From: Kelly Pierce
Subject: computer users network news #15
The following is the fifteenth newsletter of Digit-Eyes: the
Chicago Blind computer Users' Network. The initiative is built on
the principles of self-development, mutual aid, cooperative
learning and peer mentoring. The newsletter is shared in this
space in an effort for others to consider developing similar
initiatives of blind people and those with disabilities as an
alternative to vertical, "professionalize" models as well as models
national in scale and resource intensive that serve merely as
demonstration centers with outcomes never reaching the end user.
For back issues and to learn more about us, check out our home page
at http://www.city-net.com/vipace/friends/chicago. to join us
online, subscribe to the visually Impaired computer User group List
at listserve@maelstrom.stjohns.edu. In the body of the message,
simply type "subscribe vicug-l" without the quotations.
Kelly
COMPUTER USERS NETWORK NEWS
Adaptive Technology
for the Blind and Visually-Impaired
Vol. III, no. 5 September-October, 1997
Published bimonthly by
Digit-Eyes
Blind Service Association
22 West Monroe Street
Chicago, Illinois 60603
voice-mail: 312-458-9006
Copyright 1997
Editor: Cindy Brown
MISSION STATEMENT
Our mission is to provide a vehicle for our consumers to share
information with each other. This is accomplished by stimulating
the pro-active involvement of our readers.
CONTENTS
SUBSCRIPTION INFORMATION .......................... 3
CHECK US OUT ........................................ 3
NETWORK NEWS
by Cindy Brown ................................ 3
"WHAT'S IN A NAME" OF A NETWORK? .................... 4
THE OPTACON: PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE
by Deborah Kent Stein .......................... 4
TEAMWORK
by Nate Branson ................................ 7
DO IT--WRITE NOW! ................................... 9
THE RIGHT STUFF: CHOOSING ADAPTIVE TECHNOLOGY
by Kelly Pierce ................................ 9
FYI ................................................. 14
TREASURES! .......................................... 14
DATES TO REMEMBER! .................................. 15
SUBSCRIPTION/MEMBERSHIP INFORMATION
A subscription for the Computer Users Network News is included
in the Computer Network annual membership donation of fifteen
dollars or more. The newsletter is available on cassette tape or in
print. It is also accessible on-line. Normally, each annual
membership entitles you to all six issues for that particular
calendar year.
However, an extra bonus is currently available for any new
members who join in the last two months of this year. Any person
who joins for the first time after October 1st of 1997 will get our
last issue this year plus all issues in 1998. In other words,
he/she will get seven upcoming issues instead of getting six past
issues, and the minimum donation remains the same--fifteen dollars.
To begin or renew your membership in our network, please send
your contribution, along with your name and address to Blind
Service Association, indicating your intention to join the Computer
Network, and specifying in which of the above formats you wish to
receive your newsletters.
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CHECK US OUT
You can check us out on the web page made available to us
through Vipace. You'll find current and back issues of this
newsletter. That's at http://www.city-
net.com/vipace/friends/chicago.
You can also check out our upcoming events by phoning 312-458-
9006.
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NETWORK NOTES
by Cindy Brown
In the October 8, 1997 Cognoscentae meeting, the following
decisions were made:
--Beginning with this issue, minutes from the latest
Cognoscentae meetings will be included with the newsletter. They
will be read on the end of the taped version, and print copies will
accompany the print version. Since minutes of each meeting need to
be approved at the subsequent meeting, minutes from the most
current meeting will not be sent out until the next time a
newsletter comes out.
--Tapes of monthly seminar presentations are available to any
member for a donation for each tape. A list of topics will be made
available in a future newsletter. Tom Jones has agreed to be the
librarian for the seminar tapes. Members who want more information
should contact Tom through the voice-mail line.
--For those who join the network as new members from now until
the end of 1997, instead of getting all the newsletters for this
calendar year, they will be mailed the last issue of the newsletter
for this year and will not have to rejoin in order to get the 1998
newsletters.
