eBook, Files, Student and Work - Nonprofit Technology

Benetech’s New Image Description Tool Improves Accessibility of Graphical Content for Students with Print Disabilities

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

MAY 15, 2012

This week, Benetech’s DIAGRAM Center has announced the release of an open source web application for creating and editing crowdsourced image descriptions in books used by students with print disabilities. Books with image descriptions will go back into the Bookshare library for students with print disabilities to use in their coursework.

Images

Images Student Accessibility Content

Advancing Reading Equality with Bookshare’s Exponential Growth

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

SEPTEMBER 12, 2014

Thousands of ebooks are pouring into the collection each month thanks to the dedication of our volunteers around the world and partnerships with more than 500 socially responsible publishers who donate their digital files. These milestones represent a giant leap forward in the number of students and individuals we serve.

Literacy

Literacy eBook Global Audio

Digital Divide Data: our Partner in Laos

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

NOVEMBER 21, 2012

We really love this approach, which we think of making our money work twice. For example, our Bookshare online library for the blind, uses several different social enterprises to do data entry and proofreading work on textbooks. We call this our social enterprise supply chain. We scan the books in the U.S.,

Laos

Laos Digital Data New York City

Bringing Millions of Books to Billions of People: Making the Book Truly Accessible

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

JULY 9, 2018

The print book doesn’t work for people who are blind, partially sighted, dyslexic, have physical limitations, people who haven’t learned to read, or people who can’t read the particular language of a specific book is written in. We can use the same ebook file to deliver the content ten different ways. We can do better!

Accessibility

Accessibility eBook People Copyright

Donor Spotlight: Lavelle Fund for the Blind

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

JANUARY 5, 2015

One foundation that has been a committed supporter of our work is the Lavelle Fund for the Blind. Frankly, it didn’t go as well as we had hoped, and Lavelle worked with us to retarget the grant to focus on students with visual impairments. This pilot paved the way for our work in the education field.

Fund

Fund India United States eBook

The Gift of Reading, a Circle of Life

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

NOVEMBER 10, 2014

It became a burden to his family and caregivers to constantly drop what they were doing to turn a page, so he began seeking out ebooks. Few were available, and he had trouble with the ones that were: they’d often be in a format that didn’t work well with his voice recognition software.

Life

Life Gift eBook France

On the Future of Braille: Thoughts by Radical Braille Advocates

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

JULY 3, 2013

In what is known as the “ braille provision ,” the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) of 2004 mandates that the teams who help write educational plans for students with disabilities presume that all blind and visually impaired children should be taught Braille unless it is determined to be inappropriate. Accordingly, U.S.

Literacy

Literacy eBook Images Accessibility

Technological Protection Measures and the Blind

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

JUNE 22, 2013

This has created the ironic situation where blind people, who because of their disability require access to digital copies, have been effectively locked out of purchasing ebooks for the last decade. So, the student might be able to read only 60% of the relevant content, and have no idea about what the equations say. NLS in the U.S.),

Measure

Measure Technology Audio eBook

Upholding The Social Bargain: Bookshare and Copyright Compliance

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

SEPTEMBER 21, 2012

The biggest area of our work to date is for schools in the U.S., which get Bookshare at no cost when serving students with qualifying disabilities (thanks to funding from the Office of Special Education Programs at the U.S. When we do, almost all of them are inadvertent: basically users who don't understand how technical things work.

Copyright

Copyright Social Law Student

Bookshare Celebrates Its 10th Anniversary at Google

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

MAY 2, 2012

Betsy Beaumon, Benetech VP and General Manager of Bookshare During the event, our Bookshare staff offered demos of our Bookshare library and our Go Read accessible ebook reader for Android. They also demoed Read2Go, the accessible ebook application for the Apple OS and Route 66 Literacy, Benetech’s online literacy instructional program.

Celebrate

Celebrate Google Literacy Library

Benetech’s Framework for Developing New Social Enterprises

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

FEBRUARY 27, 2013

I was delighted when Ron Schultz invited me to collaborate with him on his latest book Creating Good Work – The World’s Leading Social Entrepreneurs Show How to Build a Healthy Economy. Ron Schultz's latest book, Creating Good Work Creating Good Work arrives at a critical time for the social entrepreneurial movement.

Develop

Develop Social Library eBook

The Case for Copyright Exceptions and Fair Use

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

JANUARY 17, 2014

Such action, the Court decided, didn’t constitute copyright infringement because it was fair use , that is, a limitation and exception to the exclusive rights granted by copyright law to the author of a creative work. students) with a collection of 220,000+ (and counting) accessible books—the world’s largest library of its kind.

Copyright

Copyright Law Accessibility Library

Why I’m Scared of the SOPA bill

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

NOVEMBER 28, 2011

We provide accessible ebooks that can be spoken aloud, turned into Braille or large print. We serve over 150,000 students with disabilities alone with free online services funded by the Department of Education (however, nothing contained in this post has anything to do with our funders). Or file a DMCA notice. Wonderful stuff.

eBook

eBook China Copyright Library

Benetech: the Equilibrium Change Machine

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

JANUARY 5, 2016

I just read the new book from Sally Osberg, President and CEO of the Skoll Foundation, and strategy guru Roger Martin, Getting Beyond Better: How Social Entrepreneurship Works. But, it’s always useful to explore the framework of one’s work. Osberg & Martin, Getting Beyond Better: How Social Entrepreneurship Works, 2015.

Change

Change eBook United States Conservancy

Why I’m Scared of the SOPA Bill by Jim Fruchterman

Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media

DECEMBER 8, 2011

We provide accessible ebooks that can be spoken aloud, turned into Braille or large print. We serve over 150,000 students with disabilities alone with free online services funded by the Department of Education (however, nothing contained in this post has anything to do with our funders). Or file a DMCA notice. Wonderful stuff.

eBook

eBook Copyright China Law

Nonprofit Technology

Benetech’s New Image Description Tool Improves Accessibility of Graphical Content for Students with Print Disabilities

Advancing Reading Equality with Bookshare’s Exponential Growth

Trending Sources

Digital Divide Data: our Partner in Laos

Bringing Millions of Books to Billions of People: Making the Book Truly Accessible

Donor Spotlight: Lavelle Fund for the Blind

The Gift of Reading, a Circle of Life

On the Future of Braille: Thoughts by Radical Braille Advocates

Technological Protection Measures and the Blind

Upholding The Social Bargain: Bookshare and Copyright Compliance

Bookshare Celebrates Its 10th Anniversary at Google

Benetech’s Framework for Developing New Social Enterprises

The Case for Copyright Exceptions and Fair Use

Why I’m Scared of the SOPA bill

Benetech: the Equilibrium Change Machine

Why I’m Scared of the SOPA Bill by Jim Fruchterman

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