Visual signal for Twitter keywords
In the spirit of Nabaztag, here’s an interesting hack involving an animatronic monkey that waves its arms whenever a keyword appears in a Twitter stream. Good alternative to a beep for Deaf and hard-of-hearing people.
Gizmodo: Super cute Twitter monkey goes bananas when it spots a keyword
Cloudy captions
Online captions make videos accessible to people with hearing or language disabilities, and make content indexing and searching possible for everyone. There are more than a few online captioning tools. But SpeakerText is a bit different. It uses speech recognition and human transcribers to provide text at $2 a minute plus your volume-based monthly fee, with a turnaround of 48 hours. It stores the synchronized transcript in the cloud, and loads a player when people visit the video on your site, with additional features like search and quote. A good price for an innovative service that may help captions go even more mainstream.
SpeakerText Builds the Missing Text Layer for Online Video [Invites]
Primp up the volume!
No one buys a laptop or netbook for audio quality, but lots of people use their portable devices for audio-intensive apps like playing music, watching movies, and talking on VoIP. Now people with mild to moderate hearing loss can improve their audio with a USB device. The X-Tube DTS looks like an old electronic tube, and glows blue when operating. Beyond the classy optics are some impressive acoustics: simulated surround sound, better frequency response, and on-screen sliders for bass enhancement and “voice clarification”. As always, your mileage may vary, but the review at the link below is pretty positive, except for suggesting that you use better headphones than the bundled ones. Only $45 dollars once it arrives.
PhoneTag Live, you’re it!
Ditech Networks (not the lenders) has had a voice mail transcription service for a while. Now they’re offering live transcription for conference calls. This is a mainstream version of the real-time captioning service that’s been available for deaf and hard of hearing participants through specialty service providers. Going mainstream often has payoffs in quality, variety, and price; what will the future of live transcription bring? Right now it’s on the phone; will we see live follow-me transcription bringing captioning into every environment?
PhoneTag Live Transcription for Conference Calls available now from Ditech Networks | Business Wire
Caption crunch
Onstage LED displays that provide redundant text have been an opera staple for some time, but to the best of our knowledge there hasn’t been a widespread equivalent for other types of theatrical performances. That might change with Airscript, a wireless device currently being tested in London that furnishes simultaneous translation of what’s going on; it has a channel for eight languages, and we were pleased to see that one was English for the benefit of Deaf/hard of hearing people, or just those with lousy seats. It shows multiple lines, so that you don’t have to spend all your time staring at it and away from the stage.
Engadget: AirScript translator beams live theater subtitles over the air
Voluptuous volume
You wouldn’t dream of doing a PowerPoint presentation without bringing a projector to maximize visibility, right? However, if the presentation has an audio component, at most you might stuff a couple of cheap speakers into your carry-on and figure that’ll take care of amplification. SMK-Link is aiming to change that by selling the GoSpeak! amplification system, which weighs less than 5 lbs., costs about $400, and “delivers quality voice and music amplification in smaller to mid-size venues.” Given the likelihood that a significant percentage of any audience these days will have some hearing issues, due to the natural effects of age or the not-so-natural effects of iPods, we hope this type of technology becomes a must-have.
BusinessWire: Announcing GoSpeak!™ Pro Ultra-Portable Amplification System
The beat goes on
The 3M Littman Electronic Stethoscope, like other stethoscopes we’ve covered before, has obvious advantages for doctors who are hard-of-hearing–including ambient noise reduction, acoustic seal earpieces, and amplification options. But we’re also interested in its recording and Bluetooth capabilities, which allow body noises to be captured and transferred hands-free to a nearby computer for later analysis, accommodating at least medical professionals with dexterity impairments, and possibly other disabilities as well.