I truly cannot believe that the Authors Guild is sticking to the untenable and astounding proposition that the Kindle 2 is infringing on authors’ copyrights because it includes a text-to-speech function. In an op-ed in the New York Times today, Authors Guild president Roy Blount says that the “quite listenable” text-to-speech audio on the Kindle 2 does, in fact, infringe on authors’ copyrights, and that authors should receive royalties from the Kindle’s audio “performance” of a book in the same way they would receive royalties on an audiobook. Blount goes on to complain that the Guild is now being “assailed” by everyone from the National Federation of the Blind to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which took the Guild’s argument to its logical conclusion and determined that authors want royalties for the performance of bedtime stories. Hyperbolic sarcasm? Sure. Reasonable portrait of the same type of “logic” the Authors Guild is using to argue for royalties on text-to-speech? Abso-freakin-lutely.

The EFF does a great job pointing out all the ways in which the Authors Guild has no legal basis for its complaint — first, the works aren’t derivative under any legal definition, which is what Guild Spokesman Paul Aiken claimed when he said the Kindle 2 didn’t “have the right to read a book out loud” (and isn’t that the most surreal example of the rise of the culture of ownership you’ve ever heard?). Second, there’s no unlawful distribution, since Amazon pays royalties on the books it sells and those books are simply synthesized into speech by the Kindle 2, and third, there’s no unlawful performance, since you’re the only one likely to be listening to the audio rendition.

But Blount doesn’t address the legal fisking at all, and why would he? He’s on a sympathy campaign full of empty threats. He “clarifies” that the Authors Guild isn’t asking for royalties on “non-commercial” performances of “Goodnight Moon,” but says, “If parents want to send their children off to bed with the voice of Kindle 2, however, it’s another matter.” What? No it’s freaking not another matter. It’s the exact same matter. A perfectly protected personal use of media that’s been legally distributed. But without a legal leg to stand on, Blount simply stops making sense. In response to the quite legitimate argument that the Kindle’s text-to-speech capability is a boon for the visually impaired, he notes:

“… publishers, authors and American copyright laws have long provided for free audio availability to the blind and the guild is all for technologies that expand that availability. (The federation, though, points out that blind readers can’t independently use the Kindle 2’s visual, on-screen controls.) But that doesn’t mean Amazon should be able, without copyright-holders’ participation, to pass that service on to everyone.”

Now, Roy Blount is, himself, an accomplished author. But clearly, he didn’t get an editor to take a pass at this particular paragraph. You cannot logically argue that you’re “all for technologies” that expand literary access to the blind, but then demand royalties simply because Amazon did the expanding without asking you. Is that really what this comes down to? Is the Authors Guild just feeling kind of pissy that no one told them this was coming?

Blount misses the point on so many levels. He opens his attack on the Kindle 2, a device that offers an all new and very exciting opportunity to extend the value and wonder of reading to an entirely new audience of gadgeteers, a device that makes it unbelievably simple and less expensive to buy a book anytime, anywhere, by complaining about “all the new ways of not getting paid that new technology affords authors.” Oh, my lord. Stop being such a short-sighted ass. I have a list of books as long as my arm that I’m going to buy as soon as I unwrap my Kindle 2 tonight — and I wouldn’t buy them otherwise, because it’s a pain in the butt to order them and I don’t have room on my shelves. The Kindle 2 is the kind of technology that will, by design, cause people to buy more books. It will almost certainly help expand the reach of ebook readers, which will cause people to buy more books. Plus, the Kindle supports Audible! You can actually buy and listen to audio books on the device, without even resorting to the listenable but ultimately not that satisfying robotic text-to-speech voice! Sure, Kindle 2 doesn’t support ePub, and I wish it would, but at its heart, it’s a device about buying books!

Look. The Kindle 2 text-to-speech feature is at worst a novelty and at best a helpful feature that might let me listen to parts of a book instead of reading it when the power goes out. Or maybe I’ll load it up on behalf of my visually impaired friend and then give it to her to listen to. But frankly, I have a hard time thinking of too many applications for the feature, which makes me think it’ll probably be a little-used element of a device that is ultimately for reading. And you’d think that authors would prefer to look at it that way instead of continuing to lavish attention on a minor technological improvement in a way that’s making them look like desperate, sad, out-of-touch fools. I’m sure you’re worried about the literary decline of America, Roy Blount and the Authors Guild. I’m sure you’ve got no love for Amazon and their insistence on lower prices and unfriendliness to publishers. But you’re really, really, really wrong on this one, and you need to let it go. It’s getting kind of embarrassing.

Filed under: Rant, Add new tag, Amazon, Kindle 2, reading