[real-eyes] Re: Touch-screen gadgets alienate blind
- From: <bigdaddylou63@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <real-eyes@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 10 Jan 2009 06:58:46 -0500
this one Ginny, was forwarded to the A C B list I'm on so I just forwarded
it. No magic wand, even though I wish I had one, hahahahaha, just like many
of us I'm sure.
Insomnia? I feel your pain. Why, if you don't mind me asking. Anything
troubling you? Sometimes the stresses in our lives can cause this you know.
How funny, I just sent you an e mail talking about mine, hahahahahaha. What
timing.
It is working on 6 in the morning out here in the great Northwest or let me
say the Midwest, but I do live in Northern Indiana which is right off Lake
Michigan. I can hear the snow plows working and have been for a little time
now. We're expecting like 6 inches of snow after all is said and done. Do
I like it? NO!!!!!, that's in capital letters, just so you know,
hahahahaha.
Just the thought of going outside and having to shovel is depressing, not to
mention having to get dressed for it.
I'm sure, you've found out if you've been surfing why the internet is called
the "world wide web", hahahahahaha. There is just way to much out there,
wow. No wonder it could be bad and good.
Hope you feel better and are able to get some sleep, why don't you take like
some Tylenol or drink some tea? This might help relax you. Do you take
anything for it or have you had it before? Just curious.
Peace
Luis
----- Original Message -----
From: "V Nork" <ginisd@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <real-eyes@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Saturday, January 10, 2009 6:26 AM
Subject: [real-eyes] Re: Touch-screen gadgets alienate blind
> Dear Luis, I am up late again, insomnia for the first time really in my
> life, and am looking forward to reading this. What a nice surprise on
> this
> night especially.No hurry or anything, but what was the process you went
> through to find this article? I recently took a Library science class,
> and
> often use Proquest, a library database you may have used. If not, I can
> tell you about it some time if you like. So, with this article, did you
> go
> to one of the websites or links here in this E mail and go to the search
> box and type in the word blin, maybe with an asterisk to give you all the
> forms of the word? Or what? Or did you just get out your magic wand?
> Anyway, thanks for this, Su Amiga Virginia
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: <bigdaddylou63@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> To: <real-eyes@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Sent: Saturday, January 10, 2009 3:06 AM
> Subject: [real-eyes] Touch-screen gadgets alienate blind
>
>
>>> Touch-screen gadgets alienate blind
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Yahoo! Tech
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> NEW YORK (Reuters) -
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> The craze for touch-screen gadgets, sparked by Apple Inc's popular
>>> iPhone,
>>> is raising worries that a whole generation of consumer electronics
>>>
>>> will be out of the reach of the blind.
>>>
>>> Motown icon Stevie Wonder and other advocates came to the world's
>>> biggest
>>> gadget fest, the annual Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this
>>> week,
>>> to
>>> convince
>>>
>>> vendors to consider the needs of the blind.
>>>
>>> Wonder told a CES event that his wishlist included a car he could
>>> drive --
>>> which he acknowledged was probably "a ways away" -- and a Sirius XM
>>> satellite
>>>
>>> radio he could operate.
>>>
>>> "If you can take those few steps further, you can give us the
>>> excitement,
>>> the pleasure and the freedom of being a part of it," said the famed
>>> musician.
>>>
>>> Wonder said some companies had managed to make their products more
>>> accessible to the blind, sometimes without even meaning to. He cited an
>>> iPod
>>> music player
>>>
>>> and Research in Motion's BlackBerry as gadgets he likes to use.
>>>
>>> Advocates argue that if product designers take into account blind needs,
>>> they would make electronics that are easier to use for the sighted as
>>> well.
>>>
>>> The good news is that manufacturers do not need to put large sums of
>>> money
>>> into making products accessible, nor would they have to forsake
>>> innovation,
>>> said
>>>
>>> Chris Danielsen, a spokesman for the National Federation For The Blind.
