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It just doesn't make sense... So you got the phone of your dreams or at least a vital part of your everyday life as a low vision individual and what you need to do once you receive it ,,, call a friend to set it up for you. Why ? Because iPhone and Androids phones are not designed for accessibility out of the box. Oh yes ! It is great once it is setup correctly so why not out of the box ? No matter what phone you are dealing with, you will always see the same flaws: - Dim screen with even worse... ambient dimming - No way to invert screen - Small text size - No VoiceOver or TalkBack. Worse ! Both phones offer an accessibility option at first boot out of the box but make it hard to find and activate. What is the point ? Well there is a reason for that... Manufacturers wants to make the first boot experience looks magical and big ugly font on a black background with a robot voice talking to you when you first start your phone is just too ugly. So,, screw accessibility at first ! Those blind people will figure something up ! They are a minority anyway ! It shouldn't take too many engineers to find a way to switch the phone to a special accessibility mode at first boot if needed. But no... we have to call friend Both phones fail miserably here but Android more than iPhone . iPhone at least gets some limited voice assistance assuming you can find the menu to activate it. Android accessibility menu at first boot is very limited... no brightness toggle ... basically all you get is font size and other not so useful accessibility features. If you move from an older iPhone to a new one, apple makes it simpler to transfer all your settings by getting the two phones close to each other but you will still need your friend to do that. And things get from bad to worse when you start your setup process. That's in part 3 coming out tomorrow.

My Google Pixel 6 has arrived . Full android OS without skin from Samsung. Just a clean system. Let's look at how both phones and OS handle accessibility right out of the box. Packaging is very similar between the two phones. Android copied the luxurious packaging from Apple. Might seem like not much but it's all about touch with people with eyesight disability. From this standpoint at least the experience is identical. Small detail here but Apple seals the box with tape requiring a knife at hand. Google seals the box with tape with a tab. No need for a knife here. The way the phones are packaged is also identical with a protective layer of paper covering the screens. Easy to remove in both cases. Both boxes contain reading material not accessible to the blind ... but again who reads these instruction booklets. A single power cable is provided in the box. No wall outlet. As far as the phones themselves, the design is very different but identically luxurious and expensive to the touch. Power button and volume controls are easy to figure out. Plastic for Pixel, metal for iPhone. Since the phones both have a brushed metal bumper on the edges of the phones, the difference in quality for the buttons isn't noticeable. The unboxing experience is identical for both phones and manufacturers. It is pleasurable to the touch and to the ear. You will know you are dealing with quality product here just by the touch. The screens for both phones feel and sound sturdy. Tappping does not feel shallow. The back of the phone is glass.... I think. Pixel feels more plastic tho. Pixel is more roundish than iPhone and easy to drop. Iphone camera setup compared to Pixel setup makes the android phone more stable on the table. No matter which phone you deal with, you will need a protective case. Something to protect iPhone and make it more stable on the table . Something making Pixel less smooth and less prone to drop from your hands. Time to power on both phones. This is where the experience differs dramatically between Android and IOS. More tomorrow in part 2.

This is the article I mention in today's podcast. Click here to access the article. Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/16/opinion/blindness-retinitis-pigmentosa.html

Took a while but we are finally getting an Android 12 device. Google's own Pixel 6 with the latest Android OS. No skin (sorry Samsung) and no bloatware either. A clean Android experience to review accessibility features non Apple owners can enjoy. Never had a non-iOS phone before, the change should be interesting. See you back Wednesday for more.

We've just started a new YouTube page to feature some of the assistive technologies available for the low vision and blind community. Please click here and subscribe to catch our latest videos. If you have any suggestions for a video you'd like to see, send us an email or leave a comment below! Source: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXgWMMYWRHtckyWRXlYnd8w

In this episode: -News: Healing cornea disease with pig-skin collagen protein. -News: Latest update on Foundation Fighting Blindness quarterly meeting. -Topic of the week: A quick fix for Amazon Alexa's voice quality issue. Including a full review of Apple's voice assistant, Siri. -Mail and comments: Preparing for the next Foundation Fighting Blindness webinar; call for volunteer bloggers Checkout the episode on our Podcast page or click here. Don't forget to subscribe! Source: https://www.blindsanity.com/podcast-1/episode/28429b9d/s02e03-collagen-protein-against-blindness-and-siri-voice-assistant

Our latest podcast episode today talks about a breakthrough in a particular cornea disease. It uses pig skin collagen protein to replace cornea with some dramatic results... including blind individuals regaining 20-20 vision. See source below or click here. You can comment below. Source: https://www.newscientist.com/article/2333290-cornea-made-from-pig-collagen-gives-people-who-were-blind-20-20-vision/

Real time assistance usually involves real person or agent volunteering or paid to help you in your everyday tasks. You contact someone who will use your phone camera and describe what they see for you. There are two apps currently available. One is free the other has a monthly fee. - Be My Eyes: volunteer based and super efficient . We have a full review of the app in one episode of our podcast. The app evolved dramatically over the past few years. It used to be based on regular volunteering sighted people only. The app now adds agents from multiple organizations who will help you read documents and fill forms. For example if you want to register to vote, there are agents specifivally trained to help you fill the form. Free. - Aira: Free to monthly fee, it works as Be my Eyes but relies on agents instead of volunteers which explai why it is not free. Both are very good apps to use. My personal preference is Be My Eyes just because I used it so many times in the past. and nothing beats free. I have not tried the professional agent part of the app yet. I will update when I do. Do you have your own preference ? If so, share your thoughts below.

New beta came out today and it isn't too full of surprises. -Magnifier is still overheating the phone when in use. Descriptions are more accurate in general but it still needs work. Door recognition is becoming pretty good. -Battery percentage is finally visible on the status bar on the top of your screen at any time. -Screen capture has been upgraded, When you take one, tap on the lower left corner of the phone to decide what to do with it. It could be pretty useful if like me you take a lot of screen captures to enlarge. You can now look at a capture without it to be stored in your photo library. Will add more as I discover new features ... If you find new ones on your own, please share below.

In this week episode : -News: effect of coffee on your eyesight -News: Basic braille on TikTok -Topic of the week: Amazon Alexa -Mail and wwbsite comments. Check it out on our podcast page or download on your favorite podcast app. Source: https://www.blindsanity.com/podcast-1/episode/27542541/s02e02-coffee-alexa-together-at-last

UPDATE: Quip answered our Tweet about the price change. Check out our Twitter feed for ongoing conversation. An additional 2 bucks to the original 5, Quip was actually a pretty neat service for low vision and blind individuals. It offers to ship a new brush head with a battery every three months to keep dental hygiene simple and economical. Yes ... eight dollars isn't much each year but if you just purchase the starter kit at about 30 dollars... the news sucks. Not sure it's worth it at this point .

We are now on TikTok @BlindSanity.com and we will publish a few short descriptive video online about Braille. All you need is a portable Braille slate and its usual accessories, the stylus and the eraser. First series yesterday was dedicated to the description of the equipment. Today, we will focus on the Braille paper and its installation in the braille slate. Then we will see how to remove your work for inspection and hoe to reposition your braille work back on the braille slate. Each video is extremely descriptive for low vision and blind viewers. They are all 1 minute long only. Visit our TikTok page and comment below if you have suggestions.