The evolution of phones away from physical buttons toward touchscreens is great if you're into clean, aesthetic design. But, if you're suffering from limited vision, there are some obvious issues. Thankfully the
iPhone 4 at least has support for Braille displays like those Brailliant, as kindly demonstrated by acoustic guitar virtuoso and software guru Victor Tasaran. Using the six buttons on his Brailliant-32 he's able to navigate across icons, then feel the text beneath each one -- or wait for the phone's hurried text-to-speech to read back to him. It's an encouraging solution for smartphone accessibility, but does have a rather negative impact on portability -- and, we're sad to say, on cost as well. His 32-character unit will set you back just under $4k, which is many times the cost of the phone itself. But, at least when it's used like in the video below, sitting on the table, he won't have to worry about
signal issues.
Update: To be clear the text-to-speech is entirely being generated by the phone; it's a stock feature of iOS 4. The Brailliant is enabling Victor to cycle through icons, make selections, and "read" the on-screen text with his fingers.
posted July 13th 2010 9:28AM
Cool
@techee44
I can't really see the value.
@Failbait iPhone 4G?
@MichaelJJackson
No I was rebranding engadget a more resembling name to their content :)
@Failbait
Yeah... Failbait failed....
@Luke I see what you did there...
.:: ..: :.. ... .:. ::. :.. :.: .:. ...
@techee44
I hope you're not talking about this guy's god-awful 'music'. Imagine Kenny G with a guitar, and somehow amazingly less talented.
@loocas I resent that!
@Luke
.... But you can feel/hear the value
The iPad is very blind friendly
http://www.tuaw.com/2010/06/01/the-ipad-could-be-the-best-mobile-accessibility-device-on-the-ma/
Really cool...haters gonna hate though. All because of a stupid antenna issue that is barely affecting true owners of this magnificent phone.
@BrookLynnsFinest
LOL are you serious? "Barely affecting"?! Get your head out of the hole man... It's affecting millions of people.
@BrookLynnsFinest
Once again, fanboy. They're just brands of phones! They don't matter!
@BrookLynnsFinest
I'm pretty sure you're NOT Brooklyn's Finest.
@TheTabe
Its been blown out of proportion though, the issue really isn't a deal breaker. I've used a few and I plan to get mine when stocks in.
@TheTabe
Don't worry, he's just trying to justify his bank account spending oops I meant "loyalty".
@BrookLynnsFinest the antenna is just an excuse for the hate
it's just the whole apple bragging + evilness that gets back to them, especially the blind fanboism aka fanaticism (which is actually the true word for this) which pissed ppl until they started to hate them really bad
@tobsmonster2
Maybe it's not a deal breaker where YOU are, but in a lot of areas it is... Remember, some areas don't have as good of coverage as others... In some areas 20db signal loss is easily enough to drop calls left and right.
I know about 6 people with the iPhone 4 (4 of which were stupid enough to purchase it even after the antenna issue was outted) and 4 of them suffer dropped calls daily.
@BrookLynnsFinest
"barely affecting true owners"
what are you like 15? do you just hover from product to product being a "true" owner? how am I not a "true" owner? because I don't have a micro cell in my house? bad signal is bad.
@TheTabe
I agree to an extent - every iPhone 4 is affected. But how many of these people take it so seriously? I have one, and yeah, my bars dropped - but I've never had a dropped call. Same with a friend of mine, only issue he has which bothers him is the proximity sensor issue.
@Rarebooks Why don't the whole lot of you grow up and stop acting like pissy little kids. This article isn't about antenna issues. You're all coming off as spoiled brats with your new smartphones. "Look, mine is SO much better!" Gesh, my eight year old nephew has more maturity.
Anyways, I've seen this technology used for blind people to read computer text. I don't know how practical it is with phones but the technology itself is making blind individuals lives much easier in our modern, technology driven world.
@TheTabe
Excellent point you made there. Its a shame americans don't have the carrier choice we brits have when it comes to the iphone.
@TheTabe
Show these millions?
