Recent press releases:

Benetech Human Rights Data Analysis Group (HRDAG) Releases Report for the Liberian Truth and Reconciliation Commission

July 3, 2009, Palo Alto, CA — The Benetech Human Rights Data Analysis Group (HRDAG) has released a report based on its analysis of more than 17,000 victim and witness statements collected by the Liberian Truth and Reconciliation Commission. The report, entitled "Descriptive Statistics From Statements to the Liberian Truth and Reconciliation Commission," is included as an annex to the final report of the Liberian Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) released on July 1 in Monrovia, Liberia. The press release and summary of the HRDAG report provides details on the findings.

HRDAG provided the statistical expertise to transform information from the TRC statements into scientifically-defensible knowledge to create a clear historical record and help end impunity for the perpetrators of human rights abuses in Liberia. According to the HRDAG report, former Liberian President Charles Taylor &mdash already on trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity for his role in Sierra Leone's civil war &mdash also led the Liberian rebel group responsible for the largest number of violations during Liberia's 24 years of civil unrest.

Benetech’s Bookshare Library Expands Partnership With Publisher HarperCollins

May 1, 2009, Palo Alto, CA — Bookshare and HarperCollins Publishers have expanded their partnership to provide digital books for Bookshare’s accessible online library for people with print disabilities. Since 2005, HarperCollins has provided Bookshare with digital book files; it has now agreed to donate its full ebook catalog. Read the press release about the partnership with HarperCollins here.

U.S. Colleges and Universities Partner with Bookshare

April 29, 2009, Washington, DC — Bookshare announced today a University Partnership Program to significantly increase the availability of accessible materials and textbooks on behalf of the hundreds of thousands of U.S. post-secondary students who have a disability that keeps them from effectively reading printed books. Read the press release about the University Partnership Program here.

U.S. Trade and Textbook Publishers Partner with Bookshare

April 29, 2009, Washington, DC — In an effort to improve the availability and quantity of digital accessible educational books, textbooks and trade books, Bookshare, the world’s largest online accessible library for individuals with print disabilities, today announced partnerships with leading U.S. trade and K-12 publishers. Two dozen publishers have signed agreements with Bookshare to provide digital content, which over time will add tens of thousands of books in accessible formats to the Bookshare collection. These publishers include Brookings Institution Press, De Capo Press, HarperCollins, Modern Language Association of America, O’Reilly Media, Random House, Scholastic, The Hachette Book Group, and Townsend Press. Read the press release about these partnerships here.

Benetech CEO Jim Fruchterman to Speak at the National Press Club

April 13, 2009, Palo Alto, CA — Benetech CEO Jim Fruchterman has been invited to speak this month at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. Fruchterman will talk about Benetech's Bookshare library which has led global initiatives to increase the availability of accessible published materials for individuals with print disabilities. Bookshare is the world's largest online library of accessible books and periodicals for people who are blind, have low vision, a physical disability or a reading disability that prevents them from easily reading a traditional printed book. During the event, Fruchterman will announce Bookshare's University Partnership Program and new partnerships with major publishers who have agreed to donate digital files to Bookshare for qualified individuals to download. Read the press release about the NPC event here.

Hachette Book Group Partners with Bookshare— February 25, 2009

Bookshare and Hachette Book Group announced today that they have entered into a partnership that will make thousands of books available to people with print disabilities. This partnership has two components that break new ground in the publishing industry. First, Hachette has agreed to donate digital files for all 1,700 currently digitized frontlist and backlist titles to Bookshare's accessible online library. Secondly, Hachette will refer all customer service requests for accessible books to Bookshare for fulfillment. Hachette Book Group is a division of Hachette Livre, the second-largest publisher in the world. Hachette Book Group's product lines include books under the Little, Brown and Company, Little Brown Books for Young Readers, Grand Central Publishing, FaithWords, Center Street, Orbit, Yen Press and Hachette Book Group Digital Media imprints. Read the press release about the partnership here.

Betsy Beaumon Named General Manager of Benetech Literacy Program — February 20, 2009

Benetech named Betsy Beaumon Vice President and General Manager of its Literacy Program which includes the Bookshare and Route 66 Literacy projects. Beaumon is responsible for directing all aspects of operations, marketing and engineering.

