Centre for Internet and Society

Right to Read event in Brussels

praskrishna — 2011-04-02T12:19:06Z

A 'Right to Read' event is being held at the European Parliament, Brussels on 4 May 2010.

Blind and other reading disabled people face a "book famine". In the North less than 5% of books published are available for reading disabled people. In the South the figure is less than 1%.

Most accessible books are made by specialist agencies using charitable money. At present, such agencies, operating in different countries, but with a common language, often both transcribe the same book. They cannot avoid this needless and expensive duplication by sharing one accessible file or copy. This is because, under present copyright law, reading material in Braille, or formatted digitally for reading disabled people, cannot legally cross borders. This waste of scarce resources significantly hinders access to reading for the world's 300 million visually impaired people and millions of other reading disabled people, especially the poorest.

The UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities says that disabled people have a right to read. The best way to guarantee this right is the adoption of a binding treaty that establishes limitations and exceptions to copyright for the non-commercial production and distribution of accessible books.

The World Blind Union representing over 160 million blind and partially sighted persons in 177 member countries, has now drafted a " WIPO Treaty for Improved Access for Blind, Visually Impaired and other Reading Disabled Persons" to combat the "book famine". It is now being considered by the World Intellectual Property Organization where it has been sponsored by Brazil, Mexico, Ecuador and Paraguay. We have invited stakeholders, experts and EU officials to discuss a way forward and to ask the EU to support a binding treaty. This conference is supported by the European Blind Union and the Transatlantic Consumer Dialogue.

For further details, click here.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/right-to-read-brussels

Disability rights groups oppose changes to Copyright Act

praskrishna — 2011-04-02T12:26:01Z

Disability rights groups are up in arms against a Bill proposing an amendment to the Copyright Act, 1952, reports Aarti Dhar in an article published in the Hindu on April 23, 2010.

Disability rights groups are up in arms against a Bill proposing an amendment to the Copyright Act, 1952, that prevents non-governmental organisations, educational institutions and persons with disabilities from converting reading material including textbooks and reference material into audio, digital and other formats that can be used by differently-abled persons.

The amendment Bill, introduced in the Rajya Sabha this week, if passed in its current form, will prevent over 70 million people with disabilities in India, including persons with visual impairment, dyslexia, and cerebral palsy, from exercising their Right to Education and other fundamental rights, according to the National Access Alliance, a group of organisations and leading professionals working for the benefit of the print-disabled in India.

Licensing procedure

The extremely “cumbersome, restrictive and lengthy” licensing procedure proposed by the government for conversion to these formats will mean that students with print disabilities will be deprived of their Right to Education which has now become a fundamental right.

Members of the Alliance have been campaigning for the amendment to be re-worded to ensure that the conversion of books into all formats is allowed, all stakeholders, including organisations, educational institutions and persons with disabilities, are allowed to undertake the conversion; and the conversion should not be subject to red tape which will lead to delay. The campaigners had met Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal who assured them that the interests of persons with disabilities would be addressed. However, the amendment proposed by the Minister does more harm than good, Rahul Cherian and Nirmita Narasimhan, both members of the Alliance, told The Hindu.

Seeking support

The Alliance is now meeting members of Parliament from across the political parties to seek support. The Bharatiya Janata Party, the Left parties and the Nationalist Congress Party have already extended support to them and assured that their cause would be taken up.

According to CPI (M) MP Brinda Karat, the present amendment lacked concern for the disabled people. “Their cause is genuine and it needs to be addressed,” she told The Hindu, adding that the matter would be taken up once the Bill comes to the Standing Committee.

Members of the Alliance will continue their nationwide mass mobilisation for the cause to bring more attention to the plight of persons with print disabilities in relation to the lack of reading material in accessible formats.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/disability-groups-oppose-copyright-amendments

April 2010 Bulletin

praskrishna — 2012-08-13T04:51:19Z

Greetings from the Centre for Internet and Society! We bring you updates of our research, events and news for the month of April 2010.

News Updates

Worries voiced over ID Project
The Government of India's Unique Identification (UID) Project came under flak at a workshop organised jointly by the Citizen Action Forum (CAF), the People's Union of Civil Liberties - Karnataka, the Alternative Law Forum and the Centre for Internet and Society - An article in The Hindu - 17th April.
http://cis-india.org/news/worries-voiced-over-id-project

UID: A debate on the Fundamental Rights
UID: A debate on the Fundamental Rights - was jointly organized by the Citizen Action Forum, People's Union for Civil Liberties - Karnataka, Alternative Law Forum and the Centre for Internet and Society on April 16th at IAT, Queens Road, Bangalore - An article in the Prajavani news paper - April 17th.
http://cis-india.org/news/uid-a-debate-on-fundamental-rights

