Re: Braille copyright violations

I suggest that you might want to contact the following two people who work with production of materials for blind and dyslexic readers. Both of these men were at the first CONFU meeting (Conference on Fair Use) in September, 1994 in Washington, DC in which I also participated. At that time Mr. Kelly and Mr. Tinsley brought up the issue of fair use of print materials which are audiotaped or produced in braille in the context of character enhancement and voice recognition software used with digital works. At that time, Bruce Lehman, Assistant Commissioner of Commerce, stated that the issues connected with materials for the blind should probably be removed from the fair use conference discussions as Congress would certainly address this use of print materials to make them available to those who are blind if the producers of print materials were not cooperative. While the situation you describe in your library may not be precisely parallel to the situations incurred by the services provided by Mr. Kelly (VP for Recording for the Blind) and Mr. Tinsley (President, American Printing House for the Blind, Inc.), I am sure they could give you some advice and direction to other sources if need be.

John Kelly, Vice President, Consumer Services Recording for the Blind
20 Roszel Road
Princeton, NJ 08540
Phone: 609-452-0606
FAX: 609-987-8116 Tuck Tinsley III
American Printing House for the Blind, Inc. 1839 Frankfort Avenue, P.O. Box 6085
Louisville, KY 40206-0085
Phone: 502-895-2405
FAX: 502-895-2405 I hope these contact persons are helpful in your search for more information on this subject.

Sandra C. Walker, Visual Resources Specialist Department of Art, The University of Tennessee, Knoxville Past-President, Visual Resources Association swalker5[_at_]utk.edu

On Wed, 30 Oct 1996, Shonda Konemann <okosb[_at_]gteens.com> wrote:
>
> Could someone please help me with this problem? I am the librarian at
> the Oklahoma School for the Blind. We use materials in braille and
> large print with our students. However, when items available in large
> print are not available in braille I often find that we have "major
> discussions" among the faculty about whether it is legal to produce
> that item in braille for two to three students to use during the school
> year. We have software programs which allow us to read, scan, and
> produce materials in braille....which is fine for our own personal
> productions. I have informed our staff about copyright laws and I am
> holding out that anything produced in braille must be granted copyright
> permission from the print publisher before it is produced. I can
> understand certain items, such as magazine articles scanned and
> reproduced for research by a student. But isn't it a violation to
> produce full-text books into braille from the print for two to three
> students to use during the year....and use them year after year?
>
> I feel like the copyright police because the objections I hear from
> teachers is that "it's not fair that these kids can't have the same text
> in braille that is available and we can produce it for them...no one
> needs to know." I know! If anyone knows any laws which will help to
> clarify this issue for us, I'll be truly grateful....and probably hated,
> but it's the law, right?
>
> Thank you.
>
> Shonda Konemann
> Library Media Coordinator
> Oklahoma School for the Blind
> okosb[_at_]gteens.com --
Received on Thu Oct 31 1996 - 15:08:14 GMT