>>>
>>> "We don't want to hold up technological progress," he said. "What we're
>>> saying is, think about the interface and set it up in such a way that
>>> it's
>>> simple
>>>
>>> .... The simpler you make the user interface of a product, it's going to
>>> reach more people sighted or blind."
>>>
>>> TOUCH SCREENS
>>>
>>> With the popularity of touch screens, once simple products such as
>>> televisions and stereos have become difficult for blind people to use as
>>> they often require
>>>
>>> navigation of multiple menus that need to be seen to be used
>>> effectively.
>>>
>>> "That's an increasing problem with new digital devices. It's easy to add
>>> feature after feature that's buried under menu after submenu," said Mike
>>> Starling,
>>>
>>> chief technology officer of National Public Radio, which is working on
>>> accessible options.
>>>
>>> Manufacturers have been putting touch screens in everything from
>>> calculators
>>> and watches to computers and music players.
>>>
>>> Sendero Group President Mike May, who is blind, joked, "Can I ski 60
>>> miles
>>> an hour downhill? Yes. Use a flat panel microwave? No." Sendero makes
>>> GPS
>>> navigational
>>>
>>> devices that have an audio output for the blind.
>>>
>>> There are also screen readers that give an audio reading of a phone's
>>> menu.
>>> But Anne Taylor, director of access technologies at the National
>>> Federation
>>>
>>> for the Blind, says they do not yet help her to use a touch-screen
>>> phone.
>>>
>>> She said the ability to use a device without needing to look at it could
>>> help sighted people who are driving or older people whose eyesight is
>>> starting
>>>
>>> to deteriorate.
>>>
>>> While blind users can buy screen-reading software for $300 upward, it
>>> tends
>>> to only work on certain phones, often the most expensive smartphones.
>>> Sendero
>>>
>>> said accessible technology is often expensive, and about 70 percent of
>>> the
>>> U.S. blind population is unemployed.
>>>
>>> Taylor is using CES as a forum to present vendors a set of suggestions
>>> for
>>> product design that she sees benefiting both sighted and blind
>>> consumers.
>>>
>>> For example, manufacturers could include an easy-to-use start-over
>>> button,
>>> different sounds for different menus, and controls with good tactile
>>> feedback.
>>>
>>> PROGRESS
>>>
>>> Ahead of the show, there were some signs that vendors, while unlikely to
>>> give up on the touch-screen trend, may be more ready to consider
>>> consumers
>>> with
>>>
>>> disabilities.
>>>
>>> Developers at Google Inc are working on ways to make touch-screen
>>> phones,
>>> including those based on its own Android mobile software, usable for
>>> blind
>>> people.
>>>
>>> National Public Radio announced a special radio receiver technology and
>>> software that would connect a digital radio to a dynamic Braille
>>> generating
>>> device.
>>>
>>> It has also created special digital radio channels for readings of the
>>> day's
>>> newspapers.
>>>
>>> Dice Electronics has made a prototype radio that incorporates the NPR
>>> technology, and NPR's Starling hopes this will become a commercial
>>> product
>>> in 2009.
>>>
>>> Starling has also set up meetings at CES with other manufacturers in the
>>> hope they will include NPR's technology. He said responses to requests
>>> for
>>> information,
>>>
>>> which often go unheeded, are much more active this year.
>>>
>>> Some manufacturers could use their production facilities to make such
>>> devices, as demand weakens for more mainstream products in the economic
>>> downturn,
>>>
>>> he said.
>>>
>>> "I think in general there may be a view that accessibility may be
>>> becoming
>>> the new green," said Starling.
>>>
>>> (For more news from the Consumer Electronics Show, please click on
>>> http://www.reuters.com/news/topics/CES and visit the Reuters MediaFile
>>> blog
>>> at http://blogs.reuters.com/mediafile)
>>>
>>> (Reporting by Sinead Carew; editing by Richard Chang)
>>
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