audiobooks

Ex-default for Kindle 2 text-to-speech: Legal?

Amazon yielded to the inevitable on Friday when it announced (in this statement) that it would no longer enable the text-to-speech feature on its Kindle 2 e-book reader by default; publishers can make the call.

Instead, publishers may enable the text-to-speech feature on a title-by-title basis, if they believe that choice is in their best interest.

I have been sorely tempted to write a response to some of the factually incorrect and even grossly deceitful pieces I've seen written about this issue since the Kindle 2 was launched, but fortunately, Amazon has made that unnecessary. Nevertheless, there are still … Read more

MP3 Insider 127: Prize patrol

Donald and Jasmine announce the winner of the Gears of War II Special Edition Zune 120, but first you have to listen to them talk about Apple's new In-Ear Headphones, some pricey single-minded iPod accessories, Donald's one year Zuniversary, a roundup of the top budget headphones, and a cool and creative reason to have a Rhapsody subscription.

Also this week: think up a creative Twitter alias for Jasmine for CES and get a chance to win a JBL On Stage Micro.

Listen now: Download today's podcast… Read more

How to create audiobooks in iTunes

Digital audiobooks come in all shapes and sizes. You can purchase them online from sites like Audible, eMusic, and iTunes. You can download free audiobooks from places like Archive.org. Or, you can rip audiobooks to your computer from CD. Unfortunately, no matter where your digital audiobooks come from, getting iTunes and your iPod to treat them as an audiobook--not some random playlist of songs--can be a struggle.

If you've ever purchased an audiobook through iTunes, you may have noticed that the file appears in a separate audiobook tab in your media library. Keeping your audiobooks separate from your … Read more

MP3 Insider 119: Mobile music mishmash

Donald and Jasmine tease the iPod Nano vs. Microsoft Zune Prizefight and discuss a variety of portable audio accouterments, including a pair of headphones, a portable iPhone-compatible speaker, and the best MP3 players for audiobooks.

Also, hear some gab on the new Zune software, and find out who won last week's contest.

Listen now: Download today's podcast… Read more

How to split audio tracks

Like to listen to audio books on your MP3 player, but your player lacks a bookmark function? If you have long audio files that haven't already been split into chapters, it can be a pain to fast-forward to the desired point in the track. This tutorial can help you split audio books into shorter tracks on your own. It can also be used with music, although track length and nomenclature will be different than what is described here. (A tip: if you are splitting an audio file with several songs in it, use points of silence as a guide rather than the counter.)

Cost: Free

Time commitment: Varies

System requirements: Mac or Windows

Download and install Audacity For either Windows or Mac. Download and install the latest LAME MP3 encoder Extract the LAME file From the LAME.zip file, extract only the file lame_enc.dll. Save it someplace that's easy to find on your hard drive, such as the desktop. (When you export your files as MP3, Audacity will ask you to locate it.) Open Audacity Go to File > Open, then select the audio file you wish to split from wherever it is stored on your hard drive. In the upper-right corner of the window, ensure that the selection tool (it looks like an uppercase "I") button is highlighted. Highlight selection Starting at the very beginning of the audio file, click and drag the selector so that it highlights a selection of the file. (You can use the keyboard arrows to zero in on "0" if necessary.)… Read more

Download free 'Into the Wild' MP3 audiobook from Borders

To help kick off its new MP3 audiobook download service, Borders is offering Jon Krakauer's spellbinding Into the Wild free of charge through July 19. You do need to sign up for a Borders Digital Audiobooks account, but it's free to do so, and that's the only catch.

Well, actually, there's one more: To access the book (and any others you purchase), you have to install something called OverDrive Media Console (currently Windows-only--grrr). It's basically a download manager that organizes your audiobooks and generates multipart MP3s (which you can then copy to any portable player … Read more

Amazon acquires Audible for $300 million

Amazon.com announced Thursday that it has acquired audiobook company Audible.

The deal comes with a price tag of about $300 million in cash and short-term investments, and it is expected to be completed by the second quarter of this year.

Audible, which was founded in 1997 and operates services in the United States and United Kingdom, as well as operations in Germany and France, sells more than 80,000 audio versions of books, newspapers, and magazines, as well as television and radio content.

"Audible.com offers the best customer experience, the widest content selection, and the broadest device … Read more

Charles Darwin + Audiobook = Next-generation torture device

Boing Boing has alerted us to a public-domain audio recording of Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection that you can download and plunk onto your iPod. Now, I did a bit of the History of Science thing in college, and I must have taken at least four seminars in which Origin of Species was on the syllabus. I can consequently tell you that this is the most boring book ever written.

Yes, it's difficult to express just how influential a work of research and literature it was, and it's still obviously … Read more