Oh Roy...
The Culture of Ownership » Authors Guild, unbelievably, still after Kindle 2
Maybe it was because I was busy, and then sick, that it took me so long to connect the Roy Blount of the Author’s Guild and their recent idiocy regarding text-to-speach to the guy who writes funny and interesting stories and articles (and is a regular on Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me!).
Every so often you have to come up against the hard reality that people you like and admire (and find oh so smart) may also have some dumb, uninformed, and downright wrong views (IE not yours) on things as well.
Text to speach is a lifesaver for me, even though I don’t have the kind of disibilty he would make an exemption for. And while I would prefer a real audiobook (and have been an audible subscriber for more than a year now), sometimes they just aren’t available.
But what I find worse is that Amazon caved. The didn’t even put up a token resistance. They just aquiesed and pushed down an update that allowed publishers to disable this feature.
I think Blount is failing in the court of public opinion (if nowhere else), but Amazon is the one who has disapointed me the most…
