Another discussion the MB got me thinking... I would love to have my iPod Touch app read fanfic aloud to me during my daily commutes. I know that the Kindle has such a capability, but I can't afford to buy a dedicated e-reader. I use Stanza for reading fanfic on my Touch, but it does not have text-to-speech capabilities. I was surprised to find nothing in the iTunes store that does what I want. The few apps that came closest lacked at least one of the following properties which I would want in such an app:
- Reasonably intelligible speech, obviously
- The ability to load an entire file into the reader (Many text-to-speech apps have very short maximum character limits; e.g., 3,000 characters. That might well be sufficient for AAC purposes, but it isn't for my purposes.)
- The ability to read files from my desktop computer or from another e-reader app on the Touch, or possibly even from both. (I saw one app that came close to what I wanted, but you had to download the files from the web.)
- The ability to read files in different formats; at bare minimum in .txt format, but ideally also in epub format as well
As I said, my browsing through the iTunes store and my Google searches for such an app have both come up empty. But I figured that there are so many tech-savvy FoLCs on this list that if such an app existed, someone here might know about it. And if someone here is into writing apps, you are welcome and encouraged to run with my idea...If you could get a decent text-to-speech app together with these specifications, I would guess it would sell like hotcakes.
Thanks.
Joy,
Lynn
