[access-uk] Re: TALKING PICTURES
- From: "Ray's Home" <rays-home@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 4 Aug 2006 10:21:39 +0100
Mary Baisez is right re. the technical interest of the interview with
Inventor Ray Kurzweil which, to repeat the link, is at:
http://www.elecdesign.com/Articles/Index.cfm?AD=1&ArticleID=12979
Apart from the theme of this discussion around OCR and the challenge of
portable OCR, there is some discussion of the development of sampled
instruments including a realistic grand piano.
No one can deny the brilliance of the man and the staff in his development
company. In fairness to myself I never did underestimate the complexity of
developing software to deal with the real problems of scanning books and
other uneven surfaces. (Anyone who has tried doing this with a flatbed
scanner should know about this problem.) At the end of this message I've
pasted in the only article so far downloadable from Blindcooltech on this
put up last June.
I believe Tristram was arguing that better this product be brought to market
even at this price than not at all - I hope I represent his view properly.
In a way I'm not so sure, for while I don't want to evoke images of babies
disappearing along with the bath water I wonder still whether part of the
design criteria should have been a more affordable price. It seems what we
have hear is a device that will be within the means of better financially
placed blind people, rather in the image of those I imagine run NFB. (I
made a similar point re. the recently introduced TV (sound only) Freeview
media centre recently wondering if that should have been brought to market
at the price being asked.)
I do take to heart Tristram's comment re. the Pure talking radio. It is
disappointing that many blind folk seem unwilling to pay even this small
premium for something that is obviously so much better than making do with a
non-talking DAB radio. I have much the same feeling around attitudes
towards the talking microwave oven where unfair comparisons are made with
High Street prices. Some blind folk can be mean. I hope, I'm not in that
catagory, and I don't think I am.
If too, as I suspect, there is a business ethic alongside a charitable one
of helping fund this product development by Kurzweil Inc. then it could well
be that a small return for NFB is envisaged along with the returns demanded
by distributors. All this points, I think, to the business model for such
investment being happy with the notion of supplying the relatively few who
can afford such prices, rather than the many who cannot but, nonetheless
would certainly benefit in their everyday lives from such an obviously
useful device which meets a long felt need.
What is the alternative? Well, in truly 80s style, some will say 'there is
no alternative'. I think there is, or should be. Charities should be more
what they claim to be rather than settling to cater to those with more
disposable incomes. The Bill Gates Foundation - if that's what its called,
might appear to be the ideal funder of such a project for not for profit
sale and distribution. I believe though that this charity is focused on
third world help as much, if not more, than the needs of less well placed
disabled people and others in the developed world. So what of our
traditional charities?
Its possible to imagine, that a consortium of charities in various countries
could have helped finance and distribute what is now KNFB Reader; possible
to imagine, but not so easily realised given the labyrinthine committee
structure of such organisations, not to mention national interests. Still,
one possibility would be a charity consortium spun-off company to do the
development work, and so much of the cost is in the initial development,
rather than production. This is really a plea suggestion that if charities
are becoming focused on maintaining and increasing income in a business
manner, they should think again about the majority of those they are serving
rather than those I think they most often come into contact with, people
much like the prime movers in charity organisation who have no problems in
acquiring such obviously useful, but highly priced, equipment.
So, for those who want to hear more about the present state of development
of KNFB Reader - well, as of a couple of months back - then take a listen to
the BCT article which follows.
KNFB Reader
5/20/2006 Angie Matney
demonstrates this portable scanning system that lets you read a variety of
material
with a device you can carry with you at all times. Based on a digital
camera and
a PDA, the Kurzweil/National Federation of the Blind Reader employs optical
character
recognition and intelligence to "straighten" images that may be flawed by,
for example,
the curve in the open pages of a book. 18.7 MB
http://blindcooltech.xplorations.net/bct678KNFBReader.mp3
From Ray
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