UID is an invasion of Privacy: Experts
The Nandan Nilekani headed Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) came in for much criricism at the first of a series of debates on the issue organised in the city on Friday - Deccan Chronicle, April 17th.
http://cis-india.org/news/uid-is-an-invasion-of-privacy-experts

Experts debate on UID and rights
Bangalore, Apr 16, DHNS: A debate on ‘UID and Fundamental Rights’ organised by several city-based organisations, discussed the social, ethical issues, economic and legal issues that accompanies the UID.
http://cis-india.org/news/experts-debate-on-uid-and-rights

Amendment to Copyright Act opposed
A report on the press conference held on 15th April, at the Press Club, Bangalore: The Hindu
http://cis-india.org/news/amendment-to-copyright-act-opposed

They fight for the visually challenged
Times News Network - A report on the press conference held at the Press Club, Bangalore on 15th April, 2010.
http://cis-india.org/news/they-fight-for-the-visually-challenged

Digital Natives Research Project Coordinator
The Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore, in collaboration with Hivos Netherlands, is looking for a Research Project Coordinator to help develop a knowledge network and coordinate international workshops for the project "Digital Natives with a Cause?"
http://cis-india.org/news/research-coordinator

Expel or not? That is the question
The decision of an international school to expel 14 students for their alleged ‘promiscuous’ behaviour has led to much debate and discussion.
http://cis-india.org/news/expel-or-not

Nokia eyes GeNext to tap mobile email mkt
Finnish handset giant banks on youth to be in the technology race
http://cis-india.org/news/nokia-eyes-genNext

Research

Critical Point of View: Videos
The Second event for the Critical Point of View reader on Wikipedia was held in Amsterdam, by the Institute of Network Cultures and the Centre for Internet and Society. A wide range of scholars, academics, researchers, practitioners, artists and users came together to discuss questions on design, analytics, access, education, theory, art, history and processes of knowledge production. The videos for the full event are now available for free viewing and dissemination.

Colour Me Political
What are the tools that Digital Natives use to mobilise groups towards a particular cause? How do they engage with crises in their immediate environments? Are they using their popular social networking sites and web 2.0 applications for merely entertainment? Or are these tools actually helping them to re-articulate the realm of the political? Nishant Shah looks at the recent Facebook Colour Meme to see how new forms of political participation and engagement are being initiated by young people across the world.
http://cis-india.org/research/dn/dn2

Meet the Web 2.0 Suicide Machine
Digital Natives live their lives differently. But sometimes, they also die their lives differently! What happens when we die online? Can the digital avatar die? What is digital life? The Web 2.0 Suicide machine that has now popularly been called the 'anti-social-networking' application brings some of these questions to the fore. As a part of the Hivos-CIS "Digital Natives with a Cause?" research programme, Nishant Shah writes about how Life on the Screen is much more than just a series of games.
http://cis-india.org/research/dn/dn1

Digital Natives with a Cause?
Digital Natives With A Cause? - a product of the Hivos-CIS collaboration charts the scholarship and practice of youth and technology with a specific attention for developing countries to create a framework that consolidates existing paradigms and informs further research and intervention within diverse contexts and cultures.
http://cis-india.org/research/dn/dnrep

Advocacy

Accessibility

e-Accessibility: A Wiki Project
Envisaged and funded by the National Internet Exchange of India, and executed by the Centre for Internet and Society, a Wiki site pertaining to issues of disability and e-accessibility has recently been launched.
http://cis-india.org/advocacy/accessibility/blog/e-accessibility-a-wiki-project

Copyright Law as a tool for Inclusion
Can Copyright Law be used as a tool for Inclusion? Rahul Cherian examines this in his blog on copyright.
http://cis-india.org/advocacy/accessibility/blog/copyright-law-as-tool-for-inclusion

Web Accessibility as a Government Mandate?
Is Web accessibility just a Government Mandate? Should private sites be ignored? Wesolowski examines this in light of the steps taken by ictQATAR to make its website accessible to W3C standards, and hopes that Qatar and eventually all other Arab nations will follow suit and make Web accessibility much more of a mandate.
http://cis-india.org/advocacy/accessibility/blog/web-accessibility-government-mandate

Intellectual Property

When Copyright Goes Bad
A part of the Access to Knowledge Project, this short film by Consumers International is available on DVD and online at A2Knetwork.org/film.
http://cis-india.org/advocacy/ipr/blog/when-copyright-goes-bad

Openness

Research Project on Open Video in India
Open Video Alliance and the Centre for Internet and Society are calling for researchers for a project on open video in India, its potentials, limitations, and recommendations on policy interventions.
http://cis-india.org/advocacy/openness/blog/open-video-research

Does the Social Web need a Googopoly?
While the utility of the new social tool Buzz is still under question, the bold move into social space taken last week by the Google Buzz team has Gmail users questioning privacy implications of the new feature. In this post, I posit that Buzz highlights two privacy challenges of the social web. First, the application has sidestepped the consensual and contextual qualities desirable of social spaces. Secondly, Google’s move highlights the increasingly competitive and convergent nature of the social media landscape.
http://cis-india.org/advocacy/openness/blog/does-the-social-web-need-a-googopoly

