Abstract
The goal
of the “E-Books Open Up the World of Print to Visually
Impaired Readers” project is to create a rich collection of multi-format
e-books that have been optimized for use by print-impaired library patrons,
including the blind, visually impaired, physically challenged, and
dyslexic. The Mid-Illinois Talking Book
Center, a sub-regional library within the statewide and national network of
talking book centers, will partner with OverDrive and
other e-content distributors and publishers to select, organize, test, and
evaluate a rich, robust e-book collection and supporting technologies. All technologies supporting accessible
digital content will be included in the project, including software, systems,
and hardware—playback devices. Digital
talking books in various file formats, including recorded audio and text-to-speech
technologies, will be included in the creation and use of the collection. Techniques and strategies for accelerating
the adoption and diffusion of DAISY-enabled content will be explored. The Digital Accessible Information
SYstem (DAISY) is a worldwide standard that is designed to make content
accessible to all. The standard provides
structure to the digital talking book that enables the user to move through the
book in ways other than strictly linear listening. “E-Books Open Up the World of Print to Visually Impaired
Readers” will serve as a replicable model for how talking book
centers and libraries nationwide can mediate between content providers and
end-users to improve the accessibility and usefulness of information for all. The result of this project will be a
web-based self-service digital library for visually-impaired readers. It will contain a sophisticated digital
rights management and circulation system developed by OverDrive.
Statement of Need
A. Brief Description of the Mid-Illinois Talking Book Center
(http://www.mitbc.org)
The Mid-Illinois Talking Book Center (MITBC), with offices in
B. Statement of Need and Relationship of Project to the
MITBC Goals and Objectives
Statement
of Need:
Demand
for quick, easy access to a wide variety of content, including fiction and
non-fiction, continues to grow among the print-impaired community. Until the advent of e-books and audio books,
libraries were not friendly environments for the visually impaired. With the growth of e-books and their
availability in different formats, the dream of opening up the world of print
to the visually impaired is an attainable reality. Print-impaired users are eager to access the
entire range of printed materials now available digitally.
In the pilot E-Audio Project (http://www.mitbc.org/eaudiofinal.doc)
conducted during the first half of 2003 (see below for more
details), nearly three out of every four participants were generally pleased
with their first experience with digital talking books on a small, handheld MP3
player called the Otis. Based on their
initial experiences, over half indicated that they preferred the digital
talking book experience over the 30-year-old analog audio cassette
technology. Software, hardware, and
standards continue to enter the marketplace that make a long-held dream—of having
the content currently made available to the sighted community equally
accessible to the print-impaired on a timely basis—a sustainable library
program.
Now we need to test and handle all the pieces of the puzzle and begin putting
them together. Kerscher
and Sutton (2003)[1]
note that libraries serving the print-impaired have additional opportunities to
provide leadership in the digital age, “They can also serve as liaisons
between publishers and consumers so that both publishers and libraries serving
persons with print disabilities can work cooperatively to improve and increase
access to information.” The proposed
project will help everyone understand better what is needed to have content
creators, vendors, B2B service organizations, talking book centers, and
print-impaired end-users work together to exploit the available technology to
make the dream a reality.
The
National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Disabled (NLS) has
announced plans to migrate to digital talk books and computerized playback
devices by the end of 2008 (see http://www.loc.gov/nls/dtbfaq.html).
NLS currently supplies nearly all of the
talking books used by talking book centers.
The proposed project is one way to gauge current user readiness and
demand for digital talking books, learn more about the operational challenges
of creating a collection of digital talking books, and prepare for major
changes in the NLS program in 2008. Based
on anecdotal evidence, such as messages posted to the listservs,
a significant portion of the print-impaired population is not content to wait
until 2008 to begin accessing digital talking books on a large scale. Thus, although the proposed project will last
only one year, in essence it represents a five-year transition plan.
Relationship
of Project to the Organization’s Goals and Objectives:
The
“Mid-Illinois Talking Book Center FY04 Plan of Service” articulates the current
mission, goals, objectives, and tasks of the organization. Several of the organization’s goals and
objectives directly relate to the need the proposed project intends to address.
