[access-uk] Re: Radio for the Deaf!
- From: "Ray's Home" <rays-home@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 18 Jan 2008 13:09:04 -0000
Briefly, I did leave in the announcement that radio for the deaf and
sensory impaired was a "press release". Those always have to be
treated accordingly, and it might have been better to edit it more
than I did, though there's a link to the whole story at the end of
that post. (Editing press releases is something that's very necessary
as sometimes we use them on the talking newspaper I help record. You
get the impression those writing them are paid by the word!)
I still wonder though whether such things will be able to be
incorporated into DMB when it arrives, and that the R and D needed to
make that happen actually will happen. Mind, that isn't of course the
end of the story. In a sense we keep coming here: no funding for
on-going costs, and not nearly enough in TV where AD is still notable
by its absense, not beingpresent on more than 5-10% of programmes, and
that tells us something! I seem to recall the Dept of Culture and
whatnot wasn't prepared to contribute a penny to this. So, we might
indeed ask, what hope for all these exciting possibilities on radio?
There just isn't the political will seemingly to do more than press
announcements! I don't know enough about the US setup to comment
much, but anyone who does, well it would be nice to hear from them.
From Ray
I can be contacted off-list at:
mailto:ray-48@xxxxxxxx
-----Original Message-----
Tristram Llewellyn
Subject: [access-uk] Re: Radio for the Deaf!
Whilst one hates to be negative I cannot help having a sense of deja
vu
about all this. It reminds me somewhat of the early days of DAB here
in
the UK, bear in mind barr satelite the Americans have not experienced
digital radio up until now. Scrolling text on conventional DAB is
possible today although few sets have very large screens. Indeed
there
were a number of concept units had much larger screens for proposed
advanced text services as far back as ten years ago.
Subtitling TV is one thing because of the relationship of cost to the
whole TV budget is but a small fraction. In a radio context where
budgets are easily 5 to 10 times smaller it is a different deal where
the costs of that work are going to be about the same.
One gets a little concerned with quotes like; "There is no question
this
initiative will have a profound impact on the quality of millions of
people's lives...". Why is there no doubt, it hasn't happened and
nobody
has agreed to do anything yet! People setting up iniatives and
mannying
committees assume they are the ones driving the process but frequently
it is about who is prepared or perhaps even compelled to do something
that is the real driving force. I doubt if many blind Americans
really
feel the FCC is that concerned with accessibility for example.
Like a lot of what goes on in CES, it might never see the light of day
anyway as these things come down to money in the end whether anyone
feel
comfortable about that or not. The truely cogniscienti among the tech
world have already begun to turn away from CES as any kind of beacon
because it has become too big, too brash and promising too much that
is
not actually delivered anyway. By contrast this weeks Macworld has
launched four products all of which will be available within the month
at the very latest which is better than last years effort with the
iPhone which took quite a number of months to reach even US stores.
Have a good day everyone.
Regards.
Tristram Llewellyn
tristram.llewellyn@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Technical Support
Sight and Sound Technology
_____________________________________________
From: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On
Behalf Of Ray's Home
Sent: Thursday, January 17, 2008 10:46 PM
To: VI-Genaccess@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx; Access-Uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [access-uk] Radio for the Deaf!
Hope some will forgive the length of this post, but it is interesting.
I've not posted all of the article which is taken from the Blind
Access
Journal, a link to it is given at the end.
Wonder if the new wonder DMB standard will incorporate these features
in
Europe.
NPR launches effort to make radio fully accessible
Press Release
Source: Harris Corporation
NPR, Harris Corporation and Towson University Launch Global Effort To
Make
Radio Accessible to Hearing and Sight Impaired
First Over-The-Air Transmission From Special CES Station
LAS VEGAS, Jan. 8 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- (LVCC S227) -- NPR, Harris
Corporation and Towson University today announced a new initiative to
make
radio more accessible to the hundreds of millions of hearing and
visually
impaired people around the world.
At a press conference at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas,
the
three organizations announced the global accessible radio technology
initiative and provided the first live demonstration of the accessible
radio
technology. The group also announced a new research center for
developing
future technologies on the campus of Towson University near Baltimore,
MD. Additional plans call
for the establishment of an international consortium of equipment
manufacturers, broadcasters and other organizations to help foster
broad
adoption of the initiative.
The initiative will be spearheaded by the three founding organizations
and
will leverage cutting-edge HD Radio(TM) technology to enable
hearing-impaired people to "see" live radio content on specially
equipped
receivers by applying television closed-captioning processes to radio
broadcasts. The technology also will provide audio cues and voice
prompts,
as well as advanced radio reading services, for those visually
impaired
and
blind.
"Digital radio technology makes it possible -- for the first time --
to
serve the sensory impaired," says Mike Starling, vice president and
chief
technology officer of NPR. "Beyond developing the technology, this
initiative will ensure the accessibility of these radio services at
minimal
costs."
During the press conference, the organizations showcased the first
over-the-air transmission of the accessible radio technology using a
signal
from WX3NPR, a special temporary station authorized by the FCC for the
live
broadcast.
Attendees at the press conference watched the text transcript of the
NPR
flagship morning news magazine "Morning Edition" on the HD Radio
receiver's
viewing screen, which is what a hearing-impaired listener will see
using
the
technology.
Additionally, the demonstration carried a digital radio reading
service
that
will assist the visually impaired with daily readings of current
books,
newspapers and magazines.
"We're working very closely with radio stations around the world to
ensure
they have the right technical infrastructure in place for this
initiative,"
said Howard Lance, chairman, president and chief executive officer of
Harris
Corporation. "The new HD Radio transmission systems we're installing
are
tailor-made for this effort, as their digital capabilities will make
it
relatively easy for stations to transmit live textual transcripts to
HD
Radio receivers."
"There is tremendous need for accessible radio for sensory-impaired
people,
including the deaf, hard-of-hearing, blind, visually impaired, print
impaired, deaf/blind, and mobility impaired," said Dr. Ellyn
Sheffield,
assistant professor of psychology at Towson and co-director of ICART.
"There
is no question this initiative will have a profound impact on the
quality of
millions of people's lives. Finally, sensory-disabled individuals will
have
access to all radio programming, as well as radio emergency alerts and
vital
disaster recovery information."
HD Radio enables station operators to split their broadcasts up into
multiple channels, providing several CD-quality channels for their
audiences. Through this accessible radio initiative, a small amount of
the
total data capacity will be used to carry textual data that will be
shown
live on a screen on new versions of HD Radio receivers, essentially
providing a closed- captioning transcript of live broadcasts for the
deaf.
Initially, the closed-captioning text will be created by live,
court-reporting-type captioners at individual stations and networks.
Ultimately, the initiative is hoping to leverage advanced
speech-to-text
translation software applications that one day allow expansion of
captioning
across the radio dial. Specially equipped HD Radioreceivers are in
development with several features to provide the visually impaired
audience
with better access to broadcasts, such as audio prompts that notify
which
direction the tuner is going, what channel the radio is on, and
larger,
easier-to-read text on the radios.
More at:
http://blog.blindaccessjournal.com/
From Ray
I can be contacted off-list at:
mailto:ray-48@xxxxxxxx
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