Ron, you hit the nail on the head, most of us have been working around to
make things accesible to us long before anything talked back to us. 73
Ed K7UC
--------------------------------------------------
From: "Ron Miller" <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Sunday, March 25, 2012 3:21 PM
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: Man O Man
> I agree with all you've said, Harvey. However, I sense an apparent trend
> in
> the attitude of the community of hams who are blind and also in the
> greater
> community of blind people that unless a device provides synthetic speech,
> it
> is not "accessible." What if I can count clicks, or button presses from a
> known state and set the temperature of my oven, or the wash settings on my
> clothes or dishwasher? What if simply adding brailed, adhesive backed film
> to the control panel of my microwave oven let's me easily set the cook
> time
> and power output? Does this make the device accessible? Is a low teck
> solution to a problem with high tech products considered? We should
> advocate
> for accessibility in products but not lose our willingness to think
> outside
> the box to adapt stuff to our own use. It won't work all of the time but
> it
> just might work some of the time and let us accomplish what we want
> without
> waiting for someone else to spin an entire new iteration of a product or a
> whole new product line.
>
> My two cents worth.
>
> Ron Miller
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: For blind ham radio operators [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
> On Behalf Of Harvey Heagy
> Sent: Sunday, March 25, 2012 12:41 AM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: Man O Man
>
> I hear what you're saying Ron, but today's electronics appliances Etc. are
> much harder to find work arounds with than were older ones.
>
> And while it is possible to program them through computers, I-phones Etc.
> what if you don't have access to such a device in a given situation?
> Also,
> may times the given menu times out if you don't make selections within a
> short time period. We should be able to do whatever we need to by using
> the
> radio or whatever independently of anything else.
>
> And it's not like the technology isn't available to do it. I believe it
> is,
> it is just not being used..
> Harvey
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Ron Miller" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Saturday, March 24, 2012 12:15 PM
> Subject: Re: Man O Man
>
>
>> Hi,
>> I'm not trying to be inflammatory, or anything, but we've really got
>> to keep in mind that it is often necessary to find the work-arounds
>> that will let us access the stuff we want, when we want to. You can
>> certainly argue that a rig that doesn't talk "right out of the box"
>> isn't accessible, but blind hams have been accessing in-accessible
>> rigs for the last seventy or eighty years, or more and they never
>> talked, beeped or provided morse code readouts. My scanners have never
>> talked but they've been usable, nowadays, with software to program the
>> thousands of frequencies and talkgroups needed to follow modern radio
>> systems. If you're reading the current communications and scanning
>> magazines, you'll notice that mainstream, sighted scanner users are
>> resorting to computer programming of their scanners because it is much
>> faster and less tedious than working through the multi-layered menu
>> systems used on today's scanning receivers.
>>
>> I'm all for talking radios, microwaves, scales, TVs, stoves,
>> washer/dryers, computers, cell phones, caller IDs, and anything else I
>> can get, but I am darn sure not going to wait for industry to catch up
>> to me whenever I can leverage whatever tips, tricks and make-do's I
>> and all of the rest of you discover as we go for the things we want to
>> do.
>>
>> This group is full of prime examples of this attitude. Lots of you
>> have built your own stuff, put up antennas and towers (often with the
>> help of sighted hams), some of you have read through the
>> SmithKettlewell articles and have built the audible oscilloscopes,
>> continuity checkers and other projects presented there. We're hams who
>> are blind and pursuing the hamming hobby and communications are to the
>> best of our ability and extent of our interests.
>>
>> I hope that we don't forget the lessons learned in the past as we take
>> advantage of the technology developed in the future.
>>
>> 73
>>
>> Ron Miller
>> N6MSAClearwater, Fl. USA
>> SKYPE: arjay1
>
>
> -----
> No virus found in this message.
> Checked by AVG - www.avg.com
> Version: 2012.0.1913 / Virus Database: 2114/4893 - Release Date: 03/25/12
|