[Dtb-talk] NLS Digital Happenings Speech

[Dan Rossi]

Just a quick comment based on some of what I heard hear over the last 
couple of days.  And, my information isn't rock solid so take it with a 
grain of salt.

I don't believe the web braille incident was triggered by a blind person 
making a remark about it being easy to translate the braille to print. 
Thus, it wasn't anyone attempting to, or discussing illegal activities. 
The concern came from within NLS.

Secondly, like others, I can see why all the time and money to protect 
copyrights by encrypting the digital texts seems wasteful.  Certainly, 
like others have said, it inconveniences the honest and antagonizes the 
dishonest.  However, NLS is just trying to do their due diligence and 
keep the publishers happy.  We shouldn't take our anger out on NLS, but 
the publishers for requiring such silliness.

Lastly, like all media these days, Compact Flash will die within a few 
years, SD and Micro SD is already becoming the de facto standard for many 
of the newer devices out there.  I assume that the NLS systems will be 
flexible enough to deal with changing media types.  I am pretty certain 
that you can get adaptors that are the size of a CF card and can accept an 
SD card.

Just a couple of thoughts to toss out since this is the liveliest I've 
seen this list in a while.  *GRIN*

-- 
Blue skies.
Dan Rossi
Carnegie Mellon University.
E-Mail:	dr25 at andrew.cmu.edu
Tel:	(412) 268-9081