Publishers and authors around the world are up in arms about the Kindle 2's new "Text-To-Speech" function, which reads the book out loud for you. (Presumably in a flat, computer-y voice.) The Authors' Guild contends that the Text-To-Speech is a copyright violation, because it undercuts the author's rights to sell the audiobook version of their novels, and will eat into audiobook sales numbers. Authors' Guild Executive Director Paul Aiken has stated that ""They don't have the right to read a book out loud," which comes as surprising news to many book buyers who habitually read their own books aloud. Who knew that this was a violation of copyright? Many authors are scrambling to point out that, although they may belong to the Authors' Guild, it does not speak for them. John Scalzi has perhaps the pithiest reaction to the controversy: "Meh." Neil Gaiman apparently got tetchy with his agent, who supports the Authors' Guild position:

"My point of view: When you buy a book, you're also buying the right to read it aloud, have it read to you by anyone, read it to your children on long car trips, record yourself reading it and send that to your girlfriend etc. This is the same kind of thing, only without the ability to do the voices properly, and no-one's going to confuse it with an audiobook."

The claim that reading a book aloud creates a derivative work is clearly ridiculous, and possibly insane. However, I find it interesting that the discussion hinges on a misunderstanding of what an audiobook IS, which is to say, a nuanced and engaging performance of the book in question. (And I can't help but add that no one who has suffered through Kieron's Mac "reading" a short story on the Starship Sofa podcast would ever make that mistake.)