I have a couple readers from the National Library System. The old reader is really just a modified tape player. It has multiple tracks and speed controllers. It has simple pitch controllers and such. It is identical to the one I had when I was a kid. The technology has not changed in thirty years on this front.

Well, there is a new reader in town. It is a digital reader. It takes USB based cartridges and uses a modified m3u media file to play an audio book. You download the audio books from BARD. Google NLS BARD to find the sources and request a player if you qualify. The players will only play those books and the books will only play on the specific players. This is the most awesome thing that has happened for a long time on this subject.

This moves the books for the blind in to the 21st century. It means that I can search a web site for the book or magazine I want and download it instead of going through a request process and waiting for things to travel through the mail. Then, worrying about returning the book and waiting for the mail. If you use a Kindle, you have had this kind of support for a while. I'm just now getting on board.

This switch seems to have been rushed after the fact. The new readers appear to be so popular that the deadlines of killing the old system have been moved up a year or so. I'm not the only one who loves this new process compared to the old one.

Old Process

• Read through the catalog for a book or magazine.
• Send an email with the information to a human.
• Wait for a week for the book to turn up in the mail.
• Grab the first tape, flip the tape (3 times), second tape, ... fifteenth tape.
• Make sure all the tames are rewound all the way.
• Pack up the tames in order, flip the address label.
• Mail.
• Order something else.
• Wait.

You could request multiple books in order to have something while you were waiting for a new book to turn up. You could also have automatic selection processes in action that would bounce another book to you when the old one was received. Dealing with snail mail was bad enough. I had a very bad habit of flipping the address label more than once and mailing the book back to myself. There were a couple of bad tapes. There were a couple of bad containers for the tapes. This is to expected. Still, limiting the mechanical factors makes for less chance of failure.

New Process

• Log in to the BARD web site.
• Search around for a book or magazine.
• Download the file to the computer.
• Uncompress the file to a USB drive.
• Plug the USB drive in to the player
• Press play.
• Repeat as needed.

No late returns. You can store them on CD, though they only work on that reader.

The idea at first was to send out the USB based cartridges in the same way that the tapes were headed out. Someone was awake and said "What the hell are you people thinking?!?" Thank God. They made the web page and avoided half the troubles of the process. One side effect of this is the lack of a cartridge that fits in the digital reader. Now I have to use a USB drive which sticks out of the side of the device like a sore thumb just waiting to get knocked off, broken or lost. This makes portability a bit touchy. The digital reader does have a place to attach a strap on the back. Nice design.

Field	Data
Title	NLS BARD digital reader and the old school cassette reader
Description	I have a couple readers from the National Library System. The old reader is really just a modified tape player. It has multiple tracks and speed controllers. It has simple pitch controllers and such. It is identical to the one I had when I was a kid. The technology has not changed in thirty years on this front. Well, there is a new reader in town. It is a digital reader. It takes USB based cartridges and uses a modified m3u media file to play an audio book. You download the audio books from BARD. Google NLS BARD to find the sources and request a player if you qualify. The players will only play those books and the books will only play on the specific players. This is the most awesome thing that has happened for a long time on this subject. BARD Web site http://nslbard.loc.gov
Tags	NLS BARD legally blind audio book reader audiobook tape player digital audio Houston Texas Harris County Canon 948IS
Link	Video, BARD

Video bullets

• When I was a kid.
• Green
• Not one change in 30 years.
• Didn't read even with the reader much.
• Old Reader.
• Basic functions.
• Tapes, flipping, sides.
• Too big to fit in a back pack.
• Process of tapes, mailing, waiting
• Demo
• New Reader.
• Basic functions
• USB drive
• Portable, rounder, easier to carry.
• No cartridge. USB drive sticks out.
• Web site and no returns
• Demo

Of course, I didn't print this list and have it in front of me while making the video. I think just typing it up helped.