Category: Let's talk
How does technology influes your day to day activities? How has technology impacted the quality time you spend with your family, friends and the people around you? If your not in school or working, would you rather hang out online or do more interesting things offline? I'm not only talking about computers as far as technology goes, there's lots of latest gadgets that can really occupy ones time and get someone addicted. So, would you rather spend time with technology for instance, playing games with your playstation, listening to your iPod, texting, surfing the internet or do other things unrelated with technology? Can you live without technology such us your computer, iPod, game gadgets or any form of technology that relates to entertainment.
I love my laptop, cell phone, MP3 player, VRStream, and don't think I could manage long without them. I use the laptop for fun like chatting and playing games, but also to look for jobs. I use my cell to talk to family and friends and I do a lot of texting. I take my mp3 player on the bus to listen to music and my VRStream always has a book or two on it because I love reading. If I had a Trekker GPS, I would take it when I went out too. I really don't play video games much. I got to have my technology! LOL
I'm admittedly addicted as well. There's a running joke among my friends which is that I always seem to be wired to something, either the laptop, or x iPod. I'd include my cell in there, but currently don't have one. lol, so yeah, whether it's work or play, all things tech are my right arm, and without them I'd be haplessly bored. Give me a beach and a good book, and i'm a very happy girl. *grins*
Technology lets me talk to the people That I can't be with at this time. I like talking to people. And with out it I would be just bored. I also like reading so that is wear my bookport comes in.
Tech affects me a ton. First of all, most of my friends live all over the country and the world, so tech allows me to keep in touch with them. I'm constantly reading something, so my stream logically, is usually within reaching distance. I feel very lost without my cellphone. It's my second brain, along with my laptop to a slightly lesser extent. I've not used a land line phone for a good while, other than at a job or the like.
Finally, when I have one at least, my job is computer / network support or teaching. It'd be a little hard to have that for a job without tech. :)
On the blindness front, I really truly believe that technology has advanced the blind's ability to compete on a level footing with their sighted peers in school, social activities, and the workplace.
Agreed with Miah on the tech front. I can't live without the MacBook Pro, the iPod, or the cell phone. I've gotta be connected, but even still, I don't let it get in the way of human interaction. I've known too many people who have done that, and they end up out of touch with reality. I'm not willing to be that way. I'll say this though. In 5th grade, I got an Apple 2E with an Echo synthesizer, braille embosser, and printer. One of the greatest feelings of independance I've ever had was the first time I typed an essay, was able to braille it for my own personal proofing, and print it for my teacher to grade, completely independant of any sighted interaction. It's only gotten better from there.
agreed, tec is impowering to the blind user. enough said.
Technology enables me to do my voluntary work. I use my computer with Jaws to deal with committee matters over emails, write important documents such as press releases, policies and monitoring forms. I store the numbers of people who volunteer or are members of my organisation on my computer and refer to them when ringing people. I read documents that are relevant to meetings I have to attend, using my computer. In fact, it is fair to say that I wouldn't be able to do the voluntary work I do without a computer with Jaws.
Beyond voluntary work, I use my computer to access information related to my interests. Using my computer, I can read local, national and international news, sports and media news. I can also interact with other people who share my interests, including people I don't know. Without a computer, the only news I'd get would be from the radio, so I wouldn't get detailed news about my football club and be able to find out what people think about it instantly. I can also listen to and download the songs I like using my computer, listen to live and recorded radio, and watch live and recorded television.
Though I use my computer a lot, I am not detached from society. My voluntary work requires me to meet with people and speak to them directly, as well as manage people. I have to be present at locations where i am managing events. I have no problem with meeting people. The committee meets in person too, though without computers our work would be a lot slower.
I am a Huddersfield Town season ticket holder, so I go to football matches as well.
I have no computer-related interests, but I use my computer to maximise my enjoyment and knowledge of the many interests I have.
i don['t know how i'd survive without the internet and my pc. simple stuff like going to a restaurant website and picking out my meal ahead of time. looking up information on a topic which interests me. seeing is my airplane flight is on time or not. it is wonderful to manage independently and not have to wait for some sighted person to help out.
it's a pity taht all this tec costs so bloody much though.
