Future Audio Books - The DAISY-Project

The DAISY Consortium was formed in May, 1996 by talking book libraries to lead the worldwide transition from analog to Digital Talking Books. DAISY denotes the Digital Accessible Information SYstem.

Members of the Consortium actively promote the DAISY Standard for Digital Talking Books because it promises to revolutionize the reading experience for people who have reading disabilities. Specifically, the Consortium's vision is that all published information is available to people with print disabilities, at the same time and at no greater cost, in an accessible, feature-rich, navigable format. The DAISY Consortium has established a mission and goals in order to make this vision a reality.

The first DAISY Standard was proprietary, originating in Sweden in 1994. The idea was to use digital recording and introduce some document structuring that would allow easy navigation by the user. In its short history, the DAISY Specification has evolved considerably. It has already begun to offer a more flexible and pleasant reading experience for people who are blind or print disabled in a number of countries including Sweden, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

In 1997, the DAISY Consortium decided to adopt open standards based on file formats being developed for the Internet. The DAISY 2.0 Specification was released in 1998, and the 2.02 recommendation was approved in February 2001. Release of DAISY 3, the ANSI/NISO Z39.86 2002 Standard, was official in March 2002. This Standard was jointly developed by the DAISY Consortium, The National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped (part of the Library of Congress), and a variety of other organizations in North America. Plans are underway for the development of the supporting materials necessary to promote the Standard.

A DAISY book can be explained as a set of digital files that includes:

- One or more digital audio files containing a human narration of part or all of the source text;
- A marked-up file containing some or all of the text (strictly speaking, this marked-up text file is optional);
- A synchronization file to relate markings in the text file with time points in the audio file; and
- A navigation control file which enables the user to move smoothly between files while synchronization between text and audio is maintained.

The DAISY Standard allows the producing agency full flexibility regarding the mix of text and audio ranging from audio-only, to full text and audio, to text-only. While reading a DAISY book, a reader can go to the next or previous page, chapter or sentence. These books can be distributed on a CD/DVD, memory card or through the Internet.

You can listen to DAISY books on:

Standalone DAISY Players
Computers using DAISY playback software such as AMIS
Mobile phones
MP3 players - with limited navigation