The pertinent goals and objectives are
glossed below:
Goal B: Provide
basic library service, materials, and equipment, in a timely manner to all
eligible individuals with physical, visual, and learning disabilities to help
meet their informational and recreational needs.
Objective 1: Maintain
an adequate collection of materials, both current and retrospective, to meet reader’s requests and to meet national
standards for sub-regional talking book centers.
Gloss: Just
as the collection of Braille materials has been largely supplanted by the
audiocassette collection, so too will digital collections soon largely supplant
audiocassette collections. Although NLS
has undertaken considerable planning and made production changes in this area, real-world
testing with actual end-users and talking book centers is needed. The timeliness of access to digital content
also will be an emphasis of this project.
The earlier E-Audio Project completed in June 2003 reinforced our sense
that print-impaired end-users are clamoring for quicker access to current digital
content. We will explore ways to make
recently released content, such as works of popular fiction, available in
digital formats to the print-impaired community.
Goal H: Utilize the
Internet for programs, outreach, and as an information resource to promote
talking books.
Gloss: This
project will meet and exceed this goal, by using the Internet as the primary
medium for the delivery of digital talking book center content and
services. The Internet will be used both
as a communication medium and a transportation vehicle for moving digital
talking books back and forth between talking book centers and end-users. An iVocalize (http://www.ivocalize.com/) webinar room, which enables simultaneous voice-over-IP
discussions, text chatting, web co-browsing, and PowerPoint presentations, will
be used for most of the training, focus group sessions, project team meetings,
and general communication related to this project.
Goal I: Continue to
provide, evaluate, and promote special collections, including descriptive
videos, old-time radio shows, digital talking books, and other materials.
Objective 3: Provide
and promote digital talking books for patrons.
Gloss: This
project will greatly enlarge and enhance the collection of DAISY-enabled
digital talking books available to the print-impaired population in central and
northwest
Goal J: Continuously
seek outside funding to get the message of Talking Books to appropriate
individuals or groups and to fund special collections and other activities.
Objective 1: Investigate funding agencies for grants
for talking book services.
Gloss: This
project will help create a special collection of digital talking books and
text-to-speech-enabled e-books in a variety of formats. Because of this grant-funded project,
participating print-impaired end-users in the MITBC region will gain firsthand
experience about a wide variety of file types, delivery options, and playback
experiences.
Goal K: Educate patrons and other agencies on adaptive and
assistive technology and share information and news regarding these.
Gloss: Adaptive
and assistive technologies for accessing digital content continue to evolve
rapidly. Specifically, the DAISY
standard is improving significantly how the print-impaired can and will
interact with digital content. Project
participants will be able to get an overview of the structure of a book
(chapters, sections, subsections, etc.), then browse and skip easily throughout
the structure. In addition, the project
will provide field tests of the rapidly emerging and improving field of
text-to-speech technologies. Delivery
options and playback hardware also are changing. Through this project the Mid-Illinois Talking
Book Center, OverDrive, other agencies, and, most
importantly, print-impaired end-users themselves will attain a better sense of
the options and possibilities for using digital technologies to make more
content more easily and quickly available to end-users in a manner that
empowers them to optimally utilize the information.
Target
Group of Project Participants:
The
target group for this project will be the estimated 500 active users of MITBC
collections and services who have ready access to computers with Internet
connections. This is approximately 10
percent of MITBC’s current active user
population. We anticipate that this
percentage will continue to grow throughout the project period and into the
future. We will use listservs,
blogs, the MITBC website, and printed flyers and
newsletters to inform this target group of the project and to invite them to
participate. Our current estimate is
that approximately 100 end-users will actually participate in the proposed
study. The results and outcomes of this
project, however, will benefit talking book libraries and their patrons
throughout the country.
