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


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