http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/18/business/smallbusiness/18edge.html?_r=1&em
December 18, 2008
Entrepreneurial Edge
Software That Opens Worlds to the Disabled
By JAMES FLANIGAN
ONE computer program would allow vision-impaired shoppers to point their
cellphones at supermarket shelves and hear descriptions of products and
prices. Another would allow a physically disabled person to guide a
computer
mouse using brain waves and eye movements.
The two programs were among those created by eight groups of volunteers
at a
two-day software-writing competition this fall. The goal of the
competition,
sponsored by a nonprofit corporation, is to encourage new computer
programs
that help disabled people expand their capabilities.
The corporation, set up by computer science students and graduates at the
University of Southern California, is named Project:Possibility. It grew
out
of an idea two years ago by Christopher Leung, then a master's degree
candidate in computer science and engineering at the university, who was
working on a project at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena.
As Mr. Leung explained in a recent interview, "The project manager came
to
me and said: 'Chris, we have several blind students coming to work with
us
this summer. If you can think of anything we can do for them, let me
know. "
At the time, Mr. Leung said, he was working on a solar system
visualization
program. "I came up with a project called 'touch the sky' where a blind
person would use a forced feedback device to feel three-dimensional
reconstructions of terrain on other planets," he said.
The experience inspired him to think beyond just one group of students
and
one project. "It was apparent that there was a need for a larger
organized
effort, a community of developers and disabled persons to conceptualize
projects that can help people," Mr. Leung said. "So I gathered colleagues
into a room at J.P.L., pitched the idea and asked for their help. Several
of
them and dozens of others since then have taken on the challenge and
brought
Project:Possibility to where it is today."
The effort is centered at the University of Southern California and led
by
volunteers, including Ely Lerner, an information systems developer at
Amgen
Inc.; Elias Sayfi, a senior software engineer at the Jet Propulsion
Laboratory; and Stanley Lam, an undergraduate business student at the
university.
In 2007, they organized a competition called "Code for a Cause" in which
25
students in five teams engaged in a weekend of intense computer
code-writing. The event attracted assistance from executives at Google,
Amgen and the propulsion laboratory. This year, in October, the
competition
expanded to 50 students in eight teams with mentors from Google, Amgen
and
the laboratory, as well as judges from Lockheed Martin and Amgen and
encouraging words from a Microsoft executive.
The competition was won by Bar Code Reader, the program to help the
visually
impaired read information on grocery items. Second place went to Mind
Control, which allows the physically disabled to guide a computer mouse
by
neural impulses. All the code, written in 12-hour sessions on a single
weekend, made progress, but also left room for further development.
The Bar Code Reader team "didn't hook up a cellphone, so we used a
Motorola
simulator," said Michael Crowley, an associate professor of engineering
practice who was the mentor for the team.
James Han, founder of ProsForPros, an Internet hosting and consulting
firm
for small businesses, was the mentor of the Mind Control team. "We were
able
to leverage open-source codes for mouse control and link to the neural
actuator in the first 12 hours," Mr. Han said. "In the second 12, we
created
the user interface. I believe implementation of the program is currently
in
development with similar devices."
Project:Possibility directors have plans for more ambitious projects.
First,
there will be a competition in February with teams of computer science
students at the University of California, Los Angeles, in hopes of
multiplying the number of programs to help the disabled. The project also
plans to create a worldwide open-source Web site on which disabled
persons
and software developers can collaborate on new ideas and add to existing
programs.
"Imagine a specialist Facebook or MySpace-type social network in which
users
would be involved in designing the tools they want and need," said
Stephen
A. Lee, a British software developer who operates Fullmeasure.co.UK and
is a
director of Project:Possibility. "Students would talk to users and work
on
projects that meet needs as well as be exciting."
He estimated that "an active online community may well take six or more
months to organize, as there is inertia and shyness to overcome." There
will
also be costs to create such an online community, he said, "for Web
hosting,
associated technology costs and set-up labor."
To date, Project:Possibility has operated without revenue and without pay
for participants. Its programs belong to the nonprofit project and to the
University of Southern California. Its sole source of financing was a
$15,000 grant in early 2008 from the Mozilla Foundation, an organization
that promotes the concept of the Internet as a public resource open to
everyone.
Nor does Project:Possibility intend to be a commercial venture, Mr. Leung
said. "We do not plan to earn revenue through a spread of our programs.
In
fact," he said, "we plan to be completely open-source - our programs can
be
downloaded, modified and used by anyone at no cost - in hopes that
similar
programs will spread to other universities and around the world with or
without our involvement."
But, at a project meeting early this month, the directors decided to
establish a paid position. "We are looking to grow and that will require
people to dedicate even more of their time to this project," Mr. Leung
said.
So it will be necessary to "compensate for our core positions and perhaps
one day to have a full-time staff."
Mr. Leung lives and works these days in Beijing. "I'm a Chinese-American
who
grew up in Northern California and never spoke Chinese," he said. "So I'm
learning Chinese and working here, but keeping in touch online with
Project:Possibility."
To pay for staff, the project will continue to depend on grants from
companies and charitable groups. At some point, it hopes to establish
regular fund-raising efforts for its nonprofit operations.
"What's great is that companies like Google and Mozilla support our
projects," Mr. Leung said. The companies gain by getting ideas on
technological breakthroughs and seeing ways to adapt them to everyday
products. One Project:Possibility program, for example, called Community
Captioner, integrates subtitles with YouTube "so the hearing-impaired can
have sound with their videos."
This column about small-business trends in California and the West
appears
on the third Thursday of every month. E-mail: jamesflanigan@xxxxxxxxxxx
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