Quick note: I’ve updated the section about Audible Canada. Between last Christmas and my birthday, Steve created a monster; a book-devouring monster. Here’s how. First, he bought me Aftershokz Bluez2S headphones. Those things, although not perfect, are pretty cool. I can walk around, still hear, and listen to stuff from my phone. This made me …
Category Archives: gadgets
Hear The Sound, Blind Guys!
I’m not sure if you heard, since nobody seems to be talking about it, but there’s an eclipse tomorrow. Everybody’s all excited about it, except my grandma who hopes it will be too cloudy for people to stare at the sun and do dumb things. I get that the moon will block out the sun, …
Even Geniuses Create Monsters…
I know this is old, but in a sense, it’s really old, so it doesn’t matter. A long time ago, I came across an article about talking dolls invented by Thomas Edison. These things, although technological marvels for the time, could give you nightmares. Observe. Ok ok, you can take your hands off your ears …
The Floppotron
We’ve posted a few different computer hardware musical creations here over the years, but nothing on this scale, I don’t think. Polish engineer Paweł Zadrożniak built the Floppotron, a synchronized array of obsolete computer hardware programmed to play tunes. The current Floppotron 2.0 build sports 64 floppy drives, 8 hard drives, and a pair of …
Microsoft’s Seeing AI App Sounds Like TapTapSee On Steroids
I haven’t tried it for myself just yet since this is the first I’ve heard of it, but if Microsoft’s Seeing AI app works as advertised, holy shit! Seeing AI, a free app that narrates the world around you, is available now to iOS customers in the United States, Canada, India, Hong Kong, New Zealand …
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DirecTV and U-Verse Now Have Accessibility Features
Good news, American blind kids. You now have even more choices when it comes to accessibly watching television. In this interview John Herzog, Accessibility Solutions Engineer, describes the many advancements AT&T media based products have been gaining since November 2016. Both the DirecTV apps for Android and iOS are speech friendly now with their respective …
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Photoshopped Voices, Now With Less Data And More AI
These Lyrebird people haven’t yet reached Adobe VoCo levels of voice fakery, but they’re getting there. And though their aim is to sell their technology to companies whose products include speech synthesis, once it’s widely available, the implications are quite similar. What you’re listening to is a Lyrebird generated Donald Trump, Barack Obama and Hillary …
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The Bank Just Figured Out How To Get You To Like It More. A Dancing Robot
Should you find yourself both in Calgary and in need of a bank, there’s a chance you could be greeted by…that thing. ATB Financial has teamed up with SoftBank Robotics America to unleash Pepper, a friendly 3-wheeled robot designed to make the banking experience better or something. They say that she is capable of recognizing human …
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Her Text Said Sure, I’ll Drop In In A Minute
So much for the older the wiser, and for the it’s only young folks that spend their lives glued to their phones not paying attention stereotype. First it was the 80-year-old man plowing into a police car that was on a distracted driving patrol, and now a 67-year-old woman has fallen six feet down an …
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Sendero Wants To Know What You Would Like Out Of An Indoor Wayfinding App
It’s really nice to see GPS app makers start to focus on indoor navigation. If you’re blind I doubt I have to tell you that getting around in giant buildings can sometimes be its own special brand of pain in the ass, so being able to use the same apps that work so well outside …
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