What’s the news? - Talking Technology episode 113

On this episode of Talking Technology, we explore how you can access the news in an accessible format.

Brian discusses the importance of staying informed and how blind people can participate equally in the information age, and we demo news apps including The Journal, The Irish Times, and The Irish Examiner.

We explore the world of audiobooks and hear about some of the teams recent reads, and we hear about new accessible recipes that have been made available by supermarket brand Tesco.

Join the conversation with a WhatsApp voice note now. The number you need is +353 86 199 0011.

0:00 intro

2:23 contact details and voice notes

15:11 how to access the news in accessible formats

30:53 the incredible world of audiobooks

44:41 Talking Technology News

1:05:38 Outro

Transcript

0:00

This Fission Ireland podcast contains chapter markers. If you want to skip the intro or a topic you don't like, you can use chapter markers to do so. Chapter markers are only supported in some podcast apps. Enjoy the show. Welcome to Talking Technology with VI Labs. At VI Labs, we believe technology is the single greatest enabler for people with sight loss and all disabilities. If you're looking for the latest news and conversation on tech from a more accessible perspective, you've come to the right place. As you always do. Hello, everybody, and welcome in to Talking Technology with VI Labs, episode 113. I know 13, they say, is either a lucky or an unlucky number. I don't know if the same rules apply when it's 113, but hopefully this will be a lucky podcast for us. We're in June. It's a new month. And we've just had a bank holiday weekend, which I must say, there were some of the staff around here saying that they had awful weather. But we got lucky down in Cork. We had glorious sunshine. So there you go. We got lucky. There was loads going on. There was marathons going on. You had the Bloom Garden Festival. Board Be a Bloom, that was taking place over the weekend as well. And there's also been some good news, because it was announced that for the upcoming Monster Finals in the GAA, that there will be differences in the colors being worn by the team's journeys, jerseys even, to make it easier for those who are colorblind. We'll catch up with Daniel on that in a second. But hey, welcome in to the show. We have a packed show coming up for you over the next hour or so. We're talking all things news today and accessing the news through news apps. And we'll also be chatting about other forms of written entertainment, namely books. So we'll be chatting all about that later on in the show. So do be sure to stick around. And why not get in touch with us as well, if you've got thoughts on anything that we talk about, any news that you've seen, technology news or otherwise, we'd love to hear from you. And there are, as always, loads of ways that you can get in touch. So if you want to join the conversation, all you need to do is send us a WhatsApp voice note. If you like, the number there is 086-199-0011. And you add a plus 353 and you drop the 0 if you're doing it internationally. So it's plus 353-86-199-0011. Or if you would like to get in touch by email, you can do that too. It's content at vi.ie. That's content at vi.ie. And whether you would like to send us a voice note on some technology product you've tried or an email with all your thoughts, we'd love to hear from you. That's 086-199-0011 on WhatsApp or content at vi.ie. And to go through all the goings on from the week gone by, it's time to catch up with the man from Kilkenny himself, Mr. Joe Lonegan. Joe, how are you? Hi, David. I'm good, thanks. And same here. The weather wasn't too bad, actually, with a few showers. And we can cope with that. We were well over for showers here in Ireland. And I didn't visit Bloom, but I was going to. And instead, I just enjoyed the garden at home for the weekend. You weren't busy running the women's mini marathon, Joe, no? No, I didn't dress up and dress up as a woman and go on the mini marathon, David. I left off as well. I'm just way too busy for that. Yeah, fair enough, fair enough. It's good to take some time to relax, Joe, as they say, isn't it? Yeah. There we have it. Very good. Will you be watching the Munster GAA finals? Well, I'll be watching with no interest, because unfortunately, I'm a temporary supporter, even though I'm living in Kilkenny. And that's where I'm originally from, is Tipperary. And unfortunately, tape and our main rivals, Kilkenny, are out. So there'll be no clash of colors here. And maybe back in 2030, we'll be back again. Who knows? Tipper back, as they say, Tipper back when we do come back. But not this year. Not this year. Yeah, but I will be watching. And I don't have any issues with colorblindness or anything. But Daniel, I think, has a bit of information on the story. What's going on, yeah? Tell us, Daniel, what's the crack with all of this? Yeah, so it's an interesting story. And it's run by RTE there this morning, who are reporting that the Munster GAA, it's actually from 2027, they're going to have a policy in place to prevent jersey color clashes in provincial championship matches. Now, where this is really coming to the fore, I suppose Cork has been rising over the last two or three years. And Limerick have been there, thereabouts. And you get a clash of the red and green jerseys. So color vision deficiency comes into play here. It affects one in 12 men and one in 200 women. So it's way more common than we actually know about or, I suppose, appreciate or realize. And the most common form of color vision deficiency is an actual red-green colorblindness. So lo and behold, Cork in red and Limerick in green. So this is where this is really after being highlighted. And what happens is the reds and greens merge into indistinguishable shades of brown and gray for somebody who has color deficiency blindness. So John Harrington is an optomist in spec savers in Limerick, and so it's the ultimate red and green clash. And it's very difficult for those watching on. So yeah, the GA are going to look at this next year. There's going to be more implementation of this away jersey. Usually teams will often default to maybe a white jersey. We've seen that with Cork in the past to come up against teams with similar jerseys. They'll default to white. So it's something, I think, that obviously is being looked at by the GA, and I think it's going to be brought into fruition next year. So yeah, the estimate is that 225,000 people in Ireland live with a color vision deficiency. So Mats Gourou worked it out with over 2,200 GA clubs spread all across the country. There's an average of eight colorblind players per club who are actually playing heartland or football. So it is quite a widespread thing. And I think it's a great move. The rugby inverters have been conscious of this and more policy driven under jersey selections and coming up into clashes as well. It's great to see the GA following. And yeah, it's going to make it even a more enjoyable spectacle for all supporters. So well done. I think I could be wrong in this, but I think with rugby, it's actually part of the rules that there has to be a certain level of color contrast between the two teams. So I think it's almost been accessible by default on the rugby side. But it's good to see the GA taking a leaf out of that book and kind of following suit here. It will hopefully make things easier