# The Need for a Modern Optacon

Category: accessible Devices

## Post 1 by Eleni21 (I have proven to myself and the world that I need mental help) on Saturday, 16-Jan-2010 14:04:57

I know I've brought this up, but not quite in this way. So please forgive the repetition.
What if there was a machine that could make you see with your hands? What if you could easily read print again, without having to scan it and listen to synthesized speech or could learn print letters for the first time? What if you could read cans, boxes, music, graphics and other materials that a traditional scanner simply couldn't recognise? Now what if that machine were suddenly taken away from you, never to be seen again?
Well, there was such a machine, but due to it's being discontinued, millions of people, including me, will never know this joy. It was called the Optacon. Thankfully, there are still people repairing, maintaining and selling them (though naturally, at very high prices) and there's even a mailing list for it's users. But even the newest ones are well over a decade old. Sooner or later, all the parts will die or disappear and it'll be the end of an era. But why? Why can't we make a similar machine today? Now I know what some of you are thinking. The optacon was fairly large by today's standards, required electricity, could only show one line at a time and used vibrating pins which some people found irritating on the hands or simply difficult to interpret. Plus, it took skill to learn how to use it. But it's 2010. Technology has come a long way in 40 years. We have wireless palm-sized devices, tiny cameras that could pick out the minutest detail and pins that are less fragile and far easier on the hands and the wallet. We even have software for scanning and rendering graphics into tactile images. So why are people today being deprived of such a necessary tool? Don't get me wrong. I love the idea of a handheld scanner like the KNFB Reader. I think or is a truly marvelous invention. But it'll never replace the sense of touch. It'll never help me learn to read print, or ,assuming that several lines can be displayed, to feel pictures on the go. It can't help students in geography, mathematics or scientific classes, musicians, teachers of the blind and visually-impaired, workers who need to deal with graphics or those with hearing impairments who just went blind and don't know how to read braille. But a modern device similar to an Optacon can do this and more.
So I'm proposing that we draw up and sign a petition, to be sent to all the adaptive technology companies, demanding that something new be created to fill this void and help us gain further independence. Who's with me here? Are there any former or current Optacon users that could give their input on this? I know last time around, some of you said that you use or used one.