Shelly Palmer

Shelly Palmer Radio Report – May 24, 2013

Amazon continues adding new features to its Kindle for iOS app that make it easier to use for blind and visually impaired users. Features like X-Ray, End Actions, sharing, highlighting and bookmarking have all been tweaked to give visually impaired users easier access to the nearly 2 million titles in its catalog that feature text-to-voice VoiceOver narration. These complement the existing features for these users already built-in to iOS, like zoom, assistive touch and support for peripheral braille displays. While the features are currently only available on iOS, Amazon says it will make them available on more platforms in the future. Amazon has been criticized in the past for not doing enough for its visually impaired users and has even had blind users protesting in front of its headquarters over lack of support on the Kindle platform. This latest effort is a step in the right direction, as we all deserve the ability to succeed in the connected world.