As General Manager for a major segment of Benetech’s nonprofit technology services, Beaumon will manage external relationships and partnerships. She will assure customer satisfaction, retention and growth of these programs by maintaining Benetech’s high standards for quality and product performance. “The addition of a seasoned executive such as Betsy Beaumon to the team will further strengthen our ability to deliver on Benetech’s mission,” said Benetech CEO Fruchterman. “Betsy brings the technology and entrepreneurial expertise that we need to continue to expand our literacy programs and support our customers.” Read the press release about Betsy Beaumon here.

HRDAG and Ensaaf Release Report on Punjab — January 29, 2009

The Benetech Human Rights Data Analysis Group (HRDAG) and Ensaaf has released a report presenting verifiable quantitative findings on mass disappearances and extrajudicial executions in the Indian state of Punjab, contradicting the Indian government's portrayal of the Punjab counterinsurgency as a successful and "humane" campaign. The report by HRDAG and Ensaaf, “Violent Deaths and Enforced Disappearances During the Counterinsurgency in Punjab, India,” (2.9 MB PDF with cover; 504 KB PDF without cover) presents empirical findings suggesting that the intensification of counterinsurgency operations in Punjab in the early 1990s was accompanied by a shift in state violence from targeted lethal human rights violations to systematic enforced disappearances and extrajudicial executions, accompanied by mass "illegal cremations." Read more in the press release here.

Benetech Launches New Bookshare Library — January 27, 2009

Bookshare, the world's largest accessible online library for people with print disabilities, has been completely rebuilt to make it significantly easier for individuals with print disabilities to access the books they want and need. The new library offers many improvements including strengthened quality control standards for book content, free assistive software applications and a rapidly expanding collection of digital files from contributing publishers. The design changes allow Bookshare to serve its growing membership of over 43,000 users and accommodate its collection of more than 43,000 texts. Bookshare now features the current best practices for website accessibility, Google-like search functions and more Braille options for Bookshare members who are blind. Read the press release about the new Bookshare here.

View entire Press Release Archive.

Recent publications:

Cibelli, Kristen, Amelia Hoover, and Jule Krüger. 2009. "Descriptive Statistics From Statements to the Liberian Truth and Reconciliation Commission," a Report by the Human Rights Data Analysis Group at Benetech and Annex to the Final Report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Liberia. Palo Alto, California. Benetech.

Critical Report Analyzes Sri Lanka's Disappeared —October 27, 2007

Romesh Silva, a statistician for Benetech's Human Rights Data Analysis Group, has co-authored a report that synthesizes the voices of 633 families and relatives of disappearance victims throughout Sri Lanka using descriptive statistical analysis. The report, "Clarifying the Past and Commemorating Sri Lanka's Disappeared: A Descriptive Analysis of Enforced Disappearances Documented by Families of the Disappeared" was written in collaboration with the non-governmental human rights organization, Families of the Disappeared (FoD) and the International Center for Transitional Justice.

The report is part of an ongoing initiative to create a massive, objective and undeniable statistical record of past and present human rights violations in Sri Lanka. This project aims to augment human rights monitoring and reporting by non-governmental groups in order to positively influence the Sri Lankan peace process. By ensuring that arguments about the total magnitude, pattern and levels of responsibility associated with mass violations are informed by science, human rights debates about truth and accountability will be enriched.

Benetech CEO Co-authors Groundbreaking Paper on Expansion Capital Strategies For Social Enterprises — April 3, 2007

Benetech CEO Jim Fruchterman has co-authored a groundbreaking paper that analyzes the financial challenges faced by maturing Social Enterprises that seek access to expansion capital. Nothing Ventured, Nothing Gained: Addressing the Critical Gaps in Risk-Taking Capital for Social Enterprise was co-written with Jed Emerson, a Senior Fellow with the Generation Foundation of Generation Investment Management and Tim Freundlich, the Director of Strategic Development at the Calvert Social Investment Foundation.

Benetech HRDAG Analyzes Key Data for Bangladesh Human Rights Report — December 14, 2006, New York, NY

A report issued by Human Rights Watch (HRW) has documented abuses committed by Bangladesh's Rapid Action Battalion (RAB), an elite anti-crime force that has been implicated in alleged torture and unlawful killings of people in custody.

The statistical analysis presented in the report, "Judge, Jury, and Death: Torture and Executions by Bangladesh's Elite Security Force," was conducted by Romesh Silva, a statistician with the Benetech Human Rights Program. The report concludes that between June 2004 and October 2006, the RAB killed at least 367 people in Bangladesh and tortured hundreds more.

Benetech's statistical analysis helped HRW explain the statistical patterns of the killings over time and with respect to the specific units with the RAB that were most responsible for the violence.