The (in)Visible Subject: Power, Privacy and Social Networking
In this entry, I will argue that the interplay between privacy and power on social network sites works ultimately to subject individuals to the gaze of others, or to alternatively render them invisible. Individual choices concerning privacy preferences must, therefore, be informed by the intrinsic relationship which exists between publicness/privateness and subjectivity/obscurity.
http://cis-india.org/advocacy/openness/blog/the-in-visible-subject-power-privacy-and-social-networking

Internet Governance

Does the Safe-Harbor Program Adequately Address Third Parties Online?
While many citizens outside of the US and EU benefit from the data privacy provisions the Safe Harbor Program, it remains unclear how successfully the program can govern privacy practices when third-parties continue to gain more rights over personal data. Using Facebook as a site of analysis, I will attempt to shed light on the deficiencies of the framework for addressing the complexity of data flows in the online ecosystem.
http://cis-india.org/advocacy/igov/blog/does-the-safe-harbor-program-adequately-address-third-parties-online

Sense and censorship
Sunil Abraham examines Google's crusade against censorship in China in wake of the attacks on its servers in this article published in the Indian Express.
http://cis-india.org/advocacy/igov/blog/sense-and-censorship

Report on the Fourth Internet Governance Forum for Commonwealth IGF
This report by Pranesh Prakash reflects on the question of how useful is the IGF in the light of meetings on the themes of intellectual property, freedom of speech and privacy.
http://cis-india.org/advocacy/igov/blog/report-on-fourth-IGF

Telecom

The Right Ring Tone
Focus on improving service quality with a strong partner, and not on one-shot stake sales, says Shyam Ponappa in his article published in the Business Standard on April 1, 2010.
http://cis-india.org/advocacy/telecom/blog/ring-tone

Other Advocacy

Maps for Making Change Wiki Now Open to the Public
Since December 2009, CIS has been coordinating and nurturing the Maps for Making Change project, organised in collaboration with Tactical Tech. During the past four months, participants have been on a challenging yet fertile and inspiring journey that is now slowly coming to an end. Would you like to know more about what has happened in the time that has passed? The Maps for Making Change wiki is a good place to start.
http://cis-india.org/advocacy/others/maps-for-making-change-wiki-now-open-to-the-public

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/april-2010-bulletin

They fight for the visually challenged

radha — 2011-04-02T12:48:45Z

Times News Network - A report on the press conference held at the Press Club, Bangalore on 15th April, 2010.

Bangalore: The National Access Alliance (NAA) on Thursday opposed the Centre’s move to amend the Copyright Act 1957, which will prevent NGOs, educational institutions and persons with disabilities from converting reading material into audio, digital and other formats.

Nirmita Narasimhan, programming manager for the Centre for Internet and Society, on Thursday said: “Roughly, one lakh books are published every year, but only 700 are available to the blind in an accessible format. And most of these are illegally converted by NGOs. But what else can these organizations do?”

Converting texts into formats involves applying for a licence, which takes about three months; still it may take many more months for actual conversion to happen. Any student would lose a year by then, she explained.

Executive director of the centre, Sunil Abraham said: “It is important to remember that everyone is only temporarily visually-enabled. The issue affects all of us. Unlike American students, print-disabled Indians cannot freely convert their study books into MP3 format.”

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/they-fight-for-the-visually-challenged

Amendment to Copyright Act opposed

radha — 2011-04-02T12:49:15Z

A report on the press conference held on 15th April, at the Press Club, Bangalore : The Hindu

Bangalore: The proposed amendment to the Copyright Act 1957 will deprive over 70 million persons with disabilities in India from exercising their Right to Education, according to the National Access Alliance.

The amendment, being introduced in the budget session of the parliament will prevent non-governmental organisations, educational institutions and persons with disabilities from converting reading material, including textbooks and reference material, into audio, digital and other formats.

“The licence procedure for the conversion of these formats is cumbersome, restrictive and lengthy. This will deprive students with print disabilities of their Right to Education,” Sunil Abraham, executive director, The Centre for Internet and Society, told presspersons here on Thursday.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/amendment-to-copyright-act-opposed

e-Accessibility: A Wiki Project

rebecca — 2011-08-23T04:51:08Z

Envisaged and funded by the National Internet Exchange of India, and executed by the Centre for Internet and Society, a Wiki site pertaining to issues of disability and e-accessibility has recently been launched.

Such a project is most timely as India has a large percentage of disabled persons in its population— estimated to be over seven per cent as per the Census of 2001. Taken in figures, this amounts to roughly 70-100 million persons with disabilities in the territory of India. Out of this number, a mere two per cent of persons with disabilities residing in urban areas have access to information and assistive technologies.

