[real-eyes] Fw: [Missouri-l] Fw: [acb-l] Harris Corporation and Towson UniversityLaunch Global Effort To Make Radio Accessible to the Hearingand Sight Impaired
- From: "Terrie Arnold" <tanderson3@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: <real-eyes@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2008 05:05:42 -0600
----- Original Message -----
From: "Terrie Arnold" <tanderson3@xxxxxxxxx>
To: "Missouri List" <Missouri-l@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Friday, January 11, 2008 4:53 AM
Subject: [Missouri-l] Fw: [acb-l] Harris Corporation and Towson
UniversityLaunch Global Effort To Make Radio Accessible to the Hearingand
Sight Impaired
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Frank Casey" <frcasey@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
> To: "acb-nl" <acb-l@xxxxxxx>
> Sent: Thursday, January 10, 2008 8:36 PM
> Subject: [acb-l] Harris Corporation and Towson University Launch Global
> Effort To Make Radio Accessible to the Hearing and Sight Impaired
>
>
>> Greetings,
>>
>> Although the press release, below, is rather lengthy, I believe it is
>> important reading for all sight and vision impaired consumers.
>>
>>
>> Frank Casey
>> frcasey@xxxxxxxxxxxx
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Press Release
>> Source: Harris Corporation
>>
>> NPR, Harris Corporation and Towson University Launch Global Effort To
>> Make
>> Radio Accessible to Hearing and Sight Impaired
>> Tuesday January 8, 12:00 pm ET
>> 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.
>>
>> Following the demonstration, the participating organizations unveiled
>> details for the International Center for Accessible Radio Technology
>> (ICART), which
>> will be headquartered at Towson University in Towson, MD. Towson will
>> house
>> the primary administrative and academic research office for the
>> initiative,
>> with NPR Labs in Washington, DC, providing technology R&D and software
>> development, and Harris Corporation supplying transmission and research
>> support
>> at its radio broadcast technology center in Cincinnati, Ohio.
>>
>> Members of the global initiative went on to detail plans to further study
>> and understand the challenges faced by the sensory-impaired population in
>> accessing
>> radio broadcasts, and develop methodologies to address those issues
>> through
>> cutting-edge technologies. To ensure that the effort represents the
>> widest
>> range of participants and fosters the broadest possible adoption,
>> organizers
>> said they will work to bring together policymakers, broadcasters,
>> transmission
>> equipment companies and receiver manufacturers from around the world.
>> Presently, the initiative has more than a dozen members, representing
>> virtually every
>> aspect of the "microphone to loudspeaker" chain: broadcasters, network
>> content providers, infrastructure and transmission equipment companies,
>> and
>> receiver
>> manufacturers. In addition to founding members NPR, Harris and Towson
>> University, supporting organizations include iBiquity Digital
>> Corporation,
>> Delphi,
>> NDS, Radiosophy, Helen Keller Institute, Carl and Ruth Shapiro Family
>> National Center for Accessible Media at WGBH(NCAM), Northern Virginia
>> Resource Center
>> for Deaf and Hard of Hearing Persons, and the G3ict, an Advocacy
>> Initiative
>> of the United Nations Global Alliance for ICT and Development.
>>
>> NPR, Harris and Towson will jointly determine strategic direction of the
>> organization, with assistance from the initiative's full membership. NPR
>> will provide
>> much of the content, Harris will provide much of the transmission-
>> related
>> technologies, and Towson will provide research into the needs of the
>> sensory-disabled
>> population and will house the primary ICART facility on its campus.
>>
>> "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
>> Radio
>> receivers
>> 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 than 1,500 radio stations are currently broadcasting in HD Radio in
>> the
>> United States. Over half of the CPB-qualified stations have been awarded
>> HD
>> Radio conversion grants by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
>> According to current estimates, by 2010, all 825 public radio stations
>> should be broadcasting
>> digitally.
>>
>> More information on the initiative can be found at
>> www.i-cart.net.
>>
>>
>>
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