The A T tech costs more though.
but over time, AT is cheaper, when taking into account man hours paid etc. companies and authorities don't realise that providing someone with a copy of k1000 let's say at £795 is cheaper in the long run than paying a human reader. beats me.
I agree with others that technology has and is helping blind people to be more independent with things they might otherwise have to depend on a sighted person to almost do for them. At home, I'm on the computer quite a bit, and even when it was gone because it was getting looked at and fixed at one point, I kept forgetting it was gone and missed it. I also used to have a cell phone wich (while I didn't use it constantly) made things very convenient. I will be getting a notetaker soon, which I know will get a lot of use, and a digital recorder that I just got several days ago, and I use my MP3 player whenever I leave the house (usually only when I'm going to be riding in a vehicle to somewhere). I also have and use a color/light detector almost every day.
While I have managed without my cell and computer, because I know I can ask to borrow a phone or go to the library for the computer, the color detector is something that I would not want to do without. It's been a huge help to me when people leave the lights on around the house, and I can independently match my own clothes and sort other things by color. I'd also get really bored without my MP3 player or at least a portable radio. The notetaker I've also been used to having; it is a quick and convenient way to take down information or write notes or keep a journal, and while I know I can manage without one, I'm so used to having one around.
I have a cell phone, but I don't use it as much as I do my desktop and my Pac mate.
Don't think I could make it without them.
As a person who often writes tech reviews, I will give my opinions too :)
While I belive in a more spiritual life and one which is one with Earth (Gaia) and the energies of nature, I would still have to agree that technology really helps blind people. Until we discover a way to do telepathy or tap truly in to the astral and akashic records of the universe, it will be around, and without I think anyone would have a hard time to survive in a fast pace world. Granted if the world wasn't so cruel and competitive it would effect people less.
I use my netbook 2 out of 5 school days, and my regular 14" laptop 3 other days - this is to conserve battery life on it for college. I use my pacmate's braille display mainly with the netbook, when in a class which requires much of my attention span.
I also have a color identifier and couldn't live without it! Other things such a cell phone are so important, since they allow me to keep in contact. I have 5 cell phones and still collecting them for fun.
I've loved technology since age 7, and don't think it'll be leaving me for a while :)
-Tomi
b
My response here is not as a developer:
Growing up I used a typewriter and slate-and-stylus. I had to do math on a Braille writer and then retype it clicking the carriage up or down by one click to insert super and subscripts and stuff - needless to say easy to screw up.
Carrying volumes of Braille plus a portable and often manual typewriter to school was a bitch. I don't say this to paint myself as anything; it was a practical issue. It was either do that and go to the free schools or get sent to the segregated one, that's all.
I couldn't read newspapers, magazines except for those the NLS sent out, and tons of stuff in my interest areas - electronics, synthesis / keyboards and the like - were not in modern terms 'accessible'.
I used to count clicks when loading patches into my keyboards from sampler decks and tape interfaces. None of that shit ever talked.
I would never return to all that:
Now with a PAC Mate or a PC I can go online, even look up a definition or the weather or whatever. I could keep the books for my food vending stand - much as I hated to have to run one for awhile - using Excel on desktop and PAC Mate. I'm sure what I just said applies to iPhone and other accessible devices now, so am not branding it's just what I use.
I can download the manuals to most devices in our house, and help out family members with stuff I can't even use myself simply because I can access the docs and understand the theory.
I can travel to another city and, using Google and Yahoo, get directions to a lot of places around there. Even recently I've used Business Search in JAWS 11 to look up a place really quickly - I didn't know what it was called so just looked up pizza places near my house and got all the info sighted people get from the phone book.
I used to dream about doing half this shit as a kid ... sure for you NFB or political types, I did function independently before. I used a typewriter with those long raised-line checks to pay the bills, kept records on Braille paper and all, but there are some major drawbacks to doing it the 'old' way:
First, as a totally blind person, you can't very well cross out what you wrote and rewrite. That means redo the whole sheet of paper for your records or *gasp* math. I totally misunderstood math growing up because it was all the mechanics of what it took to do it first in Braille then in print so teachers could see it.