Benetech Publishes Essay on Human Rights in China — July 5, 2006, Palo Alto, CA

The China Rights Forum published an essay in their July issue written by Patrick Ball, the director of Benetech's Human Rights Program and Ann Harrison, Benetech's Communications Director. The essay, entitled Asking and Answering Hard Questions: Technology in the Service of Human Rights noted that human rights analysts can use tools adopted from computer science, mathematics, statistics and demography to transform human rights arguments from political polemic to a scientific debate. The authors assert that the job of human rights investigators is to gather all data that can possibly be relevant and store it in a way that is accessible to colleagues, secure from perpetrators and difficult to destroy. The China Rights Forum is the Journal of the international Chinese non-governmental organization, Human Rights In China, which promotes universally recognized human rights and advances the institutional protection of these rights in the People's Republic of China.

Benetech Op-Ed on Violence in Timor-Leste — July 31, 2006, Palo Alto, CA

The Benetech Initiative today released an Op-Ed thanking the Australian military for defending the offices of the Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation (CAVR) during the recent violence in Dili and urging the United Nations not to squander the opportunity for accountability in Timor-Leste.

Recent articles and press coverage:

BBC and Business Press Cover Benetech's Guatemalan National Police Archive Project — May 9, 2009

Palo Alto, CA — The BBC has aired an extensive two-part investigative report on the Guatemalan National Police Archive project entitled The Atrocity Archives.

The story includes comments from Dr. Patrick Ball, Director of Benetech's Human Rights Program. The archive project was also covered in a recent story about Benetech by Investor's Business Daily. Benetech's Martus and HRDAG teams have provided technology to collect, organize, secure and back up data collected from the archive which includes an estimated 80 million records. The recovered police records, which were the subject of Guatemalan government report last month, could provide critical information about the estimated 200,000 people dead or missing during Guatemala's 36-year civil war and help bring perpetrators to justice.

ABC-7 News Interviews Benetech CEO Jim Fruchterman — October 29, 2008

The San Francisco ABC News Affiliate ABC-7 featured Benetech CEO Jim Fruchterman in its story about the recent Social Capital Markets Conference in San Francisco. The conference, which was attended by over 650 people, featured Benetech as a socially responsible business. Reporter Teresa Garcia also interviewed Kevin Jones of the Good Capital venture capital firm and Tim Freundlich who of the Calvert Social Investment Foundation who is also a founding principal of Good Capital.

Bookshare.org Covered By Indian Press — October 26, 2008

Several media organizations in India recently covered Benetech's new partnerships with Indian organizations to support the Bookshare.org library and provide accessible digital texts. These partnerships will help International Bookshare.org begin to serve India's ten million blind people, three million of whom are children. The Times of India posted a story titled For Print-Disabled Reading Best Sellers Is Just A Click Away and the Hindustan Times ran a story about the Online Library for The Blind.

The story in the Indian Express, Bookshare.org Inks Pact With Three Organizations in India, quoted Dr. Taraporevala, Director of Xavier's Resource Centre for the Visually Challenged (XRCVC) in Mumbia which will manage the registration of qualified Bookshare.org members in West India. "Print disabled persons cannot be kept away from the printed books and hence the partnership will play a key role," said Dr. Taraporevala.

High Technology For Low Vision

September 22, 2008, Palo Alto, CA — The Health Journal section of the Wall Street Journal included Benetech's Bookshare.org service in a story entitled High Technology For Low Vision. The story notes that readers with low vision can use the text-to-speech engine in the BookCourier portable reading device to read books from Bookshare.org. The story quoted Eleanor Roth who has lost much of her vision to retinitis pigmentosa and now volunteers with Lighthouse International, a nonprofit organization that offers vision rehabilitation services. "It's the best thing ever invented," said Roth of the books on her portable device.

Benetech Cited at Web 2.0 Expo

September 18, 2008, New York, NY — Tim O'Reilly, founder and CEO of O'Reilly Media, Inc, mentioned Benetech as one of several innovative nonprofit organizations during his keynote at the Web 2.0 Expo in New York City. O'Reilly said that these nonprofits upheld lasting values that he recommended that engineers embrace. He told the attendees to: follow your heart, work on the the problems that matter, and create more value than you capture. You can read a blog entry from a blogger who attended.