Regrettably, there still remains a lack of awareness on how information and services can be best delivered to persons with disabilities. Parents, teachers, government authorities and society at large remain equally unaware of the options technology today presents to enable persons with disabilities live independent and productive lives. Therefore, the wiki aims foremost to serve as a resource for persons with disabilities and their families, NGO’s, as well as the members of education and legal communities--providing valuable information surrounding disability and electronic accessibility.

Covered in 125 article wiki project includes a broad collection of articles pertaining to topics of accessibility for users, developers, organizations, developments in India, and accessibility for nations. With hopes of expansion, wikipage can be accessed and edited collaboratively at http://accessibility.cis-india.org.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/e-accessibility-a-wiki-project

March 2010 Bulletin

praskrishna — 2012-08-13T05:02:42Z

Greetings from the Centre for Internet and Society! We bring you updates of our research, news, and events for the month of March 2010 in this bulletin.

News Updates

An Open Answer to Office
OpenOffice with its new features is giving Microsoft Word tough competition, says Deepa Kurup in this article published in The Hindu.
http://cis-india.org/news/open-office

Upcoming Events

CPOV: Wikipedia Research Initiative
The second WikiWars conference will be held in Amsterdam from 26 to 27 March 2010
http://cis-india.org/research/conferences/conference-blogs/cpov

CI Global Meeting on A2K
CIS is a co-sponsor of the Consumers International Meeting on A2K to be held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia on April 21 and 22, 2010.
http://cis-india.org/events/ci-global-meeting-a2k

Research

India Game Developer Summit Bangalore 2010
The India Game Developer Conference held at Nimhans Convention Centre on the 27th of February, 2010 was attended by Arun Menon who is working on The Gaming and Gold Project at The Centre for Internet and Society. The Developer forum brought together game developers from different sectors of the Game Production Cycle, with hardware manufacturers like Nvidia demonstrating their latest 3d technology and Software developers like Crytek and Adobe demonstrating the latest in developer tools for creating and editing games on multiple platforms.
http://cis-india.org/research/cis-raw/histories/gaming/india-game-developer-summit-in-bangalore-2010

10 Legendary Obscene Beasts
Nishant Shah analyses a peculiar event of vandalism which has now become the core of free speech and anti-censorship debates in mainland China. Looking at the structure of user generated knowledge websites and the specific event on the Chinese language encyclopaedia, 'Baidu Baike', he shows how, in cities where spaces of political spectacle and public protest are quickly diminishing, the Internet has become a tool for producing new public spaces of demonstration and protest.
http://cis-india.org/research/grants/ISShanghai/itcity4

WikiWars - A report
In this blog, Nishant Shah analyses about the WikiWars, the first of the three events held in Bangalore on January 12 and 13.
http://cis-india.org/research/conferences/conference-blogs/wwrep

Telecom

Understanding Spectrum
What is spectrum and how do government and commercial decisions on this scientific phenomenon affect public facilities and costs? Shyam Ponappa examines this in his latest blog published in the Business Standard on March 4, 2010.
http://cis-india.org/advocacy/telecom/blog/understanding-spectrum

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/march-2010-bulletin

Copyright Law as a tool for Inclusion

Rahul Cherian — 2013-02-20T11:04:40Z

Can Copyright Law be used as a tool for Inclusion? Rahul Cherian examines this in his blog on copyright.

Content owners have argued for years that copyright is a simple mechanism for the protection of author’s rights and the ownership of their creations. Globally, copyright law has been used as a tool to protect and enforce the rights of authors, publishers, record producers, software companies and movie moghuls. Copyright law has largely been responsible for creating virtual monopolies. But copyright law plays another role as important as protecting the rights of content owners, that of benefiting the world at large. In this context it is relevant to ask the question: Can Copyright Law be used as a tool for Inclusion?

Historically copyright was protected to afford greater encouragement to the production of literary works of lasting benefit to the world. One of the objectives of the first codified copyright law was to prevent publishers from having perpetual monopoly over works. Therefore copyright was available only for a short period of time after which the works were open to all to use. Thus, ideas of copyright law to balance the interests of the users and the authors began to take shape and moved away from being solely concerned with granting rights to publishers. The system of copyright was not an arrangement solely to safeguard the interests of the publishers but was an arrangement to balance interests of all the parties involved in order to espouse the greater cause of “encouragement of learning”. However, as copyright law evolved and vested interests started playing a larger role in shaping copyright law the goal of promoting scholarship and the “progress of science and useful arts” was lost. The period for which copyright is protected has been extended over the years. At present copyright in a literary work is protected for life of the author plus 60 years.

