#120 Crash test Dummies

Welcome to Blind Guys Chat, where this guy, Oren O'Neill. Hello. And this guy, Jan Bloom.

Hello.

And Claudia O'Donovan.

Hello.

Talk about the A to Z of life. Well, hello, ladies and gentlemen, and you are very welcome to episode 121,592.4 of Blind Guys Chat.

Kai, that's a long time ago that we met each other.

Yeah, sorry.

Hey, guess what? You know, like the Dana Showers time, you know, etc. Look who we found under the couch. Beck, who are you calling?

Very old.

Stuart Lawler. You're very.

Welcome back, guys. It's great. Well, do you know something? My son tells me I'm very old all the time, so it's okay.

He's only five.

Keep used to it. Keep used to it, guy.

Well, the reason we brought a Stuart on was because Stuart are. Because Clauda and I, it's the Stewart night, not Cl and I are absolutely knackered because we've come back. We've just literally come back from a festival, the animation festival in Dingle, which, if anybody doesn't know, Dingle is in the south of the country. It's in County Kerry, southwest. And it's southwest. And it's right down at the bottom of Ireland. And it's a beautiful spot.

Is it? Because I know there was a lot of, well, controversy a couple years ago. They were renaming it to Undangan, the Irish version. Is that still the case or is this is a jingle?

Yeah, no, it's. Well, it's both. But the signs all say on Dangan.

Yeah, yeah.

As far as I'm aware. And I could be wrong and somebody could write in and correct me on this. As far as I'm aware. The reason that the. Basically, Jan, to give you the backstory is that Dingle wanted all their road signs to be Irish in the Irish language only. And the argument was that, well, if I'm an American tourist and I don't know the Irish, or I'm a German tourist, whatever, and I'm driving around Dingle, how am I supposed to know where I'm going? Because all your signs are in Irish. And I think the way that the government have got around it, and I say I could be wrong, is it was. It's EU legislation, as far as I am aware, that you can have your own country's native language as a signpost, but you must also put it in English as well. So you. But I. But I. So I think the compromise for Dingle was that they go Irish first on Dangam and Then underneath that it says Dingle.

I think you're exactly that. What happened with relation to the EU and naming places?

Yeah, we have the same also in the Netherlands with the province Friesland. They also have their own language and they also preferred to have the signs on city names and whatever, also in their own language. And then they had also this compromise to do a double etc.

I'll tell you something. We. We got out at the top of the Connor Pass this morning on our way home and honestly, I could barely stand up that my. I had my glasses on and my glasses were being pushed into my. No, that wasn't. I wasn't. We didn't drink at all. The glasses were being pushed into my face and I was holding the camera up, trying to take a photo. And honestly, I had to grip it. I had to hold it on the front rather than at the edge like you would normally, because it was just being pushed. I've never seen wind like it. It was bananas.

It's always windy. And poor Larry was getting so, so bored.

He was there as well.

Oh yeah. He was crying. He wanted out. He wanted out. And I didn't let him out because the wind was so strong it would may have bl away. Well, I did have a brilliant idea. On the way home I was saying to Clauda, what have we. Because Larry sheds a lot of hair. What if we.

What if Wind. I got it.

If he faces bus to the wind and then let the wind. Let the wind just blow all the hair.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Love that.

Like two propellers off the airplane, you know, in front of.

Might have been a bit distressing though. But.

Yeah, but we got to see before we get.

So he's bold now.

He's bold.

Get a good shave. Free shave.

But our big, our biggest thrill was this is an animation festival that takes place as for every year. It's been 13 years and jam Media are the main sponsors of the organizers. Jam. Yeah. And it's, it's, it's, It's, I suppose mainly for students who are coming out, coming out of college who are, you know, working in animation and either writing or actually, you know, animation drawing or stop motion or whatever. So it's mainly for them. So they, they get an opportunity to listen to some. Some speakers and they also get an opportunity to pitch some ideas. But the biggest thrill I think for, for me was on the Saturday but the Friday for I think for everybody was a thrill. The first people on speaking and I cannot remember the man's surname, but Nick park and Merlin crossing him, crossing him. Who were the co directors of the latest Wallace and Gromit movie, Vengeance Most Foul. So Nick park, some of you should remember and will remember, he is the creator of Wallace and Gromit. And I think he started. His first. His first feature was the Wrong Trousers and then he made Chicken Run. Chicken Run. And now he's their latest movie, which was launched last year, I think, or the year before, is Vengeance Most Foul. There are two main characters. Wallace, who's the daddy, the person. And he has human. The human. And he's got a dog called Gromit. And Gromit is much more intelligent than Wallace. Wallace is an inventor, but he always gets his inventions, kind of screws them up and Gromit always kind of has to fix them and correct them. And he's. He's brilliant. But the best thing, the best, best, best ever was we saw Clodo, saw Merlin in the bar on the Saturday afternoon, and we were just chatting to him and I said, could you give me an indication of what Wallace and Gromit, what their actual size is? And he went off to his bedroom and a few minutes later he came back with Wallace and Gromit, the models.

Oh, wow. So you got to.

And this is the actual things in.

The film that they use? In the film, yeah.

And these are insured for. I think there's about 20 of them, models. But these are insured, he said, for an undisclosed amount. The ones we were touching were silicone, but he also had a clay model of Grommet, which was used. But. And you can move. You can.

And what is. What did you feel? What do. How do you. Would. Would you describe it?

It's kind of. Kind of hard to describe, but if you can imagine. If you can imagine. If you can imagine feeling Chef. Chef. From his nose all the way to his tail, including his legs, his belly, his chin, all of that. Right. And. And you can feel absolutely everything. And one of the things. One of the things I caught on very late when I was. When I was feeling Grandma, was could actually feel the dog's ribs underneath.

Is it the dog?

Silicones?

Yeah. Grommet is the dog, yeah.

Oh, I don't know. I don't know.

Wallace is a human.

Wallace is a human.

So what they do is they build what they call an aperture, which is like a skeleton of the dog, but with. With bendable metal, and then they. They cast the silicone onto it. But the silicon is a mold that they've made in plasticine first. And then, because it's silicone. They can bend it. So they. But there's. The body is solid.

Wallace has this funny thing. He's. It's kind of set in the north of England, so it's a. Buy gum and all that kind of stuff. And they love. They love cheese and they love Wensleydale cheese. So he's all. So. So Wallace is always looking for, hey, Grommet, where's the Wensleydale?

Well, he has a great Nordy England accent.

And the funny thing is they have. So they have different mouth positions for. If they're talking or whatever. They've got 14 mouth positions. So what they do is they take out one mouth. So a mouth that's going, you know, w for Wensleydale. And then they'll put in a mouth that's going for Ensleydale. And they literally change the mouth shapes and they remold it into the actual head. And that's how they do it. They take a shot, then they take it out, move it a little bit and move the whatever and then take another shot. So it's just. Just. It's incredible how they do it.

Anyway, it was brilliant. But let's talk about.

Yeah.

CSUN 2025 and somebody that we have as a guest host.

He was there.

Went to Los Angeles.

Yeah.

So did he allow you were going and how did you.

Well, I didn't know. So I went to Anna. I went to see Son. I didn't know I was going till quite shortly before it, actually a couple of weeks before it, because we weren't sure who we were, how we were going to be represented at CSUN from sight and sound. But I did go to Anaheim. That's where it is at the moment. It's been in. Obviously, CSUN has been moving around California. It's been in LAX airport, beside lax. That was definitely.

They wanted to keep away from the fires that they.

Went down to San Diego, got really expensive. And then it's moved back. Anaheim's about 45, 50 minutes from the airport in a taