As an AT specialist here in Grand Junction, I have been following the
attention given to Ryan's invention since last year.  My initial reaction
to his invention was, that's interesting, but it has no advantage over
pencil and paper for people who are deaf.  Our coordinator for deaf
services has talked to Ryan, and he has shown it to some deaf people here
(after development).  Their thoughts were that it may have some use for
people who have communication and motor impairments, who have difficulty
with forming letters the "right" way, and the glove can be programmed for
the way they sign the alphabet.  By the way, Ryan developed his glove
with parts from Radio Shack and a golf glove in a few months while
attending high school full time.  My son goes to the same high school as
Ryan; he is genuinely a modest, brilliant, and creative student.

On Sun, 13 Jan 2002 17:16:50 GMT John Nissen <[log in to unmask]>
writes:
> Hi Jim,
>
> Thanks for your correction - it is just the ASL alphabet that Ryan
> covers.
>
> Ryan's glove may be similar to an invention for deafblind people,
> for
> input of the deafblind manual alphabet, called Dexter, patented by
> James Kramer.  (Search with deafblind glove alphabet)
>
> Once a deafblind person has input text, it can be read out by any
> text-to-speech engine.  But for Dexter there is a corresponding
> output
> device called the Hand-tapper, patented by Klein and Fox I believe.
>
> Most good ideas have been thought of before!
>
> Cheers from Chiswick,
>
> John
> --
> In message
> <[log in to unmask]>
> [log in to unmask] writes:
>
> >I have had the pleasure of meeting with Ryan on a couple of
> occasions in
> >the past year when he paid us a visit at the University of
> Colorado.  Not
> >only is he a very creative, intelligent, and motivated young man,
> but he is
> >also a truly a nice unassuming person -- not the least bit
> arrogant,
> >egotistical,  or stuffy.
> >
> >I am sure Ryan would be the first to correct some of the editorial
> >embellishments, but it should be pointed out that this device
> translates
> >finger-spelling and not true ASL as the article implies.  His next
> step is
> >to make a synthetic speech output system for the device, and I have
> offered
> >some ideas and made myself available to him for further
> consultation should
> >he desire it, but he will undoubtedly do fine without me <smile>.
> >
> >We do hope Ryan will attend CU this Fall and become a big part of
> the new
> >AT R&D Center we are proposing to the university, but of course,
> will
> >respect whatever choice he makes.
> >
> >-- Jim
>
> --
> Access the word, access the world! -- Try our WordAloud software!!
>
> John Nissen, Cloudworld Ltd., Chiswick, London
> Tel:   +44 (0) 845 458 3944 (local rate in the UK)
> Fax:   +44 (0) 20 8742 8715
> Web:   http://www.cloudworld.co.uk
>