve Jobs kept his kids low-tech while getting rich selling that same tech to you for your kids.

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