A wonderous bird is the Pelikon
The Pelikon MorphPad can light up different sections of a mobile device’s keyboard based on the active function–just the numbers for telephony, just the control keys for a game. Should be useful for people with low vision, as well as providing cuing to people with cognitive disabilities. Take that, Optimus!
No iPad jokes from us, no sir
We were going to wait until some of the hype died down before considering the accessibility side of the iPad–but fortunately our friend Ricky Buchanan has already started the process. Looks promising!
Largesse
Intel has come up with a pretty cool wireless capability. Hook a small box up to a TV, press a button on your laptop, and voila: a large computer display. This has terrific implications for accommodating students with low vision in classrooms and elders in their homes in particular, especially in future product generations when higher resolutions will be supported.
Anandtech: The Best Thing at CES - Intel’s Wireless HD Technology
Pitching a tint
Forthcoming: touch screens for big and small technologies that can be ordered in one of 13 tinted colors. The stated rationale is to “match the body of a given device with its touch screen,” but we have bigger aspirations: Different tints make text easier to read for some people with visual or learning disabilities, and if this can be controlled via hardware many users will be accommodated as soon as they take their equipment out of its box.
Take a gawk on the wild side
iPhone apps with intentional or serendipitous accessibility implications are probably multiplying faster than we could hope to keep up with. But we have to note Lou Zoom, which makes text in the iPhone address book larger and adds some neat functionality for accessing contact-specific information that could have cognitive as well as visual benefits. Plus, it was co-designed by Lou Reed, so now we think he’s sweet, too.
Mr. Conductor, if you please
Maestro is a gesture-based baton-like device for controlling presentations. Activation appears to take place when the user simply touches a grooved area–no pressure required, which is always a good thing. The gestures look simple and easy to learn if not intuitive; move and resize the display by moving the baton diagonally downward. Just a Yanko thought bubble for now, but we’d give good odds to it becoming a commercial reality.
Tray that takes the cake
Musical cake trays are nothing new. But the Musical Cake Tray brings the concept into the 21st century by adding LED lights so you get an enhanced visual guide for slicing perfect wedges. Tray bien!