for people. Exactly, exactly. Because it's a monster heartland final is up there with the big showpiece days of the sporting calendar in any given year. So yeah, it's great to see that all viewers of the final will be accommodated. Absolutely. And in time, hopefully, we'll start to see things like audio description and stuff at these events too. But we'll get there one step at a time. Anyway, there we go. Thank you for that, Daniel. Joe, we did have some voice notes in throughout the week gone by. And one of those was from Derry Lawler. We were looking at, in the newsletter last week, we were talking about Braille. And Derry was commenting on some of the books that he reads, both in audio and in Braille. Hi, Dave, Joe, and everybody. Hope you're all keeping well. I got your email this week, and when do you prefer to use Braille over audio was your big question. Well, lately, I've been using the Braille. I joined the Virtual Braille Book Club, and I really enjoyed the one we did this month, Snowflake. And I think it's since February when I bought myself a new Braille display. I'm very lucky to have bought myself this one, it's called a DocPad X. And I really do enjoy reading Braille books on it. So you have the graphic, the multi-line part, or the top part of the DocPad. So you can read a full page of Braille at the time. Now, it's working great in Kindle, and I can send the BRF Ready Books to a dot book. But you can read them in EasyReader and in Voice-to-Reader. I have been successful to use Voice-to-Reader so well, because it doesn't read the line at the time rather than the full multi-line. But I do must say, I have a couple of books on the go all the time. So for example, this week I finished Glyph by Ali Smith. That was all Braille, and the Snowflake from the Book Club, that was all Braille. So more and more often, I'm turning to the Braille than audio, but I still have books on audio on the go. I've got myself Enough by Don French, Vengeance by John Banver, and The Nothing Man by Katrin Reinhardt. They're all in audio. But if I had them in Braille, I think I'd go for two. Thanks, Ian. Keep up the great work. Cheers, Derry. Yeah, it's really interesting, isn't it, just to hear people's different perspectives of audio versus Braille. Derry, certainly more of a reader than me. Are you much of a reader yourself, Joe? I was a bit more of a reader. When I can, I do read the odd book. I use the... First of all, look, I'll talk about what I use in a second. Well, thanks very much, Derry, for that voice note, great voice note, and advertised the Braille Book Club. And thanks for all those book recommendations. Hopefully somebody will enjoy one of those, maybe, and see what they're like. Don French one there sounds interesting to me. But yeah, I use the Kindle Reader sometimes. I think you mentioned that recently. See, there's an awful lot of books available on Kindle, and it's handy to have the Kindle Reader on your smart speaker. And you can go forward a chapter, back a chapter with a voice command. You can pause and play, and maybe even go for 10 minutes and that kind of stuff. And I find that quite good. Sometimes the voice can be a bit monotonous, but when that's the case, I will revert back to audible. And you can also listen to audible on your smart speaker, of course, as well, which is handy, as well as your iPhone and whatever else. But I suppose I let myself down as I did not keep up with Braille when I was younger. I learned the basics and got the A to Z with the interactions and stuff, but I didn't keep it up. So that is putting me to shame there. Absolutely. Yeah, no, much the same here, unfortunately. And I do kind of regret it in a way, because I wish I was more proficient as a Braille reader, but it is a fantastic skill. It's great to see Braille being used in digital form through devices like the dot pad X and others. I do read the odd time when time allows it. Of late, it's more shorter books. I recently read The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, which tells the story of a French man. And he had, it's based on a true story. And it's a diary that he wrote about his views on locked in syndrome, basically, being effectively paralyzed. He wrote the book through eye blinks, which is an incredible story. So yeah, I read that autobiography slash diary kind of book recently and thoroughly enjoyed a fascinating read, very much of its time, but still a great read. So yeah, but it's fantastic to hear people enjoying books and literature and all that good stuff. It's something we'll be talking about more with Brian later on in the show. But what's the best book you ever read, Joe? Or do you have any standouts that you recall? Best book I've ever read, that's an interesting one. I can't think of the best book I've ever read, but I've recently read a book by Robert Kiyosaki. It's Japanese, well, he's American Japanese. He wrote a book called Rich Dead Poor Dad. It's more of a philosophy about finances and the reason I read it is because he was talking about, he was advertising himself about financial crisis recently. But other than that, I haven't got the best book at the moment. I'll come back to you on that one, David. Fair enough, fair enough. Well, Derry, listen, thank you so much for the voice, I'm glad you were enjoying the Braille book club. A reminder to people that if you are interested in this, this is a new thing from Vision Ireland, you can send an email to braille at vi.ie to express your interest in that. That's braille at vi.ie. It's mainly digital Braille for now, but that may expand down the road depending on interest. So if you want to learn more about that, you can find out more in our previous episode or just send an email to braille at vi.ie. But Derry, thank you so much for that. Moving on now, there is so much to keep up to date with nowadays. And a great way to do that is keeping on top of the news, whether it's politics, your interest, sport, all of this stuff helps us to stay informed, stay educated, stay engaged with society even. And to catch up on all that and discuss how we can stay engaged and how we can access news and how that has changed in recent years, I caught up, yes, for two times on the podcast in a row with Mr. Brian Manning. Here's what happened when we caught up all about accessing the news. Joining me now on Talking Technology for two episodes in a row. What is this? Hello, Mr. Brian Manning. Hello, Mr. David Redman. How are you? May I in advance apologize for the lack of my voice. Unfortunately, I have a bit of a chest cold that I caught the other day while out in service of Vision Ireland, moving from home, house visit, house visit, as an absolutely thunderstruck in the Dell-Eugen's airport that's Wednesday and I am still suffering. So I am suffering from my dedication to Vision Ireland. So there you go. As we all do every day, some would say, Brian. Oh, yes. There you go. So Brian, we're here today to chat about news apps, news technology and access to news by those who are blind or visually impaired. This has come on leaps and bounds in recent years. It has hugely, David. It's one of the areas of all these emerging technologies over the past 20 or 30 years that I personally find brilliantly enhancing and it has impacted on my quality of life hugely. I mean, like these technologies, they're about independent living, they're about greater access to the workforce, to education, but from a quality of life perspective, I