Category: the Rant Board
I have just heard that sighted people are now having talx software instaled on their phones so that when they're driving, they don't have to look at the screan. whilest this is a good idea as far as texting goes, you just watch the price drop now its used for sighted people too! it drives me nuts that we have to pay for the privilage of not being able to see our phone screans, and they'll get charged less because they're being lazy! what does everyone else think?
i'd think it's something to do with safety. no one is lazy it's just an easier way to consontrate on the road and the phone at the same time
good. I hope the price of talks drops. and as for sighted people using it, I'm so glad that they're getting use out of it as well. If it will make the road a safer place then I'm all for it.
I agree Liam. Far too many needless and serious accidents, are caused by numpties driving with their mobile welded to their ear.I am annoyed that they get this privilage for free, however,Philippa if you had witnessed the carnage caused by the mobile phone crowd, you mightn't blow a gasket quite so quickly.
I know someone whose husband was killed because he was talking on his cell phone and not watching where he was driving. So if this program can put an end to that sort of thing and drive down the pirces for us, then all the better.
o yeah yeah I agree with the saftey thing, its just that as soon as sighted people start buying anything, the price is dropped. which is anoying if you've already bought the software when it was expencive. or even if someone else has bought it for you.
lol I don't see what the big problem is, but yeah!!!
*sexy*
i look at this as 2 separate issues. on the one hand any new technology will always cost more money once it has been around for a while than when it is first implemented. if sighted people wish to use talx and that has the knock on effect of driving the price down for visually impaired consumers then all well and good.
the other side of this coin though is the cost to people who need it as an essential piece of softwhere, as a posed to people who just feel like having it as a fancy accessory. i do have an issue with the prices of many things involved with being VI though. i mean to use a computer for example we hardly have a choice. we have to use a screen reader so we shouldn't be paying the prices that we are just to make something accessible to us that works for everybody else straight out of the box. after all doesn't it strike anybody else as being just a little bizarre the fact that we are now in the crazy position of paying more for the softwhere to make the computer accessible to us than for the computer itself?
of course i realize that these things all cost money to produce so i'm not asking that the companies that cell products to the VI world drop there prices, but that governments should do more to assist people with paying for these things.
limited market. come onsightlings buy it more. grin.
Totally agree with Harp.
I also agree with Harp.
talks being used by sighted ppl? yah bring it on! why not show them the benifits of using screen readers too? less eye strain, less time wasted in front of your screens, as a simple radio headphone setup linked to a pc with a screen reader will allow the sighted user to do other things while listening to their documents. Maybe if this is taken up on a wider basis, then prices will come down. why not market talks to sighted ppl like the mobile companies market the phones? we'd all benifit then. maybe this will lead, *maybe pie in the sky, but I can dream* to talks being a standard feature offered to those who purchase mobile phones in the shops. Wouldn't it be amazing to walk into your local mobile shop and be offered talks for a small extra charge, rather than ahving to go through hoops to find it?
Hmm, it's a tricky issue. In general it's always better go get sighted peole in on developing technologies, I think it's fantastic. Just imagine you are a company with two developers, each has to make 50000 dollars a year to want to be employed. You have a market of 2000 blind users that are willing to buy your software, now you must sell the software for at least $50 just to break even, and, matter of fact, you got to sell it for more, there are advertizing costs, packaging, administration, customer service people, brochures etc etc so perhaps $70. Now if this phenominon becomes popular in the sighted world all of a sudden your market has grown from 2000 user to 40000 users, which has drive the price down to 3 or 4 dollars a copy to break even (assuming that promotional costs etc will increease slightly let's leave it at $8 per copy). So bigger market is always better, it might encourage new companies to jump in and develop better products and the prices come down. It's a fact of economics that software like Talks is expensive to begin with since it is originally intended for, and developed for, a small specific group of users and investment must be recouped, or come from government/non profit bodies, even if they are non profit they still have to show something for the money. If a product like this becomes popular that's really just a lucky break for us or whoeve the software was originally intended for.
The other issue is why blind people have to pay so much for accessing technology. Well, there are many arguments for and against it, really. For one thing most blind people can actually get government or private organization to sponsor their purchases one way or another if they can prove that they are using the computer either for work or for education. I know in Iceland, Denmark and the UK you can get grants for technology purchases and in the States your employer has to get you the equipment you need and/or organizations are there to help you get what you need. And, well, sighted people encur a lot of expenses that we do not encur, cars, gas, car insurance etc and we receive social security that is much better than the sighted people get. If they are unemployed for lng they get no money whatsoever, we get regular monthly payments that, I admit, are not the greatest, barely enough to live off, we still get those no matter what and I think that's something that we actually should be thankful for, in a way. In other words, I think we do receive a lot of privelleges in society, which is good, but it could be argued that we're already receiving enough and more and more spnosoring is not money well spent (I'm just bringing up all sides of the issue, I'm not sure where I stand, I had an argument about this with my mobility instructor who thinks that frankly blind people get too much from society).