HRDAG Work in Chad Cited

September 15, 2008, Washington, DC — Key analysis from Benetech's Human Rights Data Analysis Group (HRDAG) was cited in a statement from Human Rights Watch regarding a complaint filed by torture survivors and the families of those who died from torture during the regime of former Chadian leader Hissène Habré. The complaint charged Habré with crimes against humanity and torture and asked prosecutors to file formal charges. The case is based on the testimony of victims and documentary evidence including tens of thousands of documents from Habré's police force discovered in an abandoned police headquarters. A preliminary analysis of the data by HRDAG showed that a total of 12,321 different victims were mentioned in the documents, including the deaths in detention of 1,208 individuals.

Bay Area ABC New Affiliate Covers HRP

July 21, 2008, Palo Alto, CA — The local ABC News affiliate KGO-TV Channel 7 has broadcast a story about Benetech's Human Rights Program and it's work at the Guatemalan National Police archive. You can watch the report here.

Benetech's Frontline Report Featured in Film Festival

The Frontline/World annual "Heroes From A Small Planet" Film Festival will screen the recent PBS Frontline/World Report on Benetech's Guatemalan National Police Archive project. The festival focuses on stories involving social entrepreneurs and will feature a discussion with Benetech CEO Jim Fruchterman who won a 1996 MacArthur Fellowship for his role as a pioneering social entrepreneur. The Skoll Foundation, which supports Benetech, is underwriting the Frontline/World broadcasts and online segments about social entrepreneurs. The event will take place Monday, June 23 at the Kabuki Theater in San Francisco. The reception begins at 6:00 pm followed by screening and discussion. Admission is free, but space is limited. If you plan to attend, please RSVP to Frontline/World at rsvp@flworld.org.

Frontline Airs Story on Guatemala National Police Archive Project

May 27, 2008, Palo Alto, CA — The PBS television series Frontline/World aired an investigative report on the Guatemala National Police Archive project which includes interviews with team members from Benetech's Martus and Human Rights Data Analysis Group (HRDAG). Martus and HRDAG provide technology to collect, organize, secure and back up data collected from the archive which includes an estimated 80 million records. The largest known human rights archive in the Americas, the recovered police records could provide critical information about the estimated 200,000 people dead or missing during Guatemala's 36-year civil war and help bring perpetrators to justice.

The archive segment aired on the East Coast on May 27th and in the San Francisco Bay area on KQED Channel 9 on June 10th.

Benetech Cited In New York Times Social Enterprise Story

April 14, 2008, Palo Alto, CA — Benetech has been cited in a New York Times story about "hybrid" technology organizations that are defining a path between the nonprofit world and traditional for-profit ventures. Benetech CEO Jim Fruchterman provides the lead quote for the article entitled, "When Tech Innovation Has a Social Mission," which appears in the Technology section of the newspaper. The story also appeared in the International Herald Tribune and on the Slashdot web sit. "There is a lot of discussion taking place right now about a whole new organization form around social enterprise," said Fruchterman in the article. "Many of these efforts can make money; they will just never make enough to provide venture capital rates of return."

eSchool News Covers Bookshare.org Text Reader

April 4, 2008, Palo Alto, CA — eSchool News has covered the recent partnership between Benetech's Bookshare.org service and Don Johnston to provide qualified print disabled students with a free text reader to access electronic books from the Bookshare.org library. Entitled, "Free Text Reader to Help Print-Disabled Students," the story notes that the Read:OutLoud Bookshare.org Edition Text Reader will serve an estimated 1 to 3 percent of the total K-12 student population-specifically, those who receive special-education services and who are unable to read standard print materials owing to physical limitations.

HRDAG Included In Science News Report on Humanitarian Statistics

March 29, 2008, Palo Alto, CA — Dr. Patrick Ball and Romesh Silva of Benetech's Human Rights Data Analysis Group (HRDAG) are included in a Science News story about statistical tools that help guide responses to human rights crises. The report, entitled "Humanitarian Statistics," describes HRDAG's analysis of deaths during the Indonesian occupation of Timor-Leste from 1974-1999. HRDAG's analysis for the Commision for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation concluded that the country suffered more than 100,000 deaths beyond what would have been expected in peacetime and that this rate of mortality was not driven by direct violence but rather famine-related deaths.

The New York Times Magazine Profiles Dr. Patrick Ball

Palo Alto, February 17, 2008 — Dr. Patrick Ball, the director of Benetech's Human Rights Program, was described by the The New York Times Magazine as "one of the most admired figures in the field." The article, entitled The Forensic Humanitarian, documents Dr. Ball's ongoing analysis of homicide rates in Colombia and describes how statisticians calculate human rights violations that have not been counted. "Statistical methodology has parted the veil of indifference and ignorance, and the true state of affairs . . . has begun to emerge," writes Dr. Ball and his colleagues in an earlier study in Peru cited by the magazine.