One of the communities that is hit hardest because copyright law focuses solely on the interest of publishers are persons with print impairment. Persons with print impairment, who may number close to 500 million globally, such as the visually impaired, dyslexics and persons with cerebral palsy, cannot read printed material. Publishers do not sell books in formats such as Braille, audio or e-text that can be “read” by persons with print impairment. Copyright law in most countries including India does not permit persons with print impairment to convert books into such formats as a result of which they are excluded from the education system (due to lack of text books), from working (due to lack of books for reference and research) and from leisure reading.

But all this is set to change. Over the last few years the World Blind Union, which represents more than 300 million persons with visual impairment, has been working on a draft treaty to allow for the conversion and distribution of books in accessible formats for persons with print impairment without infringing copyright. This draft treaty is currently being discussed at the World Intellectual Property Organisation and should hopefully be signed within the next few years. The Treaty, if signed, would be groundbreaking in the sense that it would be first time that international consensus will be reached on using copyright law as a tool for inclusion. As one of the people who was part of the treaty drafting exercise I find the resistance from most publishers to any expansion of the concept of “fair use” for persons with disabilities disturbing to say the least. This resistance is prevalent at the international level for the Treaty as well at the national level here in India where we have been working with disability rights organisations and policy research partners on amending Indian copyright law to achieve the same objectives (www.righttoread.in <http://www.righttoread.in/>). The common refrain of publishers is that any such change would result in piracy, almost as if blind people are the sole perpetrators of copyright infringement. The unsaid reason for the resistance is obvious: publishers do not want any expansion of the concept of “fair use”, even when they will not suffer any monetary loss. Publishers are concerned that the proposed expansion of “fair use” for the benefit of persons with print impairment could open the floodgates for further “fair use” exceptions for, say, education. So they resist this change, which will benefit hundreds of millions of persons with print disability around the world by enabling them to exercise their basic fundamental rights to read, to learn and to work.

What is encouraging though is that some momentum has built up at the national and international level on this issue with several countries supporting the Treaty. At the national level in India, the Ministry of Human Resource Development has proposed some appalling wording for the copyright amendment. But it is heartening to note that several leading politicians including India’s Law Minister has written to the Minister of Human Resource Development to re-look at the amendment. We are working at the Parliamentary level to try and ensure that the amendment is modified to meet the requirements of persons with print impairments. Over the next few months and years we will see how this plays out. We are quietly optimistic as always.

It is indeed heartening to note that there is a serious attempt to strike a balance between the interests of copyright owners and the public at large. Copyright law should be used as a tool to foster development and inclusion and should not perpetuate monopolies and exclusion. The exceptions to copyright for the benefit of persons with print impairment are a good starting point for using copyright law for one of its original purposes. In the long term I believe that these exceptions will create newer markets for publishers as a result of more print impaired persons becoming educated and having an income to BUY books in formats that they can read. After all, who will want to take the effort to convert a book into an accessible when they can buy the accessible version?

For those of you who are not convinced about the requirement of any change in the copyright landscape, let me pose these questions: should the right of a blind person to read a book be subservient to the copyright of a publisher or author? If a publisher refuses to sell a book in an accessible format, does the blind person have the right to convert the book into an accessible format? What if the book were needed for her education?

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/copyright-law-as-tool-for-inclusion

Web Accessibility as a Government Mandate?

praskrishna — 2011-08-17T08:46:13Z

Is Web accessibility just a Government Mandate? Should private sites be ignored? Wesolowski examines this in light of the steps taken by ictQATAR to make its website accessible to W3C standards, and hopes that Qatar and eventually all other Arab nations will follow suit and make Web accessibility much more of a mandate.

Most web developers know that they should make their websites accessible to persons with disabilities, such as including captions for videos to assist the hearing impaired, designing navigation so it can be done through a keypad as opposed to a mouse and including descriptive captions for the blind. But too often developers choose fancy design over accessibility. In some countries though, accessibility is no longer an option!

In a recent white paper published by my friends at G3ict (thank you again for taking me to see the Center for the Visually Impaired when I was in Atlanta last June – inspiring!), web accessibility is examined from a policy perspective. The white paper’s editor, Nimita Narasimhan from The Center for Internet and Society in Bangalore, India, examines web accessibility policies in 15 countries and the EU in terms of scope of policies and the type of policy. Scope refers to how comprehensive a policy. Type refers to the level of enforcement in place for the policy, ranging from being only suggested guidelines to legislative mandates.

Not surprisingly, few countries currently have a high scope and high policy enforcement level (see chart below), but more and more countries are adopting guidelines and are trending towards real enforcement. The white paper notes that W3C has already developed comprehensive guidelines for countries to use, but that in countries that do not use a Latin-based language, such as here in the Gulf, the guidelines often need to be customized to fit specific online language needs.

I found it interesting how so many countries are adopting Web accessibility standards, but also how rarely they seem to have any legislative mandate behind them. In many of the countries that do have a legislative mandate, web accessibility is often tied to a broader piece of legislation dealing with persons with disabilities in general. May be this is the way for more countries to go. I also found it interesting how most legislation makes Web accessibility mandatory only for government sites, but ignores any private sites – this seems to me to very much limit the impact.

