More Kindle 3 News no comments
The National Federation of the Blind (NFB) today released a press release commending Amazon on the accessibility features of the new Kindle 3 ereaders. The new Kindles come with a voice guide that reads all menu options aloud which will make it easier for those with vision impairments and print-disabilities to use.
Dr. Marc Maurer, President of the National Federation of the Blind, said: "We commend Amazon on the unveiling of a new Kindle that blind and print-disabled people can use. In order to compete in today’s digital society, blind and print-disabled people must be able to access the same reading technologies as the sighted. The National Federation of the Blind has long been urging Amazon to make its reading device accessible, and we are pleased that our efforts have come to fruition."
In June 2009 the National Federation of the Blind and the American Council of the Blind (ACB) filed suit against Arizona State University (ASU) to prevent the university from deploying Amazon’s Kindle DX electronic reading device as a means of distributing electronic textbooks to its students because the device cannot be used by blind students. The Kindle DX featured text-to-speech technology that can read textbooks aloud to blind students. The menus of the device were not accessible to the blind, however, making it impossible for a blind user to purchase books from Amazon’s Kindle store, select a book to read, activate the text-to-speech feature, and use the advanced reading functions available on the Kindle DX.
Besides the new and improved font technology, the new Kindle 3 ereaders will also support Chinese (both Traditional and Simplified), Japanese, Korean and Cyrillic character sets.
This could be pretty big, as it could help Amazon to greatly expand the Kindle’s market share internationally. The ereader market is big in China, and I’m thinking that the build quality and feature set at the new prices will make the Kindle 3 competitive in the Chinese ereader market. There is the issue of ebook piracy (there have been estimates that over 90 percent of ebooks read there are pirated) in China, so I’m not sure how Amazon will fare at selling Kindle books there.
The Japanese ebook market is still nascent, but it could well take off there as well. Several companies are forming to digitize and distribute content. Korean language support should also be welcome in Korea. The iPad currently does not support Korean, though it does support Chinese and Japanese.
Amazon will also be selling the Kindle 3 ereaders in the UK directly from the Amazon UK website, so no longer will buyers there need to order from the US and pay with dollars. The 3G + Wi-Fi Kindle 3 UK will cost £149 and the Wi-Fi only version will be £109. As in the US the new Kindle 3 will be released on August 27, 2010. Shipping will be free in the UK via Super Saver Delivery.
The Bookseller reports that in the UK Kindle Store ebook prices will be set by Amazon, not by publishers. No agency pricing model there.
£149.00
£109