Then, there was the incredible limitations of access to material that you constantly had to compensate for, not even knowing how a local establishment spells its name, or being unable to read directions.
I can only imagine what some of this must be like for some of you all who have bar code identifiers, color identifiers etc., or going to school with something like a PDA or net book where you can proofread your own work and the ink doesn't go out two pages into a twenty-page paper.
Some o' you hardcores can flame about this one all ya like but I don't see getting nearly as fast with a slate and stylus as I can type, either on a BX or certainly not on a QWERTY keyboard.
Even this past year, when we had to get a new car after the auto accident, we could look things up on Google (granted that's not blind-specific but I sure as hell could participate), and the amount of data we could find on used stuff was staggering. We bought a used one in 97, and at that time, using the mouse cursor, I poked all over the Internet ... a pre-Google universe was much smaller even for those of us who can enter complex boolean expressions into search engines.
This is probably why I'm such a damned pithy grinch about people complaining about accessibility and I realize probably not always warranted, but the heaviest device we carry around is much smaller than anything I carried to school as an eight-year-old boy, and the amount of information I can freely access without going through the priests we call agencies and the like is staggering.
I will answer the second half the question regarding impact on family, but first to say I certainly did not mean to imply I was the only one in my previous post who did things as I did.
I don't know, as I didn't know anybody blind growing up, but I imagine it was probably the norm and you all in your upper thirties or later probably did also or at least similar; just fending off the inevitable clashes.
But seriously, and this isn't about being blind, I can be at home when my teenage daughter gets here because I work from home. That wasn't always the case of course, but it is now and even though she's independent and I observe from the background mostly / stay out of her way, I can be there when needed. Working from home I can start really early in the morning so if I work extra hours it doesn't end up that late at night, and I can first take a break at end of day to go work out and such. There was virtually no telecommuting before there was an Internet, and high bandwidth helps us who deal with a lot of data.
And Facebook has allowed me to see what some family members are doing - a few siblings I haven't spoken to in quite a few years.
Oh Geez!! I remember the whole typewriter thing too! Not to menting ahuling a bulky brailler to all my classes in Middle school!! I love technology, and use email internet and Xcel all the time at work. I also use my laptop a ton when I'm at home. I just got a neww cell phone and I have 3 mp3 players, one secular music, one Christian music and another for audiobooks. I almost never leave the house without my Mp3 player, and my cell goes everywhere as it's my only phone. While I still used a brailler in college to take notes as I read, I still used a computer. I love technology!! My life would suck without it. I do though, try to keep a balance on my tech use. As great as it is, it is no substitute for genuine face-to-face relationships.
I agree with the last poster regarding relationships.
Yep; they're machines dammit that's why I kick 'em and cuss at 'em when I'm programming and get frustrated - and usually the daughter's not around ... lol
But seriously I made a blog post on this very subject here which you may find useful it's no how-to just my remarks from both being in the industry and being the general technology guy for friends and family. The title is "Slavery: when it's the right thing to do"
granted not much of a blogger but the last post reminded me I wrote it. Just don't forget to be technology's master ...
I'm not a slave to it, but enjoy it much. I can do without for a bit, but for a blind person it! simply! rocks! Now where's that MP3 player!
Hurray for technology!
I love to search things up on the internet for my Mother-in-law. She doesn't have a computer, so I search for different things for her.
i have a n ipod, laptop and vr stream and of course my cell. i love to read on the go and i just recently got the vr stream which was perfect and my roomate thought it was cool.
i live at a college dorm full of sighted kids and they have no idea so they think its an mp3 player and think it's cool.
it's so versatile that i can carry my whole library in my hand which is amazing.
soon, i'll be getting an iphone i don't know what to do with my little ipod since the VR stream can play music.
maybe i should use it as a hard disk for files.
Omg I could not live without it. I got a netbook now, and it's so amazingly handy at college, because it is fast and small. And I love my mobile phone, I take it everywhere ever since I got a mobile with talks on it.
I@d love a VI stream and a note taker, that would just help me bigtime.
I couldn't live without technology. Yes, I can live without it for a while, but most of my friends are all over the world ...
and without the internet it would be harder to keep in touch with my family in Germany.
So bottom line is: I need it a lot.