think the fact that, no, we can sit down and read our newspapers of choice once we have the appropriate technology skills that any foot inside a person can have access to and I think that's brilliantly empowering and enabling for us as people with sight loss. So again, I mean, as I always say, I mean, when I was a child, my only news sources really would have been the radio, maybe the six o'clock news on TV, unless I passed on someone to read a newspaper article for me, whereas now I have access to all of the big publications and then of course I have the podcasts and the various radio stations and everything, but I love, it's part of my everyday to sit down and read at least two or three newspapers. My three newspapers of choice are the Irish Examiner, the Irish Times, and I would always have looked at the Journal.ie and the White Time at the weekends because of sports and everything, I would look at the E-Party too and these are all totally accessible for me. So for example, the Irish Examiner being a court man, that would be one with particular residence for me and application for me. And in fairness, Claire Porter, who would be the head of digital design within the Examiner, she's always made herself available to us in Vision Ireland to ensure that the digital publications like the Irish Examiner and like the Evening Echo are totally accessible for screen reader users, which is fantastic, great, you just declare. And once your screen reader rotor is set to headings, the digital designers are aware of that requirement, so all of those newspapers now are laid out in headings and you set your rotor to headings, you flick them through the different articles, you tap on the article you want, which is screen reader, or if it's a Windows screen reader, you just press H to jump through the different articles or sections, you enter on the article you want, you have your reading gesture or reading command with your Joe screen reader, read the article, activate the back button, so if you're using a voiceover or talk, like you just find the back button, which in all of these publications is usually at the top left of the screen, or you activate the back gesture, the two-finger scroll, and you just select your next article and away you go, and I blissfully spend hours every day reading the newspapers and when I was a young fool, before all of these technologies came on board, I envisaged a life where I would always be scrapping for information and almost like begging for these forms of information, did I ever realize that if I was in a social setting, instead of being the kind of the least informed person in the room, that I would possibly be the best or one of the best informed people in that social setting, which is usually empowering and it's usually gratifying as well at a personal level, so it's brilliant that we have access to these, though it is unfortunate, a lot of them are behind paywalls, that's another argument, and I suppose because they're privately owned, they have to raise funding to pay for themselves, so there is that issue, but they are available and with the proper technology and the proper technical skills, which Vision Ireland, among others, can help you with, we can have access to these papers, and that is hugely liberating for blind or vision impaired people, I mean it has other implications as well, I mean the fact that we can interrogate the news, we can analyze the news, we can- We can participate, I suppose. We can totally participate, yeah. It's socially, at an electoral or political level, we can involve ourselves, we can immerse ourselves totally, be it through entertainment or we can immerse ourselves in the political spectrum, or again, just basic access to information, they call this the information age, and these are little conduits to that information that we need to be able to have access to, so I think it's brilliant that we can, I'm not gonna say we can 100% engage with the information age, but these publication tools can serve as opening doors for us to gain access to that information, hugely empowering and enriching information as well. Absolutely, yeah, it's an exciting time to have access to such a wide range of information, and as you said, it does enable participation that for a long time, blind, visually impaired people probably didn't have if we're being honest. No, we're strapped, we're strapped at the table of information, whereas no, we're at the head of the table, almost, for information, and again, I mean, when we identified three or four Irish publications, again, I mean, all of the main international publications they all have their accessibility features, and even at a local level, like the examiner, the Irish Times, the Journal itself, they do have pretty world international sections as well, so I mean, the three major levels of information, I suppose, local information, national information, and international information, they're all easily accessible once you have the means to get beyond the paywall, and you have the technologies, and the technical skills to be able to avail of their presence. Absolutely. Well, let's dive into some demos of some of the apps now. So let's dive right in, and I will show you some of the available apps that can be used to access this news. So let's start by taking a look at the Journal.ie. This is one of the free news websites that's available in Ireland, and they also own The 42, which is their sister sports website. That one, though, does require a subscription, so if you're into your GAA, or your rugby, or anything like that, then you may be interested in subscribing to The 42. But the Journal is a general news website, and that one, that's available for free. So it works decently well with voiceover, certainly for reading articles, at least. But let's go into it now and see how it works. So I've got the Journal app here on my phone. The Journal.ie. Double-tap to open. And I will double-tap to open. The Journal.ie. Scroll to top button. And there's a scroll to top button. We won't do that. We'll just flick through some of the stories. Clarendon Street. Bystander sustained stab wards. Cavern Man given life. The Daily Poll. What age did you start drinking alcohol? 11 comments. 2.4k. And we can read any of these stories. So let's keep going for now. I'm going to flick down a little bit. War of words. Michael Peter Murrell. Form Chapelizad. Man dies after he. Love Island. Wifey material. Galway footballer wastes no time looking for love as he makes Villa debut. 