ICDRI, a member of the Reading Rights Coalition, is pleased to post this Joint
Statement on Access to Books by Americans with Print Disabilities. Kareem Dale,
Special Assistant to the President on Disability Policy, has also referenced
this announcement in The White House Blog “One Step Closer to Full Access” at
www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2010/03/09/one-step-closer-full-access .
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT:
Chris Danielsen
Reading Rights Coalition
(410) 659-9314, extension 2330
(410) 262-1281 (Cell)
cdanielsen@nfb.org
Joint Statement on Access to Books
by Americans with Print Disabilities
Washington,
D.C. (March 9, 2010): The Reading Rights Coalition, which represents
thirty million Americans who cannot read print due to disabilities; the Authors
Guild, with a membership of eight thousand American writers; and the Association
of American Publishers, consisting of three hundred publishers representing 85
percent of all published materials in the United States, today issued the
following statement regarding access to books by Americans with print
disabilities:
"The growth in the number of books offered in electronic and audio
formats has created tremendous opportunities for the millions of Americans who
are blind or have other print disabilities that make it difficult or impossible
to read printed books in the same way that other Americans typically do. This
large community constitutes a previously-untapped market that is hungry for the
educational, inspirational, and recreational opportunities that books can
provide, and now offers a significant commercial opportunity to the publishing
industry.
“The Reading Rights Coalition, the Authors Guild, and the Association
of American Publishers believe that the contents of books should be as
accessible to individuals with print disabilities as they are to everyone else.
To that end, these groups agree to work together and through the communities
they represent to ensure that when the marketplace offers alternative formats to
print books, such as audio and electronic books, print-disabled consumers can
access the contents of these alternative formats to the same extent as all other
consumers."
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About the Reading Rights Coalition
The Reading Rights Coalition consists of thirty-one organizations that represent
the estimated thirty million Americans who can not read print. The member
organizations of the Reading Rights Coalition believe that access to the written
word is the cornerstone of education and democracy, and new information
technologies must SERVE individuals with disabilities rather than acting as
barriers.
