KING’S LYNN: Talking news now hi-tech
Talking newspaper goes digital showing the new equipment at Gaywood Library left to right Michael Forster (Chairman) and David Glifford (Sec)
Lynn’s talking newspaper is going digital with users of the service swapping their old-fashioned audio tapes for up-to-the-minute memory sticks.
Tape players will also no longer be needed and more than 100 blind and partially-sighted listeners are receiving high-visibility memory stick players to replace them.
Already they are appreciating the benefits of the digital system. The secretary of the town’s talking newspaper association, David Gifford, said: “The first thing people say is that the sound quality is so much better.”
Mr Gifford said the copying equipment used for the old tape-recording process was about 20 years old and very expensive to maintain. “Getting hold of tape players is also becoming more difficult,” he said.
The association had invested in a computer and a bespoke programme to record and download local news stories onto the memory sticks.
Mr Gifford said the talking newspaper had been working closely with the Norfolk and Norwich Association for the Blind. Two NNAB support workers had been visiting members in their homes to demonstrate how to use the memory stick players.
The equipment could also be seen at the NNAB information centre in Bergen Way and went on show at Gaywood Library as part of National Libraries Day.
He also thanked the Post Office for delivering the memory stick players free of charge as they were classified as “Articles for the Blind”.
Most talking newspaper listeners live in the Lynn area, but Mr Gifford said some had moved to as far afield as Glasgow and York.
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Weather for King's Lynn
Saturday 18 May 2013
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Cloudy
Temperature: 6 C to 14 C
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