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From: Lloyd.Rasmussen@f432.n109.z1.fidonet.org (Lloyd Rasmussen)
Newsgroups: misc.handicap
Subject: Blnd database
Message-ID: <15566@handicap.news>
Date: 13 May 91 21:08:42 GMT
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[This is from the Blink Talk Conference]

The database was really set up to help library personnel in the regional
and subregional libraries to find material for all consumers.  Before it
was made available, sometime in the late 70's, there was and continues
to be the microfiche catalog, which is updated I think quarterly.  I
think that BLND is also only updated quarterly, although I could be
wrong about that.  I have worked with BLND with a VersaBraille and a bit
with speech (on library time) several years ago, and it certainly works
with about any type of terminal you could come up with.  Some of the
problems in broadening the access and reducing its price are:
    Who will answer all the user questions?  You can get a taped manual
for the BRS system from NLS now.  Searching these things and keeping
from picking up hundreds of records you don't want is something that
takes practice, and will never be for the average library patron, now
matter if it became free.
    Most databases of any value in this country are for sale, not free.
The question is how many book or magazine titles do you want to trade
for access to BRS by a few hundred of the 700,000 patrons we have using
the program.
It would not hurt to write a letter to Frank Kurt Cylke, Director,
National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, 1291
Taylor Street, NW, Washington, DC 20542.  Changes don't come overnight.
Some of them never come at all, but are superseded by events.  I think a
reasoned discussion of this topic should continue.

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