By Catherine A. Durivage, Library Program Director

(Editor’s Note: We always appreciate receiving an update from the director of our Minnesota State Library for the Blind at our conventions. Here is what she had to report to us.)

Thank you for the opportunity to speak at your convention today. It’s always a pleasure to share news about the library with all of you.

Since last October, there’s been one toll-free number for ordering books, equipment or other services available from either the library or the Communication Center. Staff at either agency can assist you when you call or put you in contact with the right person. So you now only have to remember to call 1-800-722-0550 and staff who take your call can assist you.

With this said we know that some of you in recent weeks may have experienced some difficulty reaching us on our toll-free line or leaving a voicemail message. We are not sure why the problem is occurring and randomly because not everyone who calls us hasn't gotten through. We are working to resolve this problem. If you try our toll-free number and can't reach us or leave a voicemail you may wish to call us on our local number, 507-333-4828 or email us at mn.btbl@state.mn.us until we can resolve this issue.

We are also close to offering a new application for service that will provide more information about the programs and services that are available for either agency.

Another exciting change at the library is that we are resuming our volunteer recording program. Our recording program will focus on materials about Minnesota or by Minnesota authors. We hope to have at least one audio book completed and available for circulation by the end of the year, including having the book available on BARD. We are in the process of auditioning volunteer narrators and are looking for volunteer monitors and reviewers. Monitors partner with the narrator to record digital materials. The monitor directs and coaches the narrator during the recording process. The monitor follows along in the text to detect errors and ensure accuracy. Reviewers assure that recorded materials are ready for library users. The reviewer listens to a digital recording to ensure that it replicates the original text. One average one book takes 10-15 one-hour sessions to record and another 1-2 hours of editing.

Our goal is to record material not readily available elsewhere. We are also in the process of making available in digital and eventually BARD some of our previous recorded cassette titles. We are very pleased to soon be contributing more Minnesota-related content to the collection. I do not want to forget to mention that many of the books that air on Radio Talking Book are available to download on BARD as well and many of them have a Minnesota-focus.

I know I mentioned at last year’s convention that we would be offering descriptive DVDs. We’ve ordered about 60 titles and hope to make them available by year’s end. Because the collection is limited, we will initially send out only one DVD at a time. The loan period will be 14 days. We do plan to order additional titles.

For those of you that still have VHS players, our VHS descriptive video collection is still available for circulation.

Many of you may have received cartridges in the mail that have been labeled Book Requests or A Library Book for You. Some of you have called us about receiving these cartridges, confused. We apologize for the confusion. These are books that you requested that we do not have readily available on our shelves to send out. Because we want you to receive books more quickly, we are downloading copies, duplicating them and then sending them to you in generic packaging. This way, when you return the book (and please return them) we can erase what is on the cartridge and reuse it for another request without having to relabel the cartridge or container. It’s a huge timesaver for us and you receive the book sooner. We hope to soon be able to place more than one book or magazine on cartridges. Some of you want to read all the books in a series or by a particular author. In the future, we should be able to place these requests on a single cartridge and send them to you on demand. The benefit to you is that you will receive books you want quicker and for us, less handling of materials. My staff handles 2,000-3,000 items every day, so streamlining this process would be a win-win.

Now for news on a national level.

Beginning with the September/October issue, the audio version of Talking Book Topics (TBT) will now contain the order form. The order form will no longer be mailed separately. When TBT was released on cassette, the order form was included. After converting to digital back in 2012 the order form was mailed separately. Based on feedback, NLS will resume circulating the magazine cartridge and the order form in the same package. Remember, you must return the cartridge to the producer and the order form should be sent to the library.

Eleven network-produced audio magazines previously available only for download via the Braille and Audio Reading Download (BARD) have been added to the Magazine on Cartridge (MOC) program.

The magazine titles are:

Audubon (bimonthly)

Cowboys and Indians (monthly)

Humpty Dumpty (bimonthly)

Missouri Conservationist (monthly)

National Geographic Traveler (monthly)

Oklahoma Today (bimonthly)

Playboy (monthly)

Seventeen (monthly)

Smithsonian (monthly)

Southern Living (monthly)

Vital Speeches of the Day (monthly)

These eleven magazines join three others that are also available by mail on a cartridge or via BARD:

AARP The Magazine (bimonthly) and AARP Bulletin (10 issues/year). These will be bundled as a single subscription

O, The Oprah Magazine (monthly)

Rolling Stone (biweekly)

On July 20, 2016, President Obama signed a bill amending the Pratt-Smoot Act of 1931 that now authorizes the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped (NLS) to provide playback equipment in all formats, not just audio, to its users. This change will allow NLS to investigate offering refreshable braille displays or braille e-readers to patrons. Braille books and magazines could then be sent on cartridges, just like audio books. These books and magazines will still be available on BARD to download, just as they are now. NLS will likely need to conduct some pilot tests, so it could be awhile before any braille equipment would be available.

NLS is also looking at a new electronic braille format that would offer navigation capabilities just like audio books (e.g. navigating to chapters, pages, etc.)

Providing refreshable braille displays won’t happen overnight, but now NLS has the authority to pursue offering braille equipment free of charge. I am sure more information will be available in the coming months.

NLS is still in the process of converting about 5,000-6,000 cassette titles to digital and then placing them on BARD. In the last year, NLS has added about 7,000 cassettes to digital titles. NLS hopes to complete the conversion next year.

And speaking of BARD, NLS will soon be releasing software, free of charge, called BARD Express. This software will enable BARD patrons who may have difficulty downloading and unzipping books to bypass the process. It is a Windows-based software (sorry, no MAC version at this time), that when available, will be downloadable directly from your BARD account. You will be able to search the BARD collection, find books by author, title, keyword and series, add books to your wish list, just like you would do if you use BARD online or via the BARD Mobile apps. The whole process should be very intuitive and seamless. If you have a Victor Reader Stream and use the HumanWare Companion software, BARD Express will be very similar.

For those of you who are interested in learning more about BARD Express, there are some YouTube videos posted to the Library of Congress’s YouTube webpage. Simply search for BARD Express at the YouTube website. We will also provide links to the videos on our webpage at http://www.mnbtbl.org/.

NLS is beginning to develop the next generation digital talking book player. NLS to take advantage of the latest technological changes that have occurred since the original digital talking book player was introduced over six years ago. NLS will build based on the current model, but look at adding features such as wireless delivery. Books and magazines could be delivered directly to the player and you won’t have to handle individual cartridges. This means the player will need to have some built in memory to store files. The new players will also have text-to-speech capability. NLS is looking into obtaining electronic text (eText) materials that coupled with TTS, would open the door for more content to be available, for both audio and braille. The agreement with a number of commercial audio book producers over the past few years has already increased the amount of material available each year. NLS is now adding about 3,000 new books to the collection each year. I hope you all are enjoying all the new books that are available to you.

I’m beginning my 17^th year as library director, if you can believe it. Many things have changed during this time and one thing is certain, more changes are coming. On behalf of the library staff, I want to thank you for the support you have given to the library and me as we continue to embrace these changes and make this a better library for you. 

Thank you.