Dr. Patrick Ball Recognized as Cutting Edge Human Rights Statistician — Palo Alto, CA, January 29, 2008

Palo Alto, February 13, 2008 — The Christian Science Monitor has published a lengthy profile of Dr. Patrick Ball, the director of Benetech's Human Rights Program. The story entitled A Human Rights Statistician Finds Truth In Numbers documents Dr. Ball's role in analyzing some of the most prominent large scale human rights violations in recent history - including the migration of hundreds of thousands of refugees from Kosovo. Dr. Ball presented this data as an expert witness in the case against former Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.

Bookshare.org Student Users Profiled by Assisitive Technology Organization — Palo Alto, California, February 6, 2008

A group of accomplished middle school students who use Benetech's Bookshare.org service to help improve their reading comprehension, have been profiled by the assisitive technology organization Closing The Gap. The group's newspaper, which reviews assistive technology for children and adults with special needs, has published a story about Bookshare.org members at the Corte Madera School in Portola Valley, California. Written by Ann Harrison, Benetech's Director of Communications, the story documents the school's successful efforts to download Bookshare.org texts to student laptops and introduce a software program that reads the books aloud in a human voice. "I was amazed to see how engaged they were. And the types of books they have, I have never seen them reading before," said Joel Willen, principal of the Corte Madera School. "I have been in education a long time and I think this is something incredibly powerful that I wish I had as a teacher a long time ago. It is really going to revolutionize learning a for a certain group of kids."

Press Coverage of Patrick Ball — Palo Alto, CA, January 29, 2008

Dr. Patrick Ball's presentation at the Technology in Wartime conference has been covered in a story by the San Francisco Chronicle. Dr. Ball, who serves as Chief Scientist and director of Benetech's Human Rights Programs, was invited to speak by Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility (CPSR) which hosted the conference at Stanford University.

John Glass Radio Interview — Palo Alto, CA, January 23, 2008

The Kentucky Council of the Blind (KCB) radio talk show interviewed Bookshare.org's Customer Support Manager John Glass about the expansion of Bookshare.org's services to print-disabled readers. The broadcast is available online.

View entire Articles and Press Coverage Archive.

Recent presentations:

Bookshare.org for Education (B4E) Presentation to OSEP — November 2007

Presentation by Jim Fruchterman and Lisa Friendly to the Office of Special Education Programs at the U.S. Department of Education, which awarded Benetech $32 million to provide Bookshare.org to every student with a print disability in the United States.

View presentation here
PowerPoint version

HRDAG Statistician Advisors Speak In Guatemala City &mdash August 7, 2007, Guatemala City, Guatemala

August 7, 2007 — Statisticians Paul Zador and Gary Shapiro, who have provided pro bono technical assistance to Benetech's Human Rights Data Analysis Group (HRDAG), gave a presentation today in Guatemala City entitled "The Application of Statistics to Human Rights Violation Research." They were joined by HRDAG statistician Daniel Guzmán who also spoke.

Zador and Shapiro, who are members of the American Statistical Association, have consulted to HRDAG on the scientific sampling method used at the National Police Archive project. The estimated 80 million records in the archive contain critical information about police procedures during Guatemala's 36 years of armed internal conflict that resulted in 200,000 deaths and disappearances. The archive is the largest single cache of documents made available to human rights investigators in Latin America.

The event was hosted by the United Nations Development Program and the Guatemalan Human Rights Ombudsman which is overseeing the archive project.

World Summit on the Information Society — November 15, 2005

Text of remarks by Benetech CEO Jim Fruchterman at the World Summit on the Information Society in Tunis, Tunisia. The focus of the speech was on building a global digital library for people with print disabilities.
Read Jim Fruchterman's speech to the World Summit on the Information Society (PDF)

View entire Presentations Archive.

Recent white papers:

Comments on Accessibility of Google Print and Google's Library Project

Google's recent announcement of massive library digitization partnerships has generated a huge amount of interest and angst in the print disabled community, and brought focus on the Google Print program. This short white paper aims to illuminate the issues and set the stage for future discussions with Google. Google has not approved this paper, although we hope they will use it as a tool in advancing accessibility.

Download the article (PDF)

View entire White Papers Archive.