The
Needs Assessment Process (Including Participation of the Target Group):
The
Mid-Illinois Talking Book Center has been and is currently involved in several small
studies of the needs of patrons of talking book centers for digital talking
books and text-to-speech-enabled e-books. Four recently completed or current projects
are briefly described below. Examined collectively, these small studies and
pilot projects constitute the needs assessment for this proposed larger project.
1.
E-Audio Project: The purpose of the E-Audio pilot project, conducted
during the first half of 2003, was to explore
reader demand for, reader acceptance of, and the organizational and service
challenges of developing a program that provides digital talking books (DTBs), also known as audible e-books, for blind, visually
impaired, and physically challenged users.
One goal of the pilot project was to introduce readers to audiobooks in digital format using digital audio playback
devices--the eventual goal of the talking book program at the national
level. Another goal was to gain
firsthand experiential knowledge about the social, technological, economic, and
organizational issues and opportunities afforded by DTBs. The E-Audio study focused exclusively on one
content provider (Audible.com), one playback device (the Otis), and one
distribution method (devices with preloaded content sent through surface mail). The proposed study will build on these
experiences to explore digital talking books in multiple formats, from multiple
sources, using multiple distribution methods and multiple playback devices. The proposed larger study also will provide
participants with access to a larger, more pertinent collection of digital
content.
Data were collected primarily in two ways.
First, a printed 12-question satisfaction survey (plus one question
about the age of the respondent) was distributed when any of the eight Otis
players with pre-loaded content were circulated. A response rate of nearly 60 percent was
achieved. Second, circulation data about
the 48 titles in the collection were tabulated and analyzed.
The preliminary findings
based on analyses of the data indicate:
$ 87 percent of the respondents were 40 years of age or
older.
$ When asked about the overall impression of their initial
experience with DTBs, the majority (72 percent) were
generally satisfied with the experience.
$ Two-thirds of the respondents reported some problems or
difficulties with the Otis playback devices, principally with the control
buttons and the LCD screens.
$ When asked what they liked about the Otis playback device,
twenty-four respondents mentioned the smallness and lightness of the device,
twelve noted the related advantage of portability, and twelve praised the sound
quality.
$ When asked what they did not like about the Otis playback
device, ten respondents noted that the ear buds were too large, uncomfortable,
or fell out easily. Nine respondents
mentioned that the control buttons were too small, and four missed the lack of
variable speed control they currently have with audiocassette playback devices. Four noted that the LCD display was too faint
or small.
$ Over half of the respondents indicated that they preferred
DTB technology over cassette tapes and players, but in general there seemed to
be ambivalence about the technologies that support DTB services.
$ Approximately half of the respondents intend to check out
additional DTB titles.
$ Approximately half expressed a willingness to personally
purchase a DTB playback device.
$ There were a total of 69 circulation events during the
pilot project period, for an average circulation of 8.6 per device.
$ Twenty-seven of the 48 titles in the collection (56
percent) circulated at least once.
Several tentative
conclusions can be made from the experiences of the pilot project and an
analysis of the data collected. First,
there seems to be widespread interest in and willingness to experiment with DTBs among the blind, visually impaired, and physically
challenged. Second, for this user
population good sound quality and a large, diverse collection of current
content seem to be much more important than the debate between cassettes and DTBs or any general sense of a technological imperative to
migrate to the latest gadgets and file formats.
These are avid readers who want steady, uninterrupted, timely access to
current content they can enjoy and use.
Several tentative
recommendations have emerged as a result of the E-Audio pilot project:
$ DTB playback devices need larger, better spaced control
buttons.
$ Audible clues are needed to indicate when various control
functions have been executed.
$ A DTB that provided variable speed playback without the
chipmunk effect would improve upon a functionality
from the cassette player era that users really appreciate and use.
$ DTB playback devices with more memory–capable of holding
tens or hundreds of unabridged audible e-books–should be explored, but their
introduction could produce ripple effects throughout the emerging service and
distribution system.
$ Manufacturers, content providers, and libraries serving
this population should remember that most users do not differentiate between
the main playback device, accessories, content, and service. For example, uncomfortable ear buds can spoil
the entire experience.
