Following is link to the NLS Strategic Business Plan (dated December
2003) if you haven't seen it already:
http://www.loc.gov/nls/businessplan/2003.html
Particularly interesting is the section titled "DTB Player and medium
design contract". They are allowing only for one specific player
device and PC-based software only (contracted directly by
NLS...HumanWare has been awarded this contract...so software and
device for NLS playback can come only from HumanWare).
So, I have to correct and say, no, katieplayer will *not* support the
NLS books because of the approach NLS is taking and neither will any
developers other than HumanWare. We'll continue to happily support
those content providers that do want to work with third party
developers on the popular computing platforms - Bookshare, RFBD in
the U.S., etc. All we can do is build to the DAISY standard (promoted
as an open standard) and build in support for DRM schemes from
content providers who allow us to do so.
Sorry for the misinformation in my last post.
Joe
On Mar 12, 2006, at 7:06 PM, Kafka's Daytime wrote:
Hi Cheryl,
Should be yes, as long as NLS is following the DAISY 3 standard (or
some variation thereof)...but I should note we don't know yet what
(if anything) they'll be doing for Digital Rights Management (DRM)
i.e. encryption/protection of copyrighted content. I assume (hope)
there will be opportunities for developers to test content (and
build in support for any protection scheme [as we did for RFBD])
before they make it available to the public. I like Bookshare's
model. Unpack happens outside of the player so no extra hoops to
jump through from the player development (or end user) end of
things. Very nice.
Joe
On Mar 12, 2006, at 6:52 PM, Cheryl Homiak wrote:
When people using the NLS library service in the United States go
fully to digital books instead of analog casettes, will these be
readable by the same modifications being made to katieplayer to
handle daisy3 and bookshare books, or is this going to be another
separate issue?
--
Cheryl
"Where your treasure is,
there will your heart be also".
