Category: Geeks r Us
I was wondering if anybody heard of accessible devices that read (or speak) the television menus for blind people. For example, we have several channels on cable tv in Israel that blind or vi people can't use, such as the VOD channel (video on demand) that functions like a vedio library, or the tv guide that shows the schedules of the different channels. I once heard about a talking remote control produced in England, but I don't know anything about it. I'm asking about something that can actually read the menus of cable receivers or satalite tv. Any ideas anyone? Feel free to forward my question to other blind people or blind related lists.
Thanks,
Sisi
hi Firebolt. i've never heard of such a TV. As far as I can see, there's got to be a computer involved in the reading process, whatever you do. it would require a screen reader of some kind and maybe also an OCR program that could recognize the text. I don't know if it's possible to view cable channels on a computer with a TV card, as I haven't tried it. but i'm not sure, it would make any difference. The problem is that the menus are not created by the receiving device itself, but are sent from a remote computer. This means that you can't make a special TV with prerecorded menus as these might suddenly not work anymore. maybe, the TV companies might make the menus spoken, so that the sound would be sent along with the text. but i don't think, we're a large enough group to make that happen.
They should still do that though. That would be cool for blind people to be able to do their own settings on the TV. Actually, I guess it could be included when you have that Second Audio Programming setting/device on, and then there could be a general screen reader setting simular to a computer screen-reader that would read out whatever the menus said. I don't think they'd really have to program the speech; the speech could just be another feature. That way, we would just have to remember how to get there to turn it on or we could get sighted help just to turn it on and leave it like that. And if they just didn't want to do this for blind people, some people are probably to busy to actually sit down and look at the TV but still have it on anyway, and it'd be good for those people I think. *smiles*
In England some tv channels provite audio description for their programmes but i don't know if their menus speak or anything. I heard that sky which is satelite and freview which is free digital television have got audio description but i don't know a lot about them. Maybe somebody from England could tell us more.
There are a few web pages which give the TV listings for the UK. The RNIB (Royal National Institute for the Blind) has lots of advice and information on this topic on its own web site. Which I THINK is rnib.org.uk - cos I just have it on my favs list !!