In Qatar, we are still at the early stages. ictQATAR has made its website accessible to W3C standards and has encouraged other government agencies and organizations to follow suit. This is clearly just a first step and hopefully Qatar and other Arab countries will start to make web accessibility much more of a mandate.

For original article on Digital Qatar

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/web-accessibility-government-mandate

Your Signature Could Help 70 Million Read

praskrishna — 2011-04-02T13:10:48Z

A humble signature campaign in the city intends to take on a law that prevents the print-impaired from reading. You too can join in and support the cause.

Picture this: You are on a lazy weekend getaway with easy access to a hammock, cool lemonade and your favourite book. This might sound like oh-so common bliss to you, but this scenario is off bounds for over 70 million Indians. The "print-impaired", or in other words, those who cannot read due to a disability, don't have access to nearly 99% of material printed today. A campaign is currently on in Mumbai to change the law, and your endorsement could make a difference.

"The issue facing a print-impaired person is that when you have a book in standard print, it poses a problem to read," says Dr Sam Taraporevala, Associate Professor and Head of Department, Sociology at St Xavier's College.

Changing the format of a standard book is considered illegal under the Copyright Act of 1957. The Act does not permit conversion of books into a format that can be accessible for the print-impaired (through Braille, screen readers or a digital talking book format, to name a few). To counter this issue and make books accessible to all, Dr Taraporevala (also Director of the Xavier's Resource Centre for the Visually Challenged), has launched a signature campaign.

"The advantage technology offers is that if an author or publisher wants to make his work accessible, he can do so in real time." The campaign, which is part of a global initiative by the World Blind Union (WBU), Sight Savers International and other organisations, is the first of its kind for the city. It aims at collecting 500 signatures of authors and publishers, who will be directly responsible for bringing about a change. Signing the intent form does not in any way mean that the author is handing over the rights of his book.

"There is a concern among authors about providing an accessible copy of the book, that it might lead to piracy," says Dr Taraporevala. "I don't condone piracy but it's a reality and this will not add to it significantly. Why allow injustice to prevail because of an artificial fear?"

Three hundred signatures down and 200 more to go, the race is on for the January 22 deadline. But Dr Taraporevala remains unperturbed. "We will do it. I don't know how but I want to believe anything is possible."

See the original article on Mid-Day.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/your-signature-could-help-70-million-read

Free Copyright Control to Help Blind Students: Xavier's Resource Centre

praskrishna — 2011-04-02T13:10:36Z

This article throws light on the fact that even though technology has made it possible for visually challenged to access print material, there is little awareness among authors and publishers to make it accessible, and hence, only an amendment in copyright laws can bring about this awareness.

Technology has made it possible for the visually challenged to access the print. But there is little awareness among publishers and authors about the need to make printed documents accessible to all. An amendment in copyright laws is needed to bring about this awareness.

To make it happen, the Xavier’s Resource Centre for the Visually Challenged (XRCVC) has urged authors and publishers to support the global Right to Read [RTR] campaign initiated by the World Blind Union and Sight Savers International among others.

“The proposed amendments to the Indian Copyright Act are yet to be tabled in Parliament. But it is not just the law that needs to change,” said Dr Sam Taraporevala, XRCVC director. “There needs to be a quantum leap in the mindset, where people are thinking of accessibility across diverse dimensions.”

The XRCVC has urged authors and publishers to sign the RTR declaration. Technology can convert print into audio, larger print or Braille. But very little content has been converted into formats accessible to the print impaired.
The RTR campaign seeks to bring about changes to copyright laws, increase public awareness on the issue of access to reading for the print-impaired, and gather support for the treaty for the blind proposed by the WBU at the World Intellectual Property Organisation.

The XRCVC feels that amendments to the Indian Copyright Act should take interests of all stake holders into consideration. “A coordinated effort is required by all the stake holders, like the government, the copyright owners, persons with print impairment and organisations representing them, and the public,” Taraporevala said. “Signing the declaration does not involve handing over rights but indicates a statement of intent in support for the cause.”

For link to the original story on DNA.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/free-copyright-control-to-help-blind-students

Right to Read, Now in Mumbai

praskrishna — 2011-08-17T08:46:02Z

The third phase of the 'Right to Read' campaign in India held in Mumbai was coordinated by the Xavier’s Resource Centre for the Visually Challenged (XRCVC). The Mumbai Phase of the Right to Read Campaign was launched on 1st January 2010 and ran till the 27th of January 2010.

India has over 70 million persons who are unable to read printed materials and published information due to some forms of physical, cognitive or sensory disabilities. This includes the blind, visually impaired, persons with learning disabilities such as dyslexia and persons who are unable to use their hands or the upper part of their body and hence, cannot hold books. For these persons, information has to be converted into formats such as Braille, large print, audio, electronic and other formats which they can access using assistive technologies.

