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Press-Journal Photo/ Jim Lewis
Phone that reads aloud a ‘godsend’ for the blind
by Jim Lewis
For The Press And Journal
: 12/2/2009
A peek inside the kitchen cabinets of David DeNotaris’ Hershey home would once reveal a collection of canned goods wrapped in notes written in braille on index cards that were held in place by rubber bands. It was how DeNotaris, who is blind, knew what to eat.
“You want to know the difference between a can of chicken noodle soup and a can of pork and beans,’’ he said.
Now he uses his cell phone to identify every can, from soups to nuts. He takes a picture of a label with his phone’s camera, and an electronic voice inside the phone reads the label’s print to him.
It’s the latest technological gadget to help blind and vision-impaired people read the print they encounter in life -- from restaurant menus to train schedules, business cards to grocery store receipts.
Introduced in 2008, the cell phones are programmed with software developed by knfb Reading Technology, a partnership between private firm Kurzweil Technologies and the National Federation of the Blind.
Electronic readers existed before, but they were bulkier than the Nokia phones that knfb Reading developed.
The phone costs about $1,400, which includes the price of the reading software ($995), said James Gashel, vice president of business development for knfb Reading.
The phones were demonstrated recently at the National Federation of the Blind in Pennsylvania’s annual conference at the Best Western on Eisenhower Boulevard.
Place a $5 bill on a table, snap a picture of it with the cell phone’s camera, and an electronic voice announces, ”Five dollars.’’ It doesn’t stop there. “The bill is backside up,’’ it advises.
To Jim Antonacci, president of the Pennsylvania federation, the cell phone is a godsend. At hotels, he uses it to read the labels on complimentary shampoo and conditioner bottles in the bathroom to tell them apart.
His cell phone unlocked the mysteries of the book of guest services, local landmarks and recommended restaurants that he always discovered in his room but could never read.
“I always wondered what they said,’’ said Antonacci, of Willow Grove. “Now I can read them. It’s really amazing what that phone does.’’
DeNotaris, the director of the state Department of Labor and Industry’s Bureau of Blindness and Visual Services, uses his cell phone to read the foil packages that hold his favorite flavors of tea bags. Now he knows when he’s preparing mint or Earl Grey.
“It gives people access,’’ said DeNotaris. “We can get access to information we couldn’t get before.’’
For Gashel, who is blind, the cell phone offers freedom.
“I don’t have to hand something to someone and have them read it to me,’’ he said. “It just changes your way of life.’’
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