Blog posts in "Talking Book Service"

ICFL "Cool" staff

sue.walker — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 12:33:04 -0600

ICFL staff is prepared to "Beat the Heat" with hats and sunglasses for TBS Awareness Day. 20 public libraries statewide are planning activities during the week of August 17-21. Activities will:

Raise Idaho's citizens awareness about this free, statewide service
Highlight resources available in local libraries for persons unable to read standard print
Provide information on vision loss and how to cope with it

The following public libraries are participating in "Beat the Heat: How to Survive after 45"

Ada community
American Falls
Blackfoot
Boise (Cole and Ustick branch)
Burley
Couer d'Alene
Eastern Owyhee County (Grandview)
Emmett
Jerome
Kootenai Shoshone (Hayden branch)
McCall
Meridian (main and Silver Stone branch)
Mountain Home
Nampa
Payette
Plummer
Portneuf (Pocatello)
Snake River Community (Blackfoot)
Twin Falls

Library outreach

sue.walker — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 11:14:30 -0600

Earlier this week I visited 7 public libraries in Bingham, Bonneville, and Jefferson counties to discuss the Talking Book Service. I enjoyed meeting with library staff and touring their libraries. I was impressed with the variety of resources available to persons unable to read standard print. Materials in large print, audio materials in both cassette and CD-Rom format, music, Playaways, and E-audio books are available in many collections.

Staff enthusiastically accepted outreach materials and information about the Talking Book Service in order to increase user access to materials not available locally. They also accepted TBS players so that TBS users requiring a replacement player can receive one from their local public library and not have to wait for a replacement player to be mailed from Boise. Staff involvement in their communities increases potential user knowledge of the Talking Book Service and gives them the chance to continue reading when physical limitations occur.

Once again I'm proud of the difference Idaho librarians make in their communities and invite all public libraries to share information about the Talking Book Service with their users.

Retrospective TBS titles available

sue.walker — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 16:03:34 -0600

We've just finished selecting the 1500+ titles that will be distributed in digital format when the Talking Book Service transition begins next year. These titles will be available on cartridges and will play on the new digital players. It was a challenge to select 1500 titles from the more than 12,000 currently available in digital format, but we hit the major genres: westerns, romance, suspense, mystery, and bestsellers hard with additional titles from most other genres. With 50-75 new titles added each month, we should have a decent collection to start circulating on cartridges when the players are available in mid 2009.

In addition to the collection of digital cartridges, the complete digital database containing about 20,000 titles will be available to download titles that are not used as frequently as the cartridges.

Reading Alternatives

sue.walker — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 11:30:37 -0600

The transition to the digital format in the Talking Book Service presents a whole new way to read for those requiring reading alternatives. Users can now download books from NLS BARD onto specialized players. The database is available 24/7 and contains a growing collection (more than 11,000 titles at this time) of books from the NLS collection. All titles added to the collection are automatically added to NLS BARD. For more information on accessing NLS BARD and compatible players, contact the Talking Book Service.

Books on Tape Update Spring 2008

sue.walker — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 00:00:00 -0600

The Spring 2008 Books on Tape Update newsletter, order forms, and podcasts are now available for download.

Podcast Feeds:

New Descriptive Videos Podcast Feed
Books on Tape Update Newsletter Podcast Feed
New Books on Tape Spring 2008 Podcast Feed