New ABC Application for Access to Books for Blind and Visually Impaired
The Accessible Books Consortium (ABC) has launched a new application that provides access to digital books to individuals who are blind, visually impaired or otherwise disabled.
ABC is a public-private partnership under the flagship of World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), which includes different organizations and institutions for blind and visually impaired people.
In order to offer as many books as possible in an accessible format for the blind and visually impaired people, ABC has launched a new free application through the ABC Global Book Service online catalog, enabling direct search and immediate download of more than 63,000 works. The initial catalog offered by the new app includes collections of five libraries for the blind from Switzerland, France and Canada. This will make it easier for beneficiaries to obtain books worldwide.
At IPI, we have already posted about the operation of the Accessible Book Consortium (ABC) project.
More information on the ABC’s new application is available here.
The 43rd session of the WIPO Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (hereinafter SCCR) made substantial progress on the issues advocated by the A2K Coalition (Access to Knowledge Coalition), which IPI is a member of. This year’s session was the most productive on the issues of exceptions and limitations. James Love (Knowledge Ecology International), a long-time observer at WIPO, described the outcome and the impact of the public interest community as the strongest since the conclusion of the Marrakech Treaty, which brought global copyright exceptions for the benefit of the blind and visually impaired.
Today, March 17, 2023, a symposium on law in the information society is taking place in the golden lecture hall of the Faculty of Law in Ljubljana. Dr. Maja Bogataj Jančič will present copyright aspects of artificial intelligence at the symposium.
The third day of the 43rd session of the WIPO Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights is intended for discussion on the topic of exceptions and limitations to copyright, especially in connection with the right to research.
The 43rd session of the WIPO Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (SCCR/43) is being held in Geneva from March 13 to 17, 2023. The Intellectual Property Institute has a permanent observer status at WIPO since 2022 and is also a member of the Access to Knowledge Coalition (A2K coalition).