To date we have 117 current Optacon user surveys and 20 potential Optacon user surveys. REPAIRER PROGRESS We have been in contact with a repairer in Australia. The company name is Pentronics and the repairer's name is Nigel Herring. I'm sure Richard Oehm will be back in touch with us about this. THE SEARCH FOR OPTACONS This week Optacons have turned up on Ebay for sale. If any lister follows Ebay regularly perhaps we can keep track of that. Last week some Optacons had turned up in Pennsylvania. Several listers and other respondents have volunteered to contact the agencies or educational institutions where they initially received training to find out if there are any Optacons left. Please keep the list posted about this since we don't want to contact the same places too many times. TIPS AND MEMORIES As the Optacon users continue to share stories and methods of performing different tasks, I hope that we can gather together some of that information by subject, for example, tips on signing documents. The compilations could be similar to the message we had about the wish list. THE GROWN-UP OPTACON USER We received a survey this week from another respondent who had learned the Optacon as a child and utterly dropped its use after that. The person is only now reconsidering that decision. This is the second or third person to mention this. In college I think, I would have benefited from the Optacon a lot. In high school or younger however I think it would have been more of a burden than anything else. We need to know more about this. OUR AVERAGES The number of surveys per week has dropped from twenty-five to ten. We are still hearing from very avid Optacon users as well as some who use it less often. If any of our postings appear in any of the magazines, we should get a lot more survey responses. PROJECT GOALS Preserving the Optacon is still our main goal. We need to reach as many Optacon users as possible if only to let them know that Optacons can still be repaired. As a direct reault of our work, some Optacon users are being reunited or re-acquainted with their Optacons. Other users are reading about uses they never thought of and trying new experiments. Some people who never heard of the Optacon are learning about its merits. We are also continuing to isolate those special uses for which the Optacon is still unique. All of these outcomes are positive and reasons enough to continue our work. IF THE OPTACON IS TO BE PRESERVED, IT'S EVERYONE'S JOB. THIS IS NOT A SPECTATOR SPORT. IF YOU WANT IT, YOU CAN HAVE IT. IT'S UP TO YOU! Catherine ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ -Catherine Thomas braille@xxxxxxxxx / ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe at any time, just send a message to: optacon-l-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with the word "unsubscribe" (without the quotes) in the message subject. Tell your friends about the list. They can subscribe by sending a message to: optacon-l-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with the word "subscribe" (without the quotes) in the message subject.