I'll show you millions of android fanboys who don't even OWN the iPhone making up this bullshit flaw.
Which if it were so drastic why are real owners complaining and returning them to Apple Stores?
@BrookLynnsFinest
"Which if it were so drastic why are real owners complaining and returning them to Apple Stores?"
....that's a question and an answer all in one. i'm officially not acknowledging any comment you ever make again, your simply too dumb to communicate with.
@angelusp
shut up dick.
@Rarebooks
I meant why are real owners NOT complaining and returning it?
Furthermore I have yet to see any real indications that this is some widespread issue that is dramatically affecting all of the iPhone's capabilities including the most fundamental one of making a phone calls.
To be even more specific people are saying that it's a matter of dropped bars. Then others are saying that their phones are dropping entire calls....well which one is it folks? Then of course you've got the mots rabid of Apple Haters claiming that the iPhone 4 is completely INCAPABLE Of making any phone calls at all due to this antenna issue...
Ummnn okay. Again the numbers don't lie. People are still buying the iPhone 4. And most if not all of us are quite satisfied with it regardless of whether or not we're experiencing this so called "issue".
It's been blown out of proportion. That's the bottom line and quite simply THE TRUTH. Sorry you can't handle that.
BTW Engadget's Reviews is still a 9/10 despite all the moaning and bitching from the android fanboys/Apple Haters.
@BrookLynnsFinest
Someone over on Gizmodo called Steve Jobs mean names, why don't you go bother them? The adults are talking.
@ExplicitFunction
Cuz unlike you Apple Haters I like Engadget. They report on the stuff I LIKE.
I like the writers. And unlike you Apple Haters I don't accuse them of bias 24/7. I find the quality of writers here to be superb.
That's why I'm here. An Apple Hater like yourself should be over at Gizmodo or better yet go find a blog that's more to your needs. Rather than trying to force Engadget to kowtow to your crap.
@techee44
You should take your own advice, after all, anyone who refers to themselves as a 'techee' has to be a dick. That is a word reserved for people who know nothing about tech, when referring to someone that does.
@BrookLynnsFinest
Every one of your posts will be reported from now on
@DefPoetYou'll probably end up getting your self banned for bothering engadget so much. True alot of what he says is fan crap but atleast he's honest about it spending more of he's time repping his company than trashing others.
@BrookLynnsFinest Making up? Apple is deleting things about it when they are negative, doesnt that have a negative connotation?
For $4k, a blind person should be able to get an braille-touchscreen smartphone with TTS. I could see haptic feedback becoming more important here as well.
@GnomeSayin Yep... $4k for enabling on-the-go communication, when applied to impaired vision or blind ppl, is very affordable... I can see (no pun intended) lots of people using this (like my daughter).... just take note that a book projector for low vision patients costs anything around the $8k.... so, $4k for using your mobile isn't that much
I prefer to see and read good news like this. Smart phones have much to offer. Sadly there are many dudes that prefer to highlight bad things and say "we do not recommend"... Bad things will always rule over many, many good ones.
@hnb
“When you do things right, people won't be sure you've done anything at all.”
@GnomeSayin
Yes God!
The text to speech voice on that video will now always be associated with the "girl" voice from the EVO vs iPhone 4 video, which kind of adds a touch of hilarity to this :)
@pple is poo You know what dude, take it somewhere else, this article is not supposed to be flamebait, but you seem to want to put up your ridiculous flag everywhere you go. Shoo.
@pple is poo
yeah, yeah, fanboy bitching, we get it. what do you like? wp7? android? webOS?
why cant we all just get along!? they're just brands!
iPhone 4G? lulz!
i think the girl taking the video is blind also..
@mosepe Must have been. I felt like I was losing my eyesight myself...
@pple is poo "HOLD me over..."
THIS guy wasn't disappointed about not having a white one available at launch....
@Rarebooks
That was cold, but...HILARIOUS!
@Rarebooks
Don't forget about facetime...
@krisq
you can't even create the word facetime in braille
If you have to do all that work to read the screen, I guess texting while driving is out of the question.