The ‘Right to Read' campaign was started for such persons. The campaign is part of a global initiative by the World Blind Union (WBU), Sightsavers International (SSI) and other such organizations. In India it is being spearheaded by the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), Daisy Forum of India (DFI), Inclusive Planet and Xavier's Resource Centre for the Visually Challenged (XRCVC).

The campaign seeks to accelerate changes in copyright law, raise public awareness on the issue of access to reading for the print-impaired and gather Indian support for the Treaty for the Blind proposed by the World Blind Union at the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO). The XRCVC as part of its work in the field of creating an accessible and inclusive society and promoting print access has campaigned for this cause mainly in Mumbai and Western India. This report focuses on the genesis and outcome of the Mumbai chapter of the global Right to Read campaign.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/mumbai-phase-of-right-to-read-campaign

The print-impaired millions and their right to read

praskrishna — 2011-04-02T13:10:56Z

Books, books everywhere, but not a word to read. This is the scenario for the approximately 70 million print-impaired in India, a sizeable population that includes the visually-impaired young people as well the elderly — whose vision depletes with advancing age.

If you are visually impaired and want to read the latest bestseller, the chances are that you would be staring at a blank, almost-impenetrable wall. The reason: hardly about 500 to 700 of the approximately one lakh titles that are published in India every year are converted to formats like Braille, audio books and e-books for the benefit of this population, as well as versions with large prints for those with weak vision.

Now, as the Budget Session of parliament is likely to consider amendments to the Copyright Act, those advocating a ‘right to read’ for the print-impaired are hoping that among the changes would be a permission to convert books to various accessible formats like Bookshare or Daisy Book Forum for this population that want to travel into the magic world of words but are forced to be out of it.

A National Right to Read Campaign, backed by the Global Right to Read Campaign (GRRC), is already on the job, creating public awareness against what activists call the ‘exclusion’ of millions of Indians from the ‘fundamental right’ to read books.

While there are technologies and software that have enabled this population to access print materials in electronic formats that are read aloud by the machine, it is still illegal for the print-impaired people to, say, scan a book and read it using a screen reader software (such as Adobe Read Aloud) or share it with others. The matters are complicated even more by lack of international laws that allow cross-border sharing of accessible-format books between libraries in India and other countries.

“Even though the International Publishers Association is looking for a licensing system, specifically for conversion of books to accessible formats for the visually impaired, publishers are not publishing in these versions,” says Chris Friend, chair of the GRRC and World Blind Union (WBU) representative.

However, 600 authors — including Arun Shourie, Tarun Tejpal, Meghnad Desai and Girish Karnad — and publishing houses like Harper Collins, Marg Publications, etc have pledged support to the campaign.

Persons who cannot read print are not only the blind, as is the popular perception. A print impaired person can be either visually impaired or those who have other physical, cognitive or sensory disabilities such as dyslexia, autism, learning disabilities, etc, point out Sam Taraporevala and Nirmita Narasimhan of the Centre for Internet and Society, which is spearheading the Right to Read Campaign along with the Daisy Forum.

Dismal scene

In developed countries, according to WBU estimates, only about five per cent of published books are available to print-impaired persons. In developing countries like India, the percentage is reduced to a dismal 0.5 per cent. There is increasing global attention on the issue in the form of a Treaty for the Blind, Visually Impaired and other Reading Disabled Persons, which is being discussed at the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) of the UN, and for which India has expressed its support.

Disabled rights activists like Javed Abidi are for faster availability of books in other formats, and say that it’s a ‘matter of shame’ that it has not been the norm despite India moving fast along the information highway.

Publishers like Cambridge University Press and Sage, while joining the movement for making books accessible for the print impaired, are a little apprehensive about the potential of abuse of the converted formats by book pirates as well as violation of rights of authors, whose permissions are necessary to convert any book to another format under the law.

“Publishers fear leakage of accessible formats into the open market,” says Manas Saikia of CUP. Something that Friend completely pooh poohs. “It’s a myth that we visually impaired are going to rob authors’ rights or leak the books into the open market. The Daisy format watermarks every converted production, and any leakage can be traced back to the source. Also, some publishers are opposing the WBU treaty at WIPO saying we want free books. That is another myth. We are ready to pay, just give us books to read,” he says.

But the debate in public space seems to be creating some impact. Even as publishers and authors are coming out in large numbers to support access of books to the print impaired, the human resource development ministry is working on providing an exception for conversion to various formats if it is for the print impaired.

In fact, G R Raghavendra, registrar for copyrights at the ministry, confirms that such a move is afoot to remove this ‘unfortunate’ lacuna in the law. Quite naturally, everyone who loves the printed word is hoping that the print-impaired book worms will sooner than latter witness sunnier days.

