Hi all, I just came across this interesting information. Samsung's Braille mobile phone for the visually impaired won the Gold Award at the Industrial Design Excellence Awards (IDEA). The Touch Messenger is a product designed by Samsung Design China based in Shanghai, China, a country with about 9 million visually impaired people. It gives them a user-friendly cell phone experience on par with sighted users. The innovative Touch Messenger enables the visually impaired users to send and receive Braille text messages. The 3×4 button on the cell phone is used as two Braille keypads and text messages can be checked through the Braille display screen in the lower part. Current text messaging devices for the blind convert text to speech via a text reader. With the Touch Messenger's innovative screen and keyboard for Braille text messaging, blind users can now take advantage of this rapidly growing form of communication. Once this product is commercialized, it is expected to dramatically boost the quality of life for visually impaired people, numbering as many as 180 million worldwide. The Touch Messenger is considered by Samsung a demonstration of the future design direction, "human-oriented high-tech products." Francis. Francis Kane I.T. Trainer & Support Worker NCBI Working for People with Sight Loss Galway - Mayo - Roscommon francis.kane@xxxxxxx www.ncbi.ie ******************************************************************** National Council for the Blind of Ireland (NCBI) is a company limited by guarantee (registered in Ireland No. 26293) . Our registered office is at Whitworth Road, Drumcondra, Dublin 9. NCBI is also a registered Charity (chy4626). NOTICE: The information contained in this email and any attachments is confidential and may be privileged. If you are not the intended recipient you should not use, disclose, distribute or copy any of the content of it or of any attachment; you are requested to notify the sender immediately of your receipt of the email and then to delete it and any attachments from your system. NCBI endeavours to ensure that emails and any attachments generated by its staff are free from viruses or other contaminants. However, it cannot accept any responsibility for any such which are transmitted. We therefore recommend you scan all attachments. Please note that the statements and views expressed in this email and any attachments are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of NCBI ********************************************************************