33. So yes, it's June and Love Island is back. So let's go in and read this article then, for example. So I can double-tap to open the article. Image. Sean stepped away from the Galway panel last month amid reports linking him with the show. Image credit Virgin Media. And I can flick around until I find. Read comments with voiceover. Read full article with voiceover. A read full article with voiceover button. And I can just double-tap, and then that article will start reading. Galway footballer Sean Fidsey Fitzgerald has made his Love Island debut and is already causing drama in the Villa. The first episode of season 13 of the UK show aired from a Majokin Villa last night with my pajamas hosts in. A 25-year-old primary school teacher found himself choosing between two contestants on the show, Robin and Lola, the GAA star show. So there we go. We won't spoil Love Island just in case you're watching that. But the idea is simple. You can, I suppose, double-tap to read the full article with voiceover, or you can, as mentioned earlier. Read comments with voiceover. Read the comments with voiceover if you so wish as well. You can also share the article and do anything that you would in a standard news app. It's quite nice with voiceover and works pretty well. Not all areas are fully accessible. And some people do find it a bit of a challenge in particular with low vision because there isn't significant text size adjustment and so on. But from a voiceover user point of view, that is how the journal.ie app works. And it's not that dissimilar from other apps that are out there, like the Irish Times. So let's go to the Irish Times now. The Irish Times button. And there it is. Let's double-tap to open. The Irish Times. The Irish Times back. OK, now I am already in an article here in the Irish Times. And I can flick through this if I want. Audio button, save button, share button, consumer tech, link made, gobsmacked. Smart toy brings new independence for the visually impaired. Heading level one. Perfect. And this is an article featuring our very own Brian Manning, who you will already have heard on this podcast earlier on. But what I can do with this, and much in the same way as you do with the journal, is you can listen to the article by using the audio button. So I'm going to flick backwards. Can share button, save button, audio button. And I'm going to double-tap to play. Audio button. I was gobsmacked. Smart toy brings new independence for the visually impaired. It gives me the advantages that sighted people have. For Brian Manning, smart glasses are more than just a fun toy. They bring new independence and an easier way to interact with the world. So the Irish Times isn't free in the same way that the journal is free. So you do need to keep that in mind. But you may decide that that subscription is worth it for you. That's a decision that you'll have to make yourself. But there is a load of information there. And the app is decently usable. I do wish they'd had a dark mode, but there you have it. Let's move on then to the other app that Brian mentioned, particularly beloved by those of us here in Cork. And that is the Examiner. Brilliant for the old sport, the Examiner. So let's jump into the Examiner app. Irish Examiner News button. OK, let's go. Let's double-tap the Irish Examiner News. Irish Examiner. Irish Examiner News. OK. And I'm just going to pause voice over there for a second. Now, what Brian mentioned here is very good and important to note, that you want to use the rotor when using the Examiner app. So I'm going to do that now. And I'm going to give the fingers an old twist to get to the headings section. Containers, speaking rate, words, characters, voices, headings. There we go. Had to do some serious contortions with the old fingers there, but we made it work. Right, we are now in headings and our rotor action. So I can flick up and down, and that will move me through the articles. Michael Healy reclaims brother. All Ireland SFC draw. Eamonn Fitzmaurice is all. Coleman Nocturne. I found you. DWTS dancer Laura Nolan marries Matthew McNabbat. Kilkeye Castle. People, headings. So let's go into this article, shall we? A nice dancing with the stars married couple. Back button. And I can just flick through this article, then at my own pace. Article view. I found you. The pair who met on the dancing show back in 2022. Tied the knot in a ceremony at Kilkeye Castle on Saturday. And there you go. You can flick through. I found you. Laura Nolan and Matthew Tuesday. Zebra de Graham. Professional dancer Laura Nolan and her partner Matthew McNabb have tied the knot. Do you know that's so common, apparently, with shows like Dancing with the Stars and Strictly. They call it the Strictly curse that dancers are getting together off those shows. So there you go. A very emotive thing, dancing together it is. Not that I would know, but there you go. So I suppose the point that we're making with all of this is there is so much information available to us. We don't just have to always listen to the same thing day in, day out. We can explore different news publications. We can explore our own specific interests. We can learn about this stuff. We can participate in this stuff. We can participate in democracy, in sport, in just general conversation. You can even be really good at a pub quiz. It was like Brian said there. Sometimes you can be the most informed in the room if that's what you so desire. So there are loads of options. And that is worth keeping in mind, I guess. So yeah, those are demos of The Journal, which is available for free, The Irish Times, which is a subscription, and then The Examiner, beloved by Cork people. And I guess somewhere in the middle there, you can subscribe to The Examiner. And you do also get a certain number of free articles with them as well. So that is good to keep in mind. Right then, let's head back to Brian to catch up on some other forms of written entertainment, shall we? So Brian, another means of accessing a huge range of information is access to books and other forms of written material. It's not just news. It's autobiographies. It's fiction. It's all of this sort of stuff. Books give us a huge amount of information. And these are all accessible to us now too, even though they would have traditionally been visual. Absolutely. And again, that's another feature of the technology age for blind or vision impaired people. Because we do have so much access to books in so many different formats. I mean, my favorite format, personally, would be Audible. And I mean, I have and I will continue often to read a huge amount of Audible books. But again, if I may reflect back to the gaming younger past, when I was a younger person, and I mean, access to literature and access to the written word was very, very limited as a blind or vision impaired teenager even. I mean, I always reflect on the fact that if I wanted to read the Book of Winning Prize for 1986, I'd probably have to wait until it was recorded in 1996, at least 10 years. Whereas now, the ironic reality is that it's easier to publish an Audible book in many cases than it is to publish a printed book. So not just a blind person, but I mean, the growth of Audible books is exponential, mainly because silent people are using them as well. Isn't that a fascinating thing to observe? How something that, you know, it was traditionally, and correct me if I'm wrong, you're the history buff in this relationship. But it was the RNIB in the UK did the kind of invention almost of audiobooks as a concept. So they were originally designed for blind people, but now they're so mainstream. Oh, absolutely mainstream. And RNIB had their own recording studios and everything. And they were getting the actresses in to read the books. And then they found, you know, like that silent people like listening to them. And, you know, we all love this notion of the multitask, you know, reading while you're driving or doing the housework or, you know, jogging or whatever. So I mean, the biggest book shop in London at one stage was an Audible bookshop, which I believe. So again, we as blind or vision impaired people almost by a happenstance have benefited from the emergence of the technology that, you know, primarily was designed for sighted people. In its inception, maybe it was designed for blind people, but it evolved through its use for sighted people. I'm getting back to