[access-uk] Re: RNIB, how inefficient are they?

  • From: Dave Sheridan <dsheridan65@xxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: "access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Thu, 22 Jan 2015 14:12:49 +0000

The difference between the printed word in a book, on a tablet or a computer is 
minimal as the user is still reading. For a braille user reading involves 
either hard copy or a braille display, otherwise one would be listening. I'm 
not knocking you Karl, you make a choice in what's most effective for you. I do 
however have huge problems where an organisation supposedly looking to maintain 
the rights of blind and partially sighted people show such a poor attitude 
towards what is crucial for thousands of blind people's every day needs, namely 
braille. 

Dave 

Sent from my iPhone

> On 22 Jan 2015, at 13:48, Karl Proud <karl@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> 
> I guess that some people do see the printed word as old tech, certainly the 
> school my kids go to seem pretty obsessed with tablets etc.  I'm afraid that 
> I am one of those blind folk who do consider braille old fuddy duddy 
> technology, but then again I'm wrong about most things.
> 
> Karl
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On 22 Jan 2015, at 1:33 pm, Mike Ray <mike@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> 
> 
> The RNIB now seems to be run by suits with little or no grasp of what
> the customers really need.
> 
> In a world where everything is being dumbed-down to a lowest common
> denominator what we are now seeing is charity bosses who see little else
> than the bottom line.  How they got to that bottom line is of little
> importance to them.  Just making the expenditure smaller and the income
> bigger seems to be an end in itself now.
> 
> And no doubt one of the things that is pared to the bone to make the
> bottom line look better is training for customer facing staff and
> expenditure on what is seen as old technology.  And sadly Braille is
> perceived by sighted folks, and a lot of blind folks now too, as old
> tech.  Although presumably sighted folks don't regard reading printed
> words as old tech.
> 
> 
> 
> 
>> On 22/01/2015 13:16, Clive.Lever@xxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
>> Hi Dave,
>> 
>> Don't get me on my soap box about this one. Cynically, I sometimes wonder 
>> whether the more they can dissuade congenitally blind people from blocking 
>> their resources with loads of braille, the more they can concentrate on 
>> their pet subject: "sight loss". If they tell customers as a matter of 
>> course that braille copies will cost loads, take ages or generate boatloads 
>> of paper, they will get the answer they nudged their customer to give: "Ok 
>> then, I'll have an audio version". Then they will say: "more and more people 
>> are using audio and fewer are reading braille, so Braille's on its way out". 
>> Whooppee! They won't have to devote resources to it. Is there such a thing 
>> as "Lowp! (the opposite of hype), or of demoting rather than promoting a 
>> service? I encountered similar problems when I was asking for computer 
>> manuals as far back as 1982, so sadly, your tale leads me to think nothing 
>> has changed, except that the Institute sometimes appears to be suffering 
>> from sight loss itself..
> .i
>> t's lost sight of the ball! I've usually found that a rough equation stands 
>> me in good stead: Two-and-a-half to three braille pages for every a4 side of 
>> dense print in a pretty standard font size. So, when I read the original was 
>> 96 pages, I thought "300's going to be nearer the mark. I read on, And 
>> surprise, surprise!
>> 
>> Best,
>> Clive  
>> 
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of 
>> Dave Sheridan
>> Sent: 22 January 2015 12:37
>> To: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> Subject: [access-uk] RNIB, how inefficient are they?
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> I recently received a Plextalk pocket portable daisy player as a present. 
>> The kind person who gave me this enquired about braille instructions and was 
>> told that they could do this but they would be about 600 pages. The person 
>> accepted that audio instructions would suffice. After receipt of said player 
>> I rang to ask for braille instructions and was told the same thing. I asked 
>> for the braille copy. Interestingly the audio contents goes up to page 96 so 
>> I was a little confused why this would translate to 600 braille pages. I've 
>> just received the instructions in 3 volumes totalling just under 300 A4 
>> pages. Clearly those people providing potential customers with information 
>> should be well informed and clearly they are not: 
>> 
>> To add to this a friend of mine who took out a subscription to the talking 
>> book service has been perplexed by RNIB sending books which don't appear on 
>> the list she supplied them with. This has occurred twice now within a short 
>> period of time, firstly with books she hadn't ordered appearing on a pen 
>> drive sent to her and since then having changed to disc she has been sent 
>> other titles not ordered by her. Having experienced this myself over some 
>> considerable time before I was blunt with them I I do wonder why their 
>> customer service is so poor. As you have to ask for braille instructions 
>> these days you would think they would give good information and not try to 
>> put you off getting them to do the job they are there to do. 
>> 
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> 
> 
> -- 
> Michael A. Ray
> Analyst/Programmer
> Witley, Surrey, South-east UK
> 
> Don't judge my disability until you witness my ability
> 
> Interested in accessibility on the Raspberry Pi?
> Visit: http://www.raspberryvi.org/
> From where you can join our mailing list for visually-impaired Pi hackers
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