For the original article in the Deccan Herald

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/print-impaired-millions

Can’t read, so use new tech to let books speak

praskrishna — 2011-04-02T13:43:27Z

An article in the Times of India about the Right to Read campaign organised by the Centre for Internet & Society at Pragati Maidan in New Delhi as the world book fair kicked off.

Fifteen-year-old Ravi has never read a book. Diagnosed with a brain disorder when he was just three years old, he was taught how to read in a school for special children. But apart from some local newspapers and occasional letters from his family, he could never manage to enjoy a book because reading printed words was never comfortable to him.

On Saturday, Ravi was among the 300 print-impaired people — all dressed in identical blue sweatshirts and suffering from various disabilities like blindness, autism, dyslexia etc — who gathered at Pragati Maidan as the World Book Fair kicked off. Taking part in ‘Right to Read’ campaign organized by Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), they tried to create awareness about the plight of nearly 70 million people in the country who cannot read but, nevertheless, have the ability to enjoy a book or get information if book publishers take care to use the technology.

‘‘We want that people with disabilities should also be able to enjoy popular books like White Tiger or Five Point Someone. But for this, a lot needs to be done. The outdated copyright act needs to be amended so books can be converted to form which is accessible like audio books. Many publishers and writers do not give permission to have their books converted,’’ says Nirmita Narasimhan, programme manager of CIS.
As Amina flashes her wide grin, she seems just like any other normal 12-year-old child. However, a learning disorder stopped future studies for her and now her parents want to get her ‘‘settled’’ in life. ‘‘I want to study further,’’ was all she said. Amina has come from a small town in Bihar and is in Delhi with an NGO that is helping her adjust to life as a dyslexic.

Another participant in the campaign, Manoj, is blind. While he learned braille several years ago, his biggest regret is that because of his disability, he cannot enjoy the latest bestsellers. ‘‘I read whatever books are available in braille. Popular books are never accessible to me,’’ he said. The nationwide campaign began last year and since then has taken place in Kolkata and Mumbai, with Delhi being the third destination.
‘‘The campaign seeks to draw attention to the fact that out of nearly one lakh books that are published each year, barely 700 are available to people who cannot read print. The books can be converted into formats like braille, audio and large print to make them accessible to disabled people using screen readers (talking software) but it’s rarely done,’’ said a campaign volunteer.

Members of the campaign claimed that according to World Blind Union nearly 5% books are available to print-impaired persons in the developed countries. But in India the number of such books is just .5%. Javed Abidi, convener of Disabled Rights Group and one of the key-note speakers in the campaign, said: ‘‘Mostly it’s the visually impaired who have carry out the task to make the books more accessible to them. They have to scan the book and convert it and so that they can enjoy it. This needs to be changed. The onus should be on the publishers so books are made accessible to everyone.’’

The leaders of the campaign approached Union HRD minister Kapil Sibal when he came to speak at the inauguration ceremony of the fair. The minister said he has already done a lot for disabled citizens. Since the campaign was launched, over 600 authors and publishers have pledged their support to the campaign. ‘‘While technology has enabled the print-impaired community to access print materials in electronic formats that can be read using assistive technologies, converting books to these formats is not permitted by the law. The campaign also seeks necessary amendments in the Indian Copyright Act,’’ said Narasimhan.

For original article on The Times of India

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/new-tech-to-let-books-speak

Campaigners for Inclusion to Organise Awareness Raising Event at Kolkata International Book Fair on February 6

praskrishna — 2011-08-31T10:43:29Z

Campaigners for Inclusion is organising an awareness raising event on Right to Read at the Kolkata International Book Fair on February 6, 2010.

Campaigners for Inclusion (a voluntary citizen group imitative of Sruti Disability Rights Centre & CRY) had introduced the Right to Read Campaign in Kolkata last November. The programme was hosted by National University of Juridical Sciences (NUJS) where Nirmita Narsimhan from CIS and Rahul Cherian of Bookbole were present. Senior academicians like Dr. S. Das, Vice chancellor, University of Calcutta, Senior Journalists from The Telegraph as well as the Principal of Blind Boys Academy participated in a panel discussion and interacted with the audience which comprised of BPOs, DPOs, NGOs and students.

In continuance with the programme, an awareness raising event is being organised in the famous Kolkata International Book Fair on 6 February 2010. The volunteer group will be meeting in front of the Publishers Guild office at 2 p.m. Different Disability groups are expected to join them there—they will tour the entire Book Fair complex, with posters and leaflets, and end the tour in front of the Publishers Guild Office. The campaigners will then give a memorandum to the officials of the Guild.

More than one lakh people visit Kolkata Book Fair every day, so please join us to bring in awareness on non- availability of books for the print impaired.

For further information, please call:

Agni Srinivasan@ 09831477703, or

Moumita Chakraborty@ 09804364095

Video

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/events/awareness-raising-event-Kolkata