my point. I mean, you know, no, if I wanted to read on Audible, the book winning prize for this year for 2026, I probably would have access to it quicker or earlier than a sighted person reading the printed version. So that's fantastic. And I mean, like we've been through, we have book clubs, Audible book clubs, you know, affiliated, Division Ireland, we have one here in Carpenterry, which that manager Brennan started three odd years ago. And we have one in South Dublin and the... So, you know, Vision Ireland have been kind of somewhat associated with the emergence of the book clubs from within the Division of Bird and blind community. And we have, like, there's a huge expansive catalog from within audible.co.uk, which I personally am a member of. And I love reading their books. And, you know, any book I really want, I can just, you know, buy it and sit down and listen to it, and it's fantastic. But your other services, we're not confined to Audible. I mean, even within the library system in Ireland, we have BorrowBox, which is, again, a fantastic service. Again, one that's available by all every member is, again, has a specific relevance for blind or vision impaired people. And the BorrowBox app, it's very compatible, with screen reader users, you know, be it on your iPhone or your Android. It's accessible, you know, with the screen readers for JAWS, NVIDIA, et cetera. And the nice thing about that BorrowBox is that it's a free service. With Audible, you pay for your book, and, you know, you have the means of, you know, availing of sales and things like that, if you're a member of Audible. But within BorrowBox, it's a free service. All you need is a library card and, you know, the initial app setup, which the librarians themselves will help you do, or Vision Ireland will help you do. The catalog wouldn't be as expansive, we'll say, as some of the private services, but they still have very, very good quality recordings, and they have very good Irish books as well. So, you know, BorrowBox is a fantastic free service available to any library member in Ireland. And, I mean, you have other services, like, I mean, you have some of the streaming services, which I think are a brilliant idea. So, essentially, you sign up, you subscribe to the streaming service for your Audible book service, such as Scripted, for example, so you pay your tenner a month. Before that tenner a month, you can now stream as many books as you want, so you don't get to own the books or buy the books. You just get to stream the books. Again, they're very, very good quality, recording quality in each of these books. They're read by professional actors and actors. And it just totally opens the mind. I mean, you know, like, I remember one time reading that getting a good book was as good a gift or a present as getting an airline ticket, because you can get that anywhere in the world. And that's what a good book does. So, you know, it's absolutely brilliant and enlightening for blind or vision impaired people that we can avail of all of this. You know, huge, huge repository of literature. And they're there at our hands. Again, all you need is the technology and the technical skills, which, you know, Vision Ireland can help you, you know, to get your hands on and the skills. And again, if Borrow Box is the road you wish to go down, then your local librarians will help you as well. But go out there and get those books, it's brilliant. And it's fantastic to think that now we have such easy, ready access to all of this literature. Whereas, you know, a few short years ago, we most certainly didn't. Like, we had the place, and we'd have to pay a particular QDOS to Joan Morpher and Clark. She started to take over here 40, 40 odd years ago, down in the marina. And we're still enjoying the benefits of the culture that she helped to create. I mean, it was a basic service, but it was a brilliant service. And at the time, I mean, the books. Like, they weren't being recorded. Did they have for publication? I brought that with me. But it was our first kind of exposure to recorded books. And I mean, like, if you think that those services are mushroomed to the extent that they have, and to the brilliant access that we have to audible books, that was the vision of Airbnb books. Yeah, for sure. And even, you know, I was reading a book recently, and it didn't have an actual standard audio book available. But even now with the Alexa, there was, we had an article on this in Tech on Tap, the newsletter. You have the assistive reader. So you have Kindle assistive reader, and it's able to read that book now through Alexa's voice. It's not the best quality in the world, but again, it's giving you access to stuff. And that's the key thing, and it can take you anywhere in the world, as you said. Yeah, and I suppose the criterion that I would use in the context of what you just said there was, I mean, if I was reading a novel, if I'm reading, you know, Joe Spain or something like that, I prefer someone, you know, an actress reading that book. So, I mean, you know, I wouldn't read a novel through Alexa. But if I was reading a biography or a history book, then I have no problem with Alexa. Or, you know, like in both your e-book and you can have, you can have Siri or you can have voiceover, read your books. I mean, but like, again, you wouldn't have voiceover reading, you know, a novel or a spoiler. But you would most certainly read a biography that way or a history book or, you know, a factual book that way. Or even a book for the leaving cert, you know, it's enabling people in education, too. Of course, I mean, again, we have to make reference to, for example, the Meta glasses. I mean, the Meta glasses, once you've ticked the box and in the Meta app, you can actually have your Meta glasses, you know, listen to your audio books through your Meta glasses or your AirPods. So again, that's fantastic as well. You can be sitting in the bus, you know, reading your book or it's just brilliant as well. And the final one to mention that as well as we also- I certainly would not, I certainly would not advise however, like in our vision of bare people, with your AirPods and walking down the street, you that listening to your books, you need to hear it for other purposes. You do indeed. When you're, when you're, when you're, when you're- When you're navigating. When you're navigating the cityscape. The last thing to mention is that, well then, is that, you know, and you touched on it there. Vision Ireland, we've got our own services as well. Bookshare providing free access to books that people can just access through the Vision Ireland library, assuming that they are visually impaired. Yeah. And once you have your, again, your library, you know, once you have your, your, your, your, your Bookshare ID, then you can avail. And again, there are hundreds of thousands of books there. And actually just recently they facilitated Bookshare Ireland and the library facilitated Vision Ireland setting up a Braille book club. And again, because they have so much access in all of the different formats, so many books within Bookshare Ireland, that again is a fantastic service. And it's a facility that we all should be using. And again, they have, you know, right across the range in their catalog of books, you know, they have the thrillers, the novels, you know, the classical fiction, classical literature. They have the history, the biographies, everything's there. Absolutely. Brian, a