Thanks to the Internet and some original programming by Microsoft Canada, 105,000 blind or visually impaired Canadians will be able to read thousands of books, daily newspapers and magazines.
Launched Wednesday by the Canadian National Institute for the Blind, the CNIB Digital Library is described as the most advanced collection of alternative formats in the world and a model for 175 international libraries producing alternative-format information.
It also contains a Children's Discovery Portal, the world's first portal of its kind for children who are blind.
The library's on-line services including the CNIB catalogue and a digital repository of books into one unified, bilingual, Internet gateway.
There are more than 10,000 audio, text, and Braille titles available on-line, including recent bestsellers such as Life of Pi and The Stone Diaries. Users can also search and order from a collection of more than 60,000 titles.
"For sighted people, technology makes access to information easier. For people like myself who are blind, it makes access possible," CNIB president Jim Sanders said at the launch of the library.
The library was designed to work with major adaptive technology products, including screen-reading programs and Braille keyboards.
Users can listen to a CNIB Library talking book (narrated by a human) right from their computers by selecting a link for the title of that book.
The library also contains current editions of 40 daily, national and community newspapers from across Canada, and access to the full-text versions of thousands of magazines and databases such as the Encyclopedia Britannica On-line.
"The CNIB Digital Library will open up worlds of opportunity and knowledge. For example, I can now read a newspaper the same day it hits the newsstand. And the new service is particularly exciting for young CNIB clients, who will be able to visit a Web site that is just as much fun, attractive and informative as any other children's site."
The CNIB said that only 3 per cent of published materials are available in an accessible format.
The Children's Discovery Portal offers blind or visually impaired children access to on-line games, participation in on-line polls and help with their homework. They can sample or read entire books on-line and chat with other children who are blind from across the country.
For some, the CNIB said, this may be their first opportunity to meet another child who is blind.
"The whole Portal is cool but I especially love the chat room because I can speak to other kids like me," CNIB user Robert Hampson, 11, said. "I also like playing games like Dreadnought and it's fun to be able to read books right away instead of waiting for them to arrive in the mail."
The CNIB Digital Library is the result of a venture to transform the CNIB Library's collection and production process to a digital library, which had been relying on obsolete technology to reproduce materials. The collection was also at risk of being lost if it were digitized.
The cost of the project is being covered by a national $33-million campaign called That All May Read….
A total of $13.4-million has been raised to date, with Microsoft Canada leading corporate donors with $2.5-million.
"This launch is only the beginning for The CNIB Digital Library," said campaign chairman and Microsoft Canada president Frank Clegg. "Thanks to our donors, we are one third of the way there."
Microsoft Canada designed the software to manage the digital library collection, incorporating an advanced digital access and storage system from OpenText Corp. of Waterloo, Ont.