Amazon bringing Voice Guide and Explore by Touch features to Kindle Fires for vision-impaired users

Amazon's been attuned to the needs of its vision-impaired customers for years, first rolling out text-to-speech technology on its original Kindle e-reader years ago. Today the company revealed plans to add to that feature set in its Kindle Fire and Fire HD (7-inch) tablets with Voice Guide and Explore by Touch technology. Voice Guide's an improvement upon regular text-to-speech tech that reads aloud any action performed by users -- things like announcing app names and book titles when they're selected. Explore by Touch lets folks swipe their fingers across their Fire's display and identifies each onscreen item as their phalanges pass over them. Once aware of what app or piece of content's being touched, a simple tap opens the item. Ready for the new assisted navigation experience right now? Well, all you anxious Fire owners will have to wait, the update doesn't land until early next year.Filed under: Tablets, Software, AmazonCommentsSource: Amazon Continue reading at 'Engadget'

[ Engadget | 2012-12-07 00:00:00 UTC ]
News tagged with: #feature set #reads aloud #book titles

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Indigo and Books-a-Million join boycott of Amazon print titles

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[ The Bookseller | 2012-02-06 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Tough Week for Amazon

Despite posting a 35% sales increase for the fourth quarter and earnings that were better than expected (if still down compared to a year ago), last week was a tough one for Amazon. Analysts and investors were disappointed in the quarterly report, and the stock price for the nation’s largest... Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2012-02-03 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Amazon launches India e-commerce site

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[ The Bookseller | 2012-02-02 00:00:00 UTC ]
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BBC Books in two-year deal with "The Voice"

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[ The Bookseller | 2012-02-02 00:00:00 UTC ]
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McGraw-Hill 'explores education sale'

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[ The Bookseller | 2012-02-01 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Amazon ups UK ebook sales five-fold

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[ The Bookseller | 2012-02-01 00:00:00 UTC ]
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VIDEO: Amazon expects low growth for late 2011

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[ BBC News | 2012-01-31 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Barnes & Noble, Taking On Amazon in the Fight of Its Life

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[ The New York Times | 2012-01-29 00:00:00 UTC ]
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[ The Bookseller | 2012-01-16 00:00:00 UTC ]
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[ The Bookseller | 2012-01-16 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Buzz Bringing Sales to Coffee House

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[ Publishers Weekly | 2012-01-13 00:00:00 UTC ]
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'PW' February Features

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[ Publishers Weekly | 2012-01-09 00:00:00 UTC ]
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