great discussion as always. For now, thank you so much. And I would be, it would be remiss of me to ask, what are you reading at the moment, Brian? I'm actually reading a book at the moment. It's called The Passport. And it's a, it's a history, but it's, sorry, it's not the passport, it's the postcard. It's a history of the French resistance. And it's, it's an interesting book. But I have a philosophy. What I will normally do is I will read two heavy books. So I read my, the last book I read was quite a heavy book. This is fairly heavy book. The next book, I can go back to a bit of light fiction or a thriller or something, you know. So two heavy books and a light book, that's the way I do it. Nice one. And Brian, for now, thank you so much as always. Thanks David, talk soon. Always fantastic to catch up with Brian on talking technology. It really is important to stay up to date and stay engaged, whether it is with news or with books or literature or all of that sort of stuff. And that advice from Brian, two, I suppose, more kind of intense books followed by a lighter book, you know, two heavy, one light. I think that's a good kind of way to balance things. So great advice there from an avid reader in the form of Brian Manning. Brian, thank you very much for that. Right though, if you do want to get in touch with the show, remember there are loads of ways that you can do so. You can send us an email to content at vi.ie, if you would like. You can sign up for our Braille book club that we talked about earlier by sending that to braille at vi.ie. And also, we're gonna let you in on a secret. If you would be interested in joining a Vision Ireland newspaper panel, this is something that we're working on quietly in the background, and we'll be sharing more about it in due course. But if you would be interested in joining a Vision Ireland newspaper panel, just to catch up on the latest goings on in the news, maybe discuss some articles that you've read after the weekend, we would love to hear from you. This is something that's in the works. And by all means, do express your interest in that to training at vi.ie. That's training at vi.ie. And we would love to hear from you, whether you use the apps or the websites or any form of accessing the news in digital form. We are working on developing the Vision Ireland newspaper panel. So do be sure to let us know your interest for that, if that is something that you are interested in. Other than that though, speaking of the news, it's time to catch up with Daniel Dunn now for your latest talking technology news. This is talking technology news. With your latest talking technology news, I'm Daniel Dunn. Supermarket brand Tesco have announced a new set of accessible recipes that can be accessed online and have rolled out a large scale advertising campaign to promote the new accessible recipes. You may hear an ad similar to this on television over the next few weeks. Seven people in one massive test kitchen, but no one's cooking. A girl who is blind chucks her recipe card. Two Tesco colleagues appear. Need anything from Tesco? A recipe I can use. A speaker appears. Audio recipes are played. Step one. We know cooking needs to be more accessible. So we created tesco.com slash accessible dash recipes. Tesco, every little helps. So recipes are available in a number of different formats, including braille, audio, and British sign language. Unfortunately, Irish sign language does not appear to be available. The audio recipes seem to be available as an audio book on Spotify, which does unfortunately require a subscription. You can also download an EPUB file with the recipes from the Tesco website. So you could read this through Apple Books or another ebook app such as Vistream or EasyReader. In total, there are 100 recipes and these have in Tesco's words been rewritten with shorter steps, precise detail and timings, plus new accessible cooking tips. Hopefully these new recipes will set a standard in the industry and lead to more supermarkets following in Tesco's footsteps. We also need serious consideration to be given to the actual shopping process, as this can be a point of frustration for people. How do you find the process of doing the weekly shop? Do let us know with a WhatsApp Vice Note. In other news, Google have announced that they will be competing with the Meta glasses. These new glasses will be powered by Gemini and seem to have a lot of the same functionality as their Meta counterparts. Pricing for these devices is still unclear though. The new glasses will be based on the designs of Warby Parker and Gentle Monster, so this certainly won't look like assistive technology. A future set of the glasses will also include a display, but the first audio-only models are expected to hit the market this autumn. Meta are also continuing to develop their glasses range, recently launching the Optix series. These new models are designed to better support prescription lenses and also contain an action button for making requests without using your voice. This could be particularly useful for those who are deaf-blind. The smart glasses race is continuing to heat up and ultimately this could be very exciting for those who are blind or visually impaired. And now we'll look at our upcoming events from VI Labs. On the 4th of June, we got vice over on iOS Apple devices. On the 8th of June, we have touch typing. On the 9th of June, what's new in Android accessibility. On the 11th of June, seeing AI unlocked. Get to know your meta glasses is on June 16th. Booking public transport is on the 18th of June. And Microsoft Teams training is on the 23rd of June. So if you have any interest in any of these events, please do drop an email to training at vi.ie. Or for further information on any of these events, please log on to our website, vi.ie. Choose the news and events section and upcoming events for details on each of those called out. Now, finally this week, Amazon have announced a prime day, which is actually spread across four days, will be taking place in June. The large scale shopping event has taken place in July for the past number of years. But due to other big world events, such as the World Cup, Amazon are moving the event back by a month. Prime day will now take place between the 23rd and 26th of June, with Amazon hoping that customers will be stocking up for the World Cup. They are also hoping that those in the US use the opportunity to stock up ahead of the 4th of July celebrations. And America will be celebrating 250 years of independence. RTE News report a prime day is one of Amazon's biggest sale events of the year, and have helped drive 24.1 US billion dollars in online spending in 2025, when it extended the event to four days from two. This is according to data from Adobe analytics. Traditionally, Amazon prime day has been a great time to look at technology purchases, as there can be some very generous discounts and lots of smart devices. This of course, already assumes you have an Amazon prime subscription. Are you keeping an eye on anything for this year's prime day? Please do let us know. And that's all your news for this week. Be sure to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts so you don't miss our extra episode after next week's worldwide Developers Conference from Apple. For now though, it's back to you, David. Why, thank you very much, Daniel. There's lots to talk about there. Firstly, I suppose prime day, is prime