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From: Beth.Hatch-Alleyne@f207.n260.z1.fidonet.org (Beth Hatch-Alleyne)
Newsgroups: misc.handicap
Subject: NLS Database
Message-ID: <15945@handicap.news>
Date: 4 Jun 91 02:01:50 GMT
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Index Number: 15945

[This is from the Blink Talk Conference]

Diana; it seems to me, if I understood you correctly, that NLS is
playing both ends against the middle in dealing with the Database.
If I called my regional library I could get a bibliography of books
by a particular author, or on a particular subject, or particular
genre.  It would seem to be in their best interest that we have this
information at our finger tips so that we won't tie up the time of
staff members taking our phone calls and answerering our mail for
those of us who have access to modems.  NLS is paid for by the
government, it is free for us to order books and obtain
bibliographies as I mentioned above.  If BRS was to run the program,
and then they in turn tell you that NLS is really running the
program and are charging $75.00 for anyone to access the database,
that isn't fair since the library was designed to be a free source
of information and reading for us, the blind individuals who use it.
 Perhaps if we all got together and called them enough, if they
realised that a lot of us were really up in arms about it, we could
persuade them to come up with something better.  What that is I'm
not sure, but we can at least start by telling them we're unhappy
with the current system, work on it amongst ourselves to think of an
alternative, and go from there.  You have been dealing with NLS for
a while, so you have a better sense of what is really going on, but
if I've understood you correctly, the way they are doing things only
hurts us, the blind community, supposedly the people it was created
to serve.  Perhaps NLS doesn't want to discuss anything on Blinktalk
precisely because of this fact because there are many of us who do
use the library, and who do care about what happens to our fellow
blind friends.  Sorry for the length of this message, when you ask a
writer for her opinion, this is what you get.  Looking forward to
your next message, Beth.

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