Nearly all literary material known to man is inaccessible to the visually impaired. Millions of words – in notes, articles, books, scripts, blogs – are created every hour and become part of the “inaccessible universe.” In the summer of 2008 the team at Inclusive Planet set out to take on the biggest challenge in the world of the visually impaired: making the world’s inaccessible content accessible. To understand the gargantuan proportions of this problem, it is important to understand that Braille is an infinitesimally tiny fraction of this universe. The internet has been a fresh new force of accessible content but most of the accessible content on the internet is locked up in highly inaccessible websites.
So how does one solve this pervasive and widespread problem? There are large-scale global initiatives to convert books into accessible formats, but these are just a drop in the ocean. They can only cater to some needs of some people in some parts of world. They cannot address the culture, language, and subject-specific needs of tens of millions of visually impaired people across the world. The only people who can address these needs and provide meaningful solutions are members of the community itself. If Kevin from Holland shares his accessible biology notes with Rajat from India, and if Jose from Brazil shares his law school research with Lee Kyun from Korea, then we have a solution like no other. A vibrant universe where people reach out, connect, and fulfill each others’ needs. A universe created by aggregating the pools of accessible content that the visually impaired community has created for itself.
BookBole.com, Inclusive Planet’s first creation, is the outcome of this thought process. Designed exclusively for the visually and print impaired, it enables them to connect with each other and share accessible content, including books, notes, articles, blogs, and audio recordings, and build conversations around this content. Going forward, BookBole will serve as a social network, content platform, marketplace, and policy platform rolled into one. The makings of a true social venture.
On Monday, October 26, 2009, BookBole began reaching out to print and visually-impaired people the world over. It’s available in both English and Spanish.
As for our involvement and as part of our commitment to support social enterprise, both Beyond Profit and Microfinance Insights will be two of the first interactive channels on BookBole. A few times a week, we will feed live content onto the site – from our blog, from Twitter, and from our print publication, making our content available to members of BookBole.
Watch this space for more details and the formal announcement of the launch!
Follow the journey on:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/BookBole/167677086120
To get in touch write to:
Tanuj Kalia Said,
November 7, 2009 @ 5:36 am
Hello!
I have just finished attending a small seminar on the ‘Right To Read’ campaign held at NUJS, Kolkata, India. Inclusive Planet, Book Bole, Center for Internet and Society among others sponsored and supported the event. Some stimulating topics worth ruminating upon came up:
1.) Books in the audio format might not be in consonance with Right to ‘Read’ because reading the text is an entirely different experience vis-a-vis listening to someone read it out. So Braille has to remain a priority.
2.) How to incorporate diagrams and graphs in the audio version of books?
3.) A book recorded by say an American/ European gentleman might not be of much use for student living in Asia/ India because the pronunciation and accent will be too alien for him or her to understand what is being read out.
Still, it is a laudable effort indeed.
Wishing all the best to the Inclusive Planet guys!
Tanuj Kalia