Category: Cinema 31
SUNDAY'S EXTREME MAKEOVER HOME EDITION INCLUDES FREEDOM SCIENTIFIC PRODUCTS
(St. Petersburg, Florida, April 26, 2005) – Be sure to tune in for a special two-hour broadcast of Extreme Makeover Home Edition this Sunday, May 1, from
7 PM to 9 PM EDT, featuring an accessible home for a blind Florida resident.
The highly-rated ABC TV series focuses on the construction of the house for Jamie Dolan, a St. Petersburg resident who was blinded in a November 24 shooting.
Several companies, including Freedom Scientific, contributed products, time, and labor to the community-wide effort. Freedom Scientific contributed JAWS®,
the SARA™ Scanning and Reading Appliance, a PAC Mate™ QX440, the StreetTalk™ accessible GPS, and the FSReader DAISY player for both PAC Mate and Desktop.
Because of public interest and the abundant content of this show, ABC has extended the usual one-hour broadcast to two hours. The national broadcast will
be preceded at 6 PM EDT by a one-hour pre-show, aired only in the Tampa Bay area by the local ABC affiliate. The pre-show will spotlight the local volunteers
and companies that contributed to the home.
After the May 1 air date, clips from the series and product information can be viewed on the
Extreme Makeover Home Edition Web site.
Freedom Scientific’s participation is highlighted in an article on the
ABC Action News Tampa Bay Web site.
On Monday, May 2 at 8 PM EDT, the Dolan home again will be featured on the one-hour ABC series, How’d They Do That? The broadcast will go behind the scenes
to show more about building the home’s accessible features.
About Freedom Scientific
Freedom Scientific is the world's leading manufacturer of assistive technology products for those who are blind and vision impaired and products for the
special education and learning disability markets.
Freedom Scientific®, JAWS®, SARA™, PAC Mate™, and StreetTalk™ are either trademarks or registered trademarks in the United States and/or other countries.
The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.
Thanks for posting this. I saw the previews on Tuesday but didn't catch the date and time that the show would be aired! Sounds interesting. I will watch it and comment on it. Thanks again. Star
I didn't watch it, but I will comment on it. I read this article and thought, this is pathetic an accessible home? come on now. I think all this show did was succeed in givin' us blind people a bad reputation and worsened the immage of us that the general public has. I mean, it's cool that this guy got a bunch of free technology from FS, but does he really need all that? this show just made us look like we're a bunch of technological crazy people who need all these weird gadgets to get by in the world. sure, some of them help and we need a few, but we don't need "accessible houses!!!" we don't need a million different gadgets. we can turn on our own lightswitches...I heard, and this could just be someone makin' it up but I heard his "accessible house" is gonna have a friggin' voice activated light switch. was that true? please tell me not lol. "The broadcast will go behind the scenes to show more about
building the home’s accessible features." oh yes, I'm blind, I need a house with accessible features. I could understand if he was in a wheelchair, but I think this is all taken too far and that's why I didn't watch. thanks extreme makeover, you just screwed us over with a whole bunch of new stereotypes.
sorry if I'm being harsh, I just feel strongly about this.
canadian diva
I watched the show and the only technology they showed was a voice activated light switch and themostate. I'm sighted and the show made me mad. It made blind people look helpless. It was nothing but a pitty party that made blindness look like some king of unbarable nightmare. In one segment the host of the show started crying as he was talking to a blind kid because the kid couldn't see. How much more pitty does it get than that? The house was really cool and I think it's cool that people do nice things for others but I think the point of the show is pathetic.
omg. I was actually right about the light switch? Lord have mercy. that is the most pathetic thing ever. and a thermistat...if we put braille dots on our normal ones, we can use them just fine. give me a break.
guys it's all about the ratings. And if the host of that show gets emotional over something so small like that to a disabled person..... Put two and two together. The host is either A. trying to get the audience to feel sorry for this person and maybe tune in to the show more often, or B. is faking it to get ratings. I mean 2 hour shows like that plus a pre-show AND a second segment, ABC is desperate.
Oh! Thank god... I was afraid I would be the only one having some bad, very bad comments about this program!!! You are right guys, this show was very pathetic. They mentioned the "tragic event" and "blind/blindness" like one million times. Why does someone need a voice activated light switch and thermostat or even a voice activated computer??? I mean he has hands, he can use them. This was for sure an extreme make-over but not in the good way of extreme. They over did it they way way way over did it. It was like those Jerry Louis charity shows that make viewers feel sorry for the handicapped so they will donate more money. They brought in a blind home designer to design the home since he and only he could know what a blind person would need in their home. They used a different texture on each wall, so that Jamie (that was the blind guy's name) would know where he is when walking around his house. They placed a carpet hanging on a wall across from the bathroom so Jamie would know where the bathroom is... COME ON!!! Please, can't Jamie find the bathroom by the smell? LOL OK, I can understand the shock, the pain and all that of his situation but to take it and milk it like that. I hope one day Jamie will realize how pathetic the whole show was. I mean it's great he and his family got that huge house and all, but was his dignity worth that? Another part that I thought was over done was when Jamie's oldest son said he wants to grow up and invent robotic eyes for his dad to see again! The remake team took that one sentence and blew it out of all proportion. They build the kid a robotic bedroom and got him a scholarship to go to that enginering college and build robotic eyes to cure blindness (yeap that is what they said exact words!). What people will do for a few hours of fame and free goods. And oh! Ty the designer I am sure must have slept so well that night feeling proud for having helped that poor helpless tragic unfortunate blind man! Star