$ We should explore the value and feasibility of group
discounts for playback devices.
Libraries and qualified end-users may benefit from group discounts.
$ Continue experimenting with different file formats.
$ Continue experimenting with different playback devices.
$ Continue exploring different content sources.
$ Continue exploring different distribution methods.
$ Continue communicating with other teams involved in DTB
pilot projects.
·
Continue gathering and
analyzing data.
The complete final report is available online at http://www.mitbc.org/eaudiofinal.doc.
2. Project HAL: During the fourth quarter of calendar year
2003 the Mid-Illinois Talking Book Center (MITBC) and TAP Information Services,
a private service agency for libraries, have undertaken Project HAL (Handheld,
Accessible Libraries), a critical analysis and evaluation of DAISY-enabled,
portable playback devices intended primarily for use by the blind and visually
impaired to access and enjoy digital talking books. The purpose of the DAISY standard, developed
by the DAISY Consortium (www.daisy.org), is
to make all published information available to persons with print disabilities
in an accessible, feature-rich, navigable format. Examples of such devices include the Victor Reader
Vibe from VisuAide, the Telex Scholar from Telex
Communications, the
3. Lobe Library: The Lobe Library Multi-State Project (http://www.lobelibrary.org) is a
12-month beta test begun on
4. OverDrive/MITBC
Text-to-Speech Pilot Project:
OverDrive.com, the
Purpose, Goal, and Objectives of Proposed Project
Purpose:
The
purpose of the project is to build a sizable, current collection of digital
books in various formats in order to improve and accelerate access to digital
materials by the visually impaired.
Through this project we will gain real-world experience with the
technological, human factors, economic, organizational, and political
challenges of providing this new type of collection to print-impaired
end-users. Both digitally recorded
narrated books and text-to-speech technologies will be tested, using a variety
of distribution media (e.g., CD and direct delivery of files over the
Internet), as well as a variety of playback devices. A particular emphasis of the study will be on
costs and challenges associated with converting more e-content to DAISY
format.
Goal:
To help
end-users, talking book centers, and other organizations supporting access to
information to the print-impaired learn through direct experience the
technological, human factors, economic, organizational, and political
challenges of providing a large, current collection of digital books that are
optimally accessible and usable by print-impaired users.
Objectives:
·
Construct
a collection of digital books in various formats for the print-impaired population
in central and northwest
·
Create
awareness among readers about where e-books can be located on the Internet
(e.g., Project Gutenberg, Bookshare.org).
Make available some titles on demand from these Internet-based sources
of digital talking books.
·
Better
understand the issues and challenges of scaling up the number of titles
available in DAISY-compliant formats.
Convince publishers of the value and importance of releasing commercial
audio titles in DAISY-compliant formats.
·
Study
the usability, use, and usefulness of this type of collection for
print-impaired end-users.
·
Study
usage patterns of the test collection, then compare the usage patterns with
known usage patterns of the existing, larger analog audiocassette
collection. Usage will be studied at
both the title level and at smaller levels.
For example, does quicker access to recently released
content increase end-user satisfaction and use?
When end-users have access to DAISY-enabled content, do they interact
with the content differently? For
example, do they access the table of contents, then
skip immediately to the section of most interest to them? Because the test collection will contain both
fiction and nonfiction titles, that distinction will be part of the
analysis.
·
Better
understand the issues and challenges of implementing in a real service program
the November 2003 ruling from the Librarian of Congress concerning legal
circumventions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) in order to
improve access to digital content by the print-impaired. (See http://www.copyright.gov/1201/
for more information.)
·
Articulate
the project and its outcomes via a meeting of stakeholders at the end of the
project period, dissemination of the final report, journal and magazine
articles, and presentations to interested groups and conferences.
·
Determine
the issues related to sustaining and expanding this service at the Mid-Illinois
Talking Book Center, as well as replicating this service in other regions of
the country.
Expected
Outcomes:
·
We
expect that delivering the content via the Internet will be the thorniest
distribution method, but ultimately the one with the most potential.