--A new name for the Computer Network has been chosen. See
next article.
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"WHAT'S IN A NAME" OF A NETWORK?
As we explained in the July-August issue, the board has felt
that the name Computer Network has not served us as well as it
might. It did not really zero in on the segment of computer users
whose needs and interests we target in on. So we sent out an all-
points bulletin requesting recommendations for a new name.
In the August 8th Cognoscentae meeting the new name was
unanimously chosen. The new name not only has a technological ring
to it, but it also suggests physiological compensations for visual
impairment. Henceforth, this network will be known as Digit-
Eyes, nominated by the creative mind of Anna Byrne. Thanks Anna,
and all others who offered suggestions.
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THE OPTACON: PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE
by Deborah Kent Stein
Like most blind people of my generation, I grew up with the
futuristic dream of the "reading machine." I had no idea what this
magical invention would look like or how it would work its
miracles. But somehow it would grant me entrance to the bookshelves
of the world. I would have the freedom to read whatever I wanted
and needed without waiting on the whim of some busy human
intermediary.
For me the dream came true in the summer of 1977, when I
obtained my first Optacon through Associated Services for the Blind
in Philadelphia. I spent two weeks in Optacon training at ASB - the
standard time required by Telesensory Systems, Inc., the machine's
manufacturer. A special grant obtained through the dedication of
ASB's Fred Noesner covered 75 percent of the then-astronomical
$3400 cost, bringing the purchase price within range of most
consumers. My dream machine proved to be compact, lightweight, and
highly portable. The main unit contained a template or "array" with
144 tiny pins. Connected to the main unit by a slender cable was a
"camera lens" the size and shape of a mini-flashlight. I learned to
track the lens across a printed line with my right hand while
resting my left forefinger lightly upon the array. The pins of the
array vibrated to create a tactile image of each letter viewed by
the lens. I could literally feel everything on the printed page.
As soon as I began using the Optacon, I made startling
discoveries. I learned that italicized letters are slightly tilted,
that chapter titles are sometimes offset with wavy lines or
curlicues, that Penguin Books uses a tiny penguin logo while Borzoi
Books marks its title pages with a running dog, that the first
letter of the first word of a chapter is usually so large it
reaches down to the second or third line. I had survived very
nicely without knowing these things. Still, such details are an
integral part of the world of print--the world from which most
people gather so much information and pleasure.
Without a doubt reading with the Optacon was slow. Through
steady practice I built my speed to about 100 words per minute,
compared with my Braille-reading speed of 250 words per minute or
more. But reading speed was not the issue. What mattered was
access, and the Optacon provided that. Books, newspapers,
magazines, catalogues, bills, record jackets, and the recipes on
boxes of cake mix--the barriers were down, and suddenly everything
was within reach. For the first time friends lent me their
favorite books, sent me clippings, and dared to share their private
thoughts in typewritten letters.
"So what's the first thing that machine helped you do?" my
aunt asked when I brought the Optacon home from Philadelphia. "I
cleaned out my purse," I told her. It was true. I didn't plunge
straight into the latest bestseller. I emptied my purse onto the
couch and sorted through several weeks' accumulation of receipts,
theater programs, ticket stubs, and random scraps. In the past I
would have had to wait for the opportune moment with some patient
friend or paid reader who could help me weed out the debris.
Perhaps I might simply have taken the matter into my own hands,
dumping everything into the wastebasket and hoping I wasn't losing
some crucial phone number or appointment slip. Now, with the
Optacon, I could check each questionable paper and dispose of it as
I saw fit, on my own time, without having to let anyone else
glimpse into the rat's nest my purse had become.
I have had a Kurzweil scanner since 1990. I no longer use the
Optacon for reading full-length books as I often did in the past.
But the scanner has never replaced the Optacon in any other regard.
