This is such a cool idea

A Kindle for the Blind? U.S. Researchers Working on an Affordable Braille Tablet

The engineers are currently working on an entirely new technology for building what it hopes will be a more affordable Braille tablet. The device under development incorporates a “microfluid” display comprising tiny bubbles that fill with air or liquid and pop up as Braille characters.

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Does anyone else think this is a bad idea?

Iowa grants permits for blind residents to carry guns in public: Sheriffs and advocates are divided on whether that's a good idea

Don’t expect Iowa to revoke gun permits for the blind. It’s not even the only state that offers them

No offence meant to the visually-impaired, but we do, after all, prohibit people under a certain threshold of sight from driving cars because, well, that's dangerous. Isn't letting someone who can't see have a gun kind of, well, dangerous?

Thanks to YKWIA for sharing this story with me.

This is rather cool

3D sonograms let blind expectant parents "see" their babies

Thanks to Bill Hart for the link. Okay, dinner over. Time to clean.

How a tooth let a blind woman see again

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Trust

A man. A horse. And a building of trust.

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This a remarkable story, though

Blind man in Paris creates visions

Montalembert lost his sight in 1978, when two men forced their way into his New York City home looking for money. They stripped him, beat him and threatened to stab him. When the artist struggled to defend himself, one of the intruders threw what felt like hot liquid in his face. It was a base paint remover that burned his retinas.

Doctors stitched his eyelids closed, as they will likely remain for the rest of his life. The attackers were never found.

Since that day, he has created detailed visions from memory, almost the way a painter fills a blank canvas. To Montalembert, the exercise is a way of survival.

"I am afraid that the memory I have of the visible world will disappear little by little, to be replaced by an abstract universe of sound, smell, and touch," he writes in his new book, "Invisible," a poetic compilation written in English that includes excerpts from his diary and his first book, "Eclipse."

"My ability to create images absolutely must not atrophy. I must remain capable of bringing back the world I looked at intensely for 35 years."

To wake his mind into "seeing," he puts himself in visually rich surroundings that inspire him to imagine what he can no longer see. This gives him "a sense of life," an antidote to the isolation that blindness can impose.

"The stronger a visual surrounding you find yourself in, the more, maybe, your brain will catch something," he writes.

Thanks for the link from @Flipbooks as retweeted by @pfanderson.

Working to get books online for people who can't read them in hard copy

Project puts 1M books online for blind, dyslexic

The Internet Archive is scanning a variety of books in many languages so they can be read by the software and devices blind people use to convert written pages into speech. The organization has 20 scanning centers in five countries, including one in the Library of Congress.

"Publishers mostly concentrate on their newest, profitable books. We are working to get all books online," Kahle said.

Marc Maurer, president of the National Federation of the Blind, says getting access to books has been a big challenge for blind people.

"Now, for the first time, we're going to have access to an enormous quantity," he said.

Thanks to Buffy Hamilton for sharing.

Something that could open up a world for the blind

Blinded Merseyside soldier 'sees' with tongue device

A Merseyside soldier blinded by a grenade in Iraq has said his life has been turned around by technology that allows him to "see" with his tongue.

L/Cpl Craig Lundberg, 24, from Walton, Merseyside, can read words, identify shapes and walk unaided using the BrainPort device.

The machine converts visual images into a series of electrical pulses which are sent to his tongue.

The soldier said the device gives off "a pins and needles sensation".

L/Cpl Lundberg lost his sight while serving with the King's Regiment after being hit by a rocket propelled grenade in 2007.

There's a video that accompanies the article that demonstrates the device. Although it's just a prototype, and an expensive one at that, there's hope that one day it will help those who are visually impaired navigate and read. The glasses have a camera and the device translates the letters or objects into a two-dimensional shape using electrodes on a 'lolly pop' held on the tongue. The lance corporal describes it like 'licking a nine volt battery or like popping candy'. The main drawback is since it is held on the tongue, you can't talk or eat at the same time you're using the device. Researchers are working on a smaller version that might fit in roof the mouth or such that would allow this at some point.

This is an excellent example of technology pursued in an effort to make people's lives better.

Considering the visually-impaired and technology

Stevie Wonder: Touch-screens alienate blind: Motown icon, advocates encourage CES vendors to consider blind needs

but potentially good news is:

Digital Scanner Turns Books Into Audio Files Instantaneously