New Linux PDA For Blind People

[Lorenzo Taylor]

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According to David Poehlman:
# 2> No matter how low the price point, it willl be too high for  
# someone.  A decent car costs a big dollar, but we have plenty of  
# chances to be run over bby them around here.

This is very true.  The same is true for the mainstream PDA.  Not everyone can
afford to buy one, even at today's prices.  The point is that a much lower
percentage of blind and visually impaired people are able to afford to buy
devices that they need than the percentage of sighted people who can afford to
buy equivalent devices due to the extremely prohibitive cost of assistive
technology, which unlike the cost of mainstream technology increases every
couple of years rather than decreasing over time.  Take the Braille 'n Speak as
an example.  The thing can't even get on the internet, unless that has changed
in the last 2 or 3 years.  In 1990 when I first saw one, my teacher at school
told me they were $1000.  Now, that same device, although it has advanced very
little compaired to most other technology, is $1395, nearly $400 more than it
was 16 years ago.  On the other hand, the average low-end PDA, which can do at
least as much as the Braille 'n Speak, now goes on sale for $149.99, only
slightly more than a tenth of the cost of the Braille 'n Speak.  And in 1990, if
technology would have been available to make today's low-end PDA, it probably
would have been around $1500 to $2000.  And a much higher percentage of any
population can afford to pay $149.99 than can afford to pay $1395.

HTH,
Lorenzo
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