Cheers
-B
tricky. because those grants aren't what i'd call stable. there's so many hoops to cross in order to get them and they try and trick you in so many ways that those who try for them don't always get what they need. it's all well and good saying there's grants out there but unless you actually know how to get them, you won't. simple as that.
Um? They spend a lot of money for things they don't need. It is soooo expensive. If it wasn't, fine, all right. but this is so expensive that i would never, ever buy it if i was sighted.
Hmm, as has been stated, limited market higher prices - open market lower prices. That's just the way economics work. Whether we like it or not, it's a fact of life. So, why not build a bridge between the sighted and blind so prices go down. That's the only option that makes since to me. Being a software developer and company owner I understand this concept well enough...*smile* As far as Talx, if anyone is on Cingular and can get a doctor to state that you are blind enough to need the software Cingular will refund you depending on the plan you are on.
yes but that's not a universal thing. although I do know someone who might benifit from that. they are in a contract with singular but i don't know if their phone is talx compatible. Will Singular allow you to get a talx compatible phone and the programme with some cash back? or would you have to weight for your contract to be up.
Exactly.
Well, I did not need a doctor's testiment to my blindness, I just called their accessibility center up and got the Talks credits. I believe you have to wait until your contract is up to get a new phone, of course, it's $249 with $50 mail in rebate and you also have to pay $199 for Talks and it is credited back to your account so you don't have to pay a phone bill for a couple of months.
They also offer you some news/weather alert text messaging services for free but for that you need a doctor's certification of blindness.
Yeah. No it's all right - I mean they shal do it if they really wish but it is just - if I was sighted it would be wasted money for me.
Dobbin I agree with that..
Actually, you can get a new phone before your term of contract is up if your have the "upgrade my phone" option available.
Yeah really it's a win-win for both sides. The more people buy, the less it's gonna cost. And at this rate I can't afford talx so I gotta deal with straining my eyes to see the screen.
What cell providers does the talx program work with? Spring? Nextel? Verisgn? Can someone clear that part up.
I'm sure that's different in Germany as well. I don't know much about it.
BlindVI, talks works with all phones running the Symbian operating system, currently Nokia 6620 and Cingular are what most people that I know off go with, the phone is $199 after $50 mail in rebate and you pay $199 for Talks but it's credited back to you over the next billing cycles until your credits are down to 0.
Ah cool.
I understand that sighted people use talks while driving, but what I don't like about it is that we have to pay so much to use the phone, and sighted people pay the same amount to add features to the phone. It's not fair that I have to pay extra in order to use the phone. I have the software now and I love it. See the rave board for details
It’s all about supply and demand, ya it sucks sometimes but what can you do?
O don't encourage sighties to use Talks or even mobile phones in the driving seat, for heaven's sake! Last thing the UK needs is another accident like last night's, where a couple of cars and a lorry collided on the M40 and a lode of asetylene cylinders spilled out all over the road so they had to hold possibly millions of other vehicles up and close the motorway for four, fucking hours as they had to wait for the temperature of those cylinders to drop sufficiently so they could be moved safely without an explosion to add to all that mess. I'm forever giving my own mum a blast from the past because she dials numbers, texts and stuff on her bog-standard sighty Samsung phone when she's driving. Yes, OK, if she's ringing my Grandparents or something, I'll ring them for her on my mobile, but seriously, do not encourage the sighties to use their phones, at all, when they are driving, thank you. Nice one about the price of Talks going down though. Mind you, it only cost me £60 when I upgraded to the premium version of Talks on my Nokia N70, so I thought that was fairly reasonable. The phone I have now is on an 18-month contract, including our broadband, so it's basically costing me a hell of a lot more than the Talks software itself. Just take £34.99 multiplied by 18.
Ouwhwhwhwhwhch!
Jen.
I agree. It should be against the law for people to drive and use a cell phone.
yah i ageree, but i think that talks for sighted people helps them learn about the things we use as blind people.
In the UK it is against the law to hold a mobile phone while driving, though yu can take a call if it only involves pressing a button, say on a bluetooth headset. to make a call, you need to pull over, switch off your engine and then make the call, if you don't it's sixty pounds fine and three points on the licence.
oh wow. u have to turn your engine off in order to make a call? interesting.
it is actually against the law here in america for people to drive while talking on a cell phone, but people do it anyway
Yes, as for using that software, I say the following:
It's a free country boys and girls.
Yeah why not. Wouldn't that bring the price down a bit if more people start using it?
actually i think it would considerably bring the price down.
It would lower the price.
Supply and demand.