They are both tools for accessing print, but each has its own
unique strengths and limitations. The scanner can read quickly
through large blocks of standard print. It enables me to store
material on diskette for future reference, thus building up a small
library of books and articles. But the scanner has strong views on
what "standard print" really is. Poor to moderately well-xeroxed
copies, most newsprint, all faxes, print that is unusually small or
exceptionally large - all call forth the maddening message: "Page
too difficult, may be upside down!" Pages with more than one column
may be read accurately, as long as the space between the columns
isn't too narrow. Italicized words often turn into strings of
"unrecognized characters." And anything handwritten, no matter how
clearly, is totally out of bounds. With the Optacon, on the other
hand, the only limits are my time and patience. With a bit of both
I can read virtually anything. Cursive handwriting is the only
holdout; I can usually read handwriting if people print. I can also
examine charts and tables, and can puzzle out simple line drawings
and maps. The underlying fact is that the scanner interprets what
it perceives, often in its own idiosyncratic fashion. The Optacon
shows me what is on the page and allows me to interpret for myself.
When I got the Optacon twenty years ago, I believed it would
be available to blind people for as long as civilization endured.
I never imagined that the company that created and marketed this
extraordinary instrument would one day renounce it as obsolete. But
by the mid 1980's TSI (the descendant of Telesensory) had moved on
to other, more lucrative products. It promoted the Optacon, even
the newest model, with waning enthusiasm. In 1996 came the dreaded
proclamation. The Optacon would no longer be manufactured. Old
machines will be serviced "until the turn of the century," unless
the parts run out sooner. The Optacon is an essential part of my
life. In my work as a freelance writer I turn to it a hundred times
in the course of the day - to check a page number for a footnote,
to make sure the margins are correct on a printed page, to check
whether my printer needs a fresh ribbon.
Beyond my working life the Optacon is just as important. I can
browse through gift catalogues before Christmas and birthdays. I
can sort the mail and read the pieces that are addressed to me. I
can use the dictionary, the encyclopedia, and even the Yellow
Pages. Without the Optacon I could not do any of these things
independently. Each of these small but necessary tasks, plus dozens
and dozens more, could be done only with another person's
assistance. The Optacon has given blind people a level of autonomy
and flexibility unparalleled in history. Yet that gift is being
withdrawn. That sense of freedom, that knowledge that print poses
no barriers, may be lost to future generations. As a devoted
Optacon user I belong to a minority within the blind community. We
spend a lot of time worrying, raging, strategizing, and mourning.
We stockpile used machines, buying them up at every opportunity.
With renewed hope we pursue each rumor that another company will
buy up parts, will service old machines and build new ones. We tell
each other that something has to be done. We try to carry that
message to the world.
For the most part, the response is not encouraging. We are
told that the Optacon brought blind people into the age of
technology, but its day is done. It will be remembered fondly, like
the party line and the wind-up Victrola. After all, no company
wants to invest in a dead-end product--in technology without a
future.
Right now the blind community is focused upon another
technological crisis. Looming before us is the growing use of
graphics in household products that were once accessible with ease-
-microwave ovens, tape decks, VCR's, clocks, and even telephones.
How can we continue to compete in this increasingly icon-oriented
world?
Programmers are employing all their wizardry to make these new
gadgets talk to us. They're struggling to turn each new icon into
speech. To some extent they have been successful. But every new
gadget requires tampering; each manufacturer must be bargained
with. The struggle looks to be endless. According to the proverb,
a picture is worth a thousand words. At best speech is an awkward
medium with which to represent graphics. One often needs to know
the layout of the screen, where the image appears, and how it
changes when a button is pressed.
Surely there is another approach to the whole problem, one
that does not depend on speech at all. Why not develop a device to
enable blind people to read the screen tactually? Why not turn
visual graphics into tactile images?
This notion is not as farfetched as it may sound. For more
than two decades Optacon users have been reading computer screens
with a specially-designed lens attachment. The Optacon has proved
highly useful for navigating in Windows and other graphically-based
environments. Couldn't this technology be enhanced to meet the
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