day still as good as it once was, Daniel? It's hard to say, David. Yeah, like the bargains are, I don't know, they're getting a little bit harder to find the actual true bargains. I think like there's a lot of fluidity in pricing online. And, you know, you've come across some websites, I think we might mention them in the past, that keep an eye on historical prices of items. You know, so something, you could be looking at something and saying, you know, I'll hold off to Amazon Prime Day to get a good discount on it. You know, let's say it's something that's regularly on, you know, listed for 100 euro, and next thing, you know, it jumps up, it creeps up as we approach Amazon Prime Day, you know, it could be 120, and next thing, bam, it's 95. So you're really, really only saving a fiver off the true retail price, you know? So there is a bit of that going on, you know, and it's so much so that the Irish government have laws in place that an item cannot be advertised as being on sale unless it's, you know, unless it has been shown to be at the pre-sale price for at least, I think it's 30 days prior. So yeah, just, you know, governments around the EU, the Irish government included, are aware of this kind of phenomenon where prices shift quite a bit in the lead up to sales to make it appear like, you know, a sale is a sale, when it's, yeah, it's a minor discount, not sure. You know, I think maybe there has to be some sort of designation wrote around, you know, if you're advertising a sale, it has to be a bit more defined as in the discount has to be worth it, like it can't be just, you know, a couple of euro off, you know, a substantial purchase, I think, you know, betting three and four and 5% off, I think it needs to be a minimum 10%. Yeah. Maybe that's another discussion, is it? Yeah, I think it, well, I think it's all fair in the sense that, you know, ultimately, I think we all just want to save money. Yeah. And you know, that's fair enough too. And look, Amazon Prime, it might be the way to do that. If there is something that you're keeping an eye on, it's no harm to check that out for sure. I'm keeping an eye on the mesh, the mesh wifi repeaters. Okay. And yeah. And it kind of annoys me, it regularly pops up, you know, Canadian and American customers are seeing big discounts on the TP-Link mesh system. And I don't see it coming through to the Irish or UK Amazon sites. And I'm after seeing it about two or three times and it's been good reductions on those sites. So hopefully, maybe they're saving it for the UK and Ireland Amazon event, you know, where the TP-Link mesh system is going to be reduced because they're very good. They're a very good mesh system. It's just, yeah, for three units, they're quite expensive. Yeah. We use the ERO ones. And I can't say I've ever had an issue with them, to be fair. We had, I did, they did take a bit of setting up to get them all in bridging mode and getting everything on the network, talking to one another and all of this kind of crack. But it's a good system. But you like the TP-Link ones? Yeah, yeah. I've seen them in, I don't have them myself, but I've seen them in a few places, friends and different businesses and things like that that use them. Yeah, they're quite reliable, quite good. Nice. Very good, very good. And in other news there in the show this week, Tesco launching their new accessible recipes. Joe, this is really cool. But for me, I find it almost better seeing accessibility openly shouted about like this in the way that Tesco are doing. They seem quite proud of this. Yeah, they seem very proud of it because I've seen it advertised on the TV myself the other evening there. So, and yeah, it's quite, quite good. But yeah, you have to jump through one hoop together, which is Spotify, be a subscriber to Spotify. But I believe it will become more available. And you can download a digital copy of it to read. So it's just a good start, I suppose, from Tesco. If people are looking for other types of accessible recipes, you can just ask your smart speaker for the name of a dish. We'll say chicken and broccoli pie or something and give me the recipe. And your smart speaker will go and look for this on BBC Good Food. So that's another option. But there is different places online and there's a few different apps and stuff. But that's a good start anyway. Tesco's and I believe Tesco's are trying lots of different things in their shops to make shopping accessible. So we'll watch this space, David. Yeah, they've done a fair bit around things like their support with Be My Eyes and a few other bits. And actually I was in a Tesco yesterday and I spoke at the IAAP event. This was the International Association of Accessibility Professionals. I spoke at that event of how I'd never used a self-service terminal independently. And that hasn't changed. But yesterday I was with my brother and we went through just some of the accessibility features that were on the device to see if it was going to be something that I was going to be able to use independently. Now we couldn't find any screen reader options and stuff like that. And I had kind of assumed because they talked about being WCAG AA compliant that they would have some form of screen reader on the device, but I didn't see one. But that doesn't necessarily mean that it didn't exist. But I am curious to see what that actual, you know, in-store shopping experience can become because it is a huge independence thing to be able to do your shopping independently. And I know you can do it online, but you don't want to be fully isolated either. No, I often go into the shop and I look, if there is a customer service desk, I'll go to it and wait for some assistance. But they're not always ready for me. You know what I mean? I did hear whispers of some of these shops were going to try and get a designated accessibility officer to help people whether they have maybe on a different spectrum or they might have different disabilities or vision impairments or whatever it might be. But I think that'd be a good idea, actually, considering there is so many different people out there that need assistance with shopping. But yeah, those terminals, screen readers, I'm not sure is it the right solution. I think the biggest and most difficult part of shopping in the shop is finding, shopping in a supermarket, sorry, is finding the actual products. Yeah, that's fair, yeah. That's the most difficult part. Going through the checkout is probably the easy bit because look, end of the day, you can go to a managed checkout with a checkout operator. You know what I mean? So you don't have to. Yes and no. Our local shop now, and bear in mind, I'm not going to name them, but this is a big supermarket, one of Ireland's biggest supermarkets. And you can only use the manned checkout section now if you were paying by cash, not by card. If you're paying by card or app pay by extension or anything like that, you have to use the self-service terminals, which is, in my mind, crazy. Yes, that is a bit crazy. These are some of these mad restrictions that you have to live by. So to force you to use certain products, you know what I mean, or to use certain devices. But look, hopefully they won't all go that way. But as I was saying, the biggest issue for me, anyway, is actually picking out the products. And generally, most supermarkets I go to, I will get assistance to do that. And I know some people use method glasses and all these things, but method glasses make mistakes as well. And Be My Eyes isn't always available when you call them. It is 90% of the time, but there is that 10% you'll need them to, just no one answers, or maybe even Wi-Fi, or some data mightn't be. Look, we can't always rely on technology. Sure. So there is that occasion we need to get, that shops need to be aware that people will need assistance when they go in. And it's keeping people in jobs too. I think there's a value in that as well. And just having that assistance available to us, we don't want this to become completely impersonal either, where we're just, the blind people can just talk to their little AI bot and that'll do everything for them. Do you know? There's a massive value in that, David. There's a massive value in keeping people in jobs, but there's also a massive value in keeping that social element and that face-to-face element. Because if everything is machines going forward, it's going to be even harder for us as a vision impaired minority to help ourselves in these shops, you know? So I think you definitely need some people on the ground, staff on the floor, you know what I mean? So I just think it's great when you go in and there's a presence of staff there that are welcome and have good customer service skills and will help you find what you want. And we'll give you a general advice as well if you're asking about size and weight or whatever, you know? So there's loads of different things you might need in a shop and I just think it's great to have people there. Absolutely, agreed with that. And then on the technology front, Joe, Google competing with the meta glasses. This, in my mind, can only be a good thing because it brings competition. I don't know, what are your thoughts or expectations for these glasses? What do they need to do that the meta glasses perhaps can't? I think it's a massive story because lots of people out there telling me Gemini is great and has a bit more of a live functionality than meta has, especially here in Ireland, because obviously we're geo-blocked from some of the services due to our data, our privacy restrictions, which is no problem, right? Okay, I don't mind that because sometimes data can get a little bit too, it can get too much of it off of us. So, but I really welcome Google coming into this market and it might make a difference to price as well as opening up the Android stuff to people and making some of that more hands-free and that's their plan anyway, to make accessing Gemini and your phone more hands-free. So I think it's gonna be a good thing. And let's see, they might even, because meta are allowing developers on their glasses, maybe the Gemini app will be allowed on the meta glasses. So all is not lost there either. I think that's something that will or might happen. And then the other side of it is meta are expanding their range in the Gen 2s as well. So I know they have Oakley Vanguard and they have Wayfairs and they have Headliner and Schuyler, but they also now have the optics range. So the optics range is for people that may need prescription lenses. And they also are very light and flexible as well. So they have a regular size and a large size, but another great thing to do have is an action button. So you can make the action button say something like, hey meta, tell me what you can see and if there's any text, read it to me. So you don't have to keep talking to the glasses as you go around. Some people just don't like doing that. So the fact that you have an option to press a button and take the picture and then get a description in your ear, it's a lot more discrete for people. Yeah, absolutely. And I think the great thing as well is this competition, it's going to lead to improvements across the board, whether it is improvements in the price, as you said, Joe, or whether it's something like the implementation of action buttons and alternative communication methods for those who might not be able to say, hey meta. I think that's really exciting. That's really exciting for anyone that has difficulty with speech or anything like that, to have the option to just press a button and maybe tag a couple of different commands to it, it'll be a massive thing. But I think the price is going to be the price for a while. It'll be in and around that four to 600 mark, we'll say, because as most of you go for the optics, I think the cheapest I've seen in mass was four, six, nine, but then you have to go and get your prescription lenses. So, but most of the generation two are around the four, four, 19 mark, and then transitions are four, nine, nine. So they're the average prices. Don't quote me on any of those because prices can go up and down, but I think the prices of the Google ones are generally going to be around that as well. So they will stay within, hopefully they'll keep the price down. They won't bring it down really cheap, but hopefully they won't make it go up anyway. Yeah, you'd be thinking so. I think this is, it's still a very much an early adopters game. So there's still a lot of ground for Google to win if they're aggressive about this. Like if they, could you imagine if they just dropped those glasses at say 250 euro and they were just as capable as the Meta glasses. What a world that would be. Absolutely, and hopefully there, if they do go down the subscription road, they don't go too deep or too costly, you know, and they might leave. Some of it often to people that don't like subscriptions because end of the day, there is too many of them. It's become too much of a trend. Everything is between your TV, your phone, your multiple apps, there's only, there's a limit to what people can afford. So I'm hoping that they're going to be usable without subscription as well. So, and I also hope that they will open their glasses up to developers of other apps, whether they be blind friendly or just universal. Yeah, absolutely. It's interesting to see companies like IRAC coming to the Meta glasses now and whether that will all be replicated on the Google glasses, you know, or whatever they do eventually end up being called. We'll probably find out next month because these are a collaboration, as Daniel said in the news there, with Samsung. And Samsung have their large conference next month in a similar way to how Apple have theirs this month. But hey, do let us know your thoughts on all of that. You can send us a WhatsApp voice note, 086-199-0011, or you can send us an email to content at vi.ie. That's content at vi.ie. But for now, that is our show, people. Thank you so much for tuning in. Hope you enjoyed it. We will be back with an extra episode for you next week following Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference. So if you don't follow Talking Technology already, be sure to follow us in all of your different podcast apps of choice. If you so like, or you can also find us on YouTube and subscribe over there. Just search VI Labs Accessibility, and you will find us there and be able to subscribe. And we really would love that. But for now, thank you so, so much for listening. We'll be back next week for another episode of Talking Technology with VI Labs. See you then. Thanks for listening to the Talking Technology podcast with VI Labs. If you'd like to support our show, please visit vi.ie slash donate. Talking Technology is proudly sponsored by IA Labs, the market leader in digital accessibility services. IA Labs, digital inclusion, your legal obligation. you