[Dtb-talk] New Mobile Phone Can Read Digital Audio Books For Visually Impaired

[David Andrews]

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>Mobile Phone Can Read Books
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>  By Kim Tae-gyu, Staff Reporter
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>  Korea Times, South Korea, September 19, 2006
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>  LG Electronics, the world's fourth-largest cell phone vendor, has added
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>  another compelling feature to the mobile handset - reading books for the
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>  visually impaired.
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>  The Seoul-based company yesterday started marketing the model, the LF1300,
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>  through LG Telecom, the country's smallest wireless operator, at around
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>  400,000 won.
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>  Only the blind, visually-impaired and dyslexic can buy the talking phone
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>  after presenting a government certificate at sales outlets of LG Telecom.
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>  ``The LF1300 is the world's first mobile handset that is capable of
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>  reading books for the print-disabled, who otherwise could not enjoy them,"
>LG Vice
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>  President Cho Sung-ha said.
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>
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>  ``This is not about making money at all but about contributing to society.
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>  We will continue to put forth efforts to bridge the digital divide for the
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>  disabled," Cho said.
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>  Users of the gadget can download approximately 300 audio books from the
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>  Internet site of LG Sangam Library to their handsets in two ways.
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>  One is to access the digital library's Web site (
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>www.lg.or.kr) on a computer specially designed for the blind to get the
>audio books and transfer them
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>  to cell phones.
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>  The other is to download the digital books directly with cell phones
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>through the wireless network by touching a hot key on the LF1300 handset.
>Both
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>  methods are free of charge.
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>  On top of its unique feature of reading books, the LF1300 is not inferior
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>  To the contemporary top-line phones in both outlooks and functionalities.
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>  The sleek 16-millimeter-thick gizmo is armed with an MP3 player and a
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>  Bluetooth headset, which enables users to listen to the music or talks
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>  without a cord.
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>  The user interface of the LF1300 is also customized for the blind,
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>  Enabling handset users to control it through a voice guidance system.
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>  However, there is a hitch because the phone's internal memory of 17
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>  megabytes is small even for a single audio book file, which takes up 80 MB
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>  on average.
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>  As a result, a high-volume external memory, which is available at
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>  electronics shops, is a must for the talking book services.
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David Andrews and white cane Harry.