Dispatches From The Internets

Cognitive Services + Video = Transcription, speaker recognition, search/indexing, and more. This is friggin’ amazing!

The #1 tech trend? Assistive technology.

Accessibility overlays all of the topics covered in this year’s Five Technology Trends to Watch. For example, take a look at the following.

• Voice assistants: regardless of your preferred assistant, these technologies are enabling control of your home and access to information through voice recognition. In addition to this benefit to the general public, these features can be crucial to people with mobility disabilities.
• Augmented reality: the ability to overlay information on the environment can provide helpful information to people with cognitive disabilities, audio cues to people with visual impairments or alerts for people with hearing loss.
• Transportation: ridesharing solutions open up new worlds of independence for people who are blind or low vision as well as older adults that have lost the ability to drive. Building on top of these available services, autonomous vehicles will further open up the world for these populations.
• Digital health: the ability to use sensors to track health data will enable consumers to take control of their health, while also providing alerts and warning signs for caregivers and medical professionals when needed.
• Sports technology: whether it’s a day as a spectator at the ballpark or competing at the local park or course, accessible sports technologies are opening up new opportunities for people to engage with recreational activities.

Are you blind? Interested in making the Web better for everyone? Join the National Federation of the Blind’s BUILD team!

Very interesting perspective video showing how Master Chef winner (and blind chef) Christine Ha cooks. Vicarious experiences like this one can be very enlightening.

I love how she uses assistive tech like Amazon’s Echo as part of her cooking routine. I’ve found it invaluable for things like timers.