·
We
anticipate that it will be difficult to convince publishers and content vendors
of the value of incurring the additional cost of making content available to
the print-impaired population, especially in DAISY-compliant formats. Publishers may be more willing to offload
these tasks to third-party service providers, such as OverDrive
and digital conversion and mark-up service agencies.
·
We
predict that the usability of this new type of content will be difficult at
first, and will require much training of and support for individual
end-users. The use of the collection,
however, will almost immediately meet or exceed the same titles available on
analog audiocassette. We think end-user
reports of the usefulness of these new formats will be generally positive, but
not overwhelmingly enthusiastic. Based
on the E-Audio Project outcomes, most print-impaired end-users are ambivalent
toward new technology. Their primary
interests are in gaining quick access to a wide variety of current
content.
·
We
anticipate that there will be numerous technological, market-based, and
organizational issues related to implementing the November 2003 ruling by the
Librarian of Congress regarding legal circumventions of the DMCA.
·
Because
talking book centers already are part of a national network, we think the
outcomes of this project will be relatively easily replicable in other states. The need for this type of service has been
understood and articulated by talking book centers and their patrons. This study should help identify and answer
questions about the details and processes of starting and sustaining this type
of service.
Project Proposal Implementation
A. Members of the Project Team, Their Backgrounds and
Qualifications
Lori
Bell:
Tom
Peters: Peters is the founder of TAP Information
Services, which provides support for special projects and project
evaluations. Peters will serve as the
project coordinator and evaluator. He
has been a librarian for 16 years. He
conducted and wrote the final evaluation of the E-Audio Project, and he is the
principal investigator in Project HAL.
Peters also conducts several monthly iVocalize
webinars for print-impaired users, and he is involved
in the Info-Eyes project. Peters
recently co-authored a book titled, “E-Book Functionality: What Libraries and Their Patrons Want and
Expect from Electronic Books,” which was published by LITA, a division of the
American Library Association. He also
has written numerous articles about e-books and digital libraries. He has worked on and evaluated a number of
e-book projects, and he currently is serving on the conference advisory
committee planning the March 2004 conference on e-books and public libraries,
organized and sponsored by the Open eBook Forum. Peters has an M.A. in Library and Information
Science from the
Loree Potash: Potash is a Librarian at OverDrive. She has
been with OverDrive since 1992. Prior to joining OverDrive,
she worked as a librarian at Case Western Reserve University School of Law and
as an attorney. She holds an MSLS from
B. Project Plan
The
goal of the “E-Books Open Up the World of Print to
Visually Impaired Readers” project is to create a rich collection of
multi-format e-books that have been optimized for use by print-impaired library
patrons, including the blind, visually impaired, physically challenged, and
dyslexic. The Mid-Illinois Talking Book
Center, a sub-regional library within the statewide and national network of
talking book centers, will partner with OverDrive and
other e-content distributors and publishers to select, organize, test, and
evaluate a rich, robust e-book collection and supporting technologies. All technologies supporting accessible
digital content will be included in the project, including software, systems,
and hardware—playback devices. Digital
talking books in various file formats, including audio and text-to-speech
technologies, will be included in the creation and use of the collection. Techniques and strategies for accelerating
the adoption and diffusion of DAISY-enabled content will be explored. The Digital Accessible Information
SYstem (DAISY) is a worldwide standard that is designed to make content
accessible to all. “E-Books Open Up the World of Print
to Visually Impaired Readers” will serve as a replicable model for
how talking book centers and libraries nationwide can mediate between content
providers and end-users to improve the accessibility and usefulness of
information for all. The result of this
project will be a web-based self-service digital library for visually-impaired
readers. It will contain a sophisticated
digital rights management and circulation system developed by OverDrive.
A
project team comprised of individuals from OverDrive,
the Mid-Illinois Talking Book Center, TAP Information Services, and other
publishers, vendors, and organizations serving the print-impaired community
will be formed to execute the project. The
project team will organize and orchestrate all facets of the project. The major participant groups in this project
will be the group of participating end-users, publishers, business-to-business
service providers such as OverDrive and digital
mark-up service agencies, and other talking book centers. The project team also will need to balance
the technological, economic, organizational, and political aspects of the
proposed project. This project is being
conceived as more than just a technological proof of concept. We want to understand the economic,
organizational, political, and diffusion-of-the-innovation challenges that must
be addressed before sustainable, usable digital talking book libraries can be
created.
A
larger project advisory committee, including individuals from the
print-impaired community, will be formed to provide guidance and feedback about
the progress, outcomes, implications, and applications of project-related
activities and findings. The advisory
committee also will be expected to advise the project team on the
technological, economic, organizational, and political aspects of the
project.
End-user
participants in the pilot project will receive instruction from project team
members using the iVocalize webinar
software, which enables instructors and participants to converse using
voice-over-IP, text chat, co-browse the web, and view PowerPoint
presentations. IVocalize
is the only accessible Internet-based chat room available. Currently, blind instructors also are using
the iVocalize software to provide computer and
Internet training to other visually impaired users.
The
collection to be built will be diverse both in terms of file types and in terms
of subject matter. The Mid-Illinois
Talking Book Center already has a small collection of digital talking books (DTBs), containing primarily current works of fiction and
non-fiction purchased from Audible.com and OverDrive.com. As the collection is being selected and
assembled, the project team will work with vendors to make as much of the
content as possible DAISY-enabled.
Worldwide, not much content has been made DAISY-enabled, so one goal of
this project is to generate knowledge about the costs and decision-points
related to making digital talking books DAISY-enabled. The Canadian National Institute for the Blind
(http://www.cnib.ca/library/) has
some experience making content DAISY-enabled.
Initial contact already has been made with CNIB representatives to learn
more about the processes and costs associated with making digital talking books
DAISY-enabled.
Proposed
Agenda: The proposed project has several related
facets, including:
·
Selecting,
purchasing, and organizing a current, diverse, sizable collection of digital
talking books (including commercially recorded digital audiobooks)
and e-books that are text-to-speech-enabled.
·
Making
as much of the content in the collection DAISY-enabled.
·
Testing
different delivery methods for the content.
·
Obtaining
user feedback on several playback methods and devices.
·
Working
with publishers to better understand their needs and concerns in providing
commercial digital content that is optimally accessible to the print-impaired.
·
Developing
plans for scaling up the collection at the Mid-Illinois Talking Book Center, as
well as replicating this type of content at other talking book centers around
the country.
Sequencing
and orchestrating efficient, effective progress on all facets of the project
will be the principal responsibility of the project team. One of the first tasks will be selecting and
acquiring the content for the collection, then starting the process of getting
as much of it as possible DAISY-enabled.
C. Timeline
July
2004:
·
Initial
meeting of the project team
·
Develop
collection development needs and guidelines
·
Extend
invitations to talking book users and other key individuals to serve on the
advisory committee
·
Identify
and order a few playback devices to purchase and use during the project
·
Develop
specifications for making e-content DAISY-compliant
·
Identify
methods and potential outsourcing partners for making the e-content
DAISY-compliant.
·
Begin
gathering cost information from other organizations—both commercial and
not-for-profit--that are making e-content DAISY-compliant.
·
Design
and develop a training module for the end-user participants.
·
Identify
and develop as needed instruments for collecting data by which the project’s
progress and outcomes can be monitored and measured.
·
Make
initial contact with publishers to engage in discussions with MITBC and OverDrive on the practical implications of the DMCA
circumvention ruling.
August
2004:
·
Initial
in-person meeting of the advisory committee
·
Begin
purchasing content for the test collection
·
Website
design and setup for project by OverDrive
September
2004:
·
Conduct
iVocalize webinars with the
participants to train them how to access and use the collection, the various
delivery options, and the various playback options.
·
Begin
making selected titles in the collection DAISY-enabled.
·
Continue
discussions with publishers about their needs and preferences regarding making
their content optimally accessible by the print-impaired.
October
2004: