“The right to read of blind and partially sighted Canadians is in jeopardy.” More information about the Canadian National Institute for the Blind’s financial crisis in this CBC article. Stay up to date on what’s happening on their facebook page. If you are Canadian, please consider sending a letter expressing your concerns.
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Whoa, whoa, whoa, Jessamyn. The Snib has done a great deal to impede the creation and distribution of alternate-format books in this country. I’ll have a blog post up in due course.
Any plausible alternative to the Snib, along with an alteration to copyright law, would be better. Best of all would be a highly decentralized approach in which not just the Snib but sighted people don’t go around assuming it’s A-OK for the Snib to decide what blind people can read. (That’s what’s happening now and has happened for decades.)
“Right to read”? No one is telling visually impaired Canadians not to read. They’re simply not paying for materials for the visually impaired.
If a so-called “right” requires other people to fork over cash, then it’s not a right. It’s a state-mandated entitlement.
John, stop being full of shit for five seconds. The copyright holder has first right to produce an alternate format (for large print, the sole right). Can’t be bothered? Then somebody else can do it. At the moment it’s limited to a person or a nonprofit, which makes no sense whatsoever. CNIB has cornered this market for decades and materially limited the number of alternate-format titles – through outright incompetence, in my experience.
Short of abolishing that section of the law, which ain’t gonna happen, something needs to be done to provide reading materials to people with a print disability. You and Ayn Rand will be thrilled to learn that many of us want an open, decentralized system that not only permits but encourages for-profit creation of alternate formats.
John, stop being full of shit for five seconds.
Oooh, cussing! Well, I guess that means you win the argument!
The copyright holder has first right to produce an alternate format (for large print, the sole right). Can’t be bothered? Then somebody else can do it. At the moment it’s limited to a person or a nonprofit, which makes no sense whatsoever. CNIB has cornered this market for decades and materially limited the number of alternate-format titles – through outright incompetence, in my experience.
Short of abolishing that section of the law, which ain’t gonna happen, something needs to be done to provide reading materials to people with a print disability. You and Ayn Rand will be thrilled to learn that many of us want an open, decentralized system that not only permits but encourages for-profit creation of alternate formats.
It if needs to be done, then purchase the right from the copyright holder. The perceived needs of one person do not impart on obligation on someone else.
You want the copyright? Buy it. It’s as simple as that.
Alternate-format exceptions are in place in the copyright laws of dozens of countries, including Canada, the only place where this discussion matters, since we are talking about the CNIB. Canada’s alternate-format exception is exactly as I described it: The copyright holder (who does not “own†a copyright one may “buyâ€) has first dibs on creating an alternate format and sole authority to create a large-print version. If the owner fails to do the former, others may do so. The issue is exactly who may do so, not the fact that they have that legal right.
It would help if you were at least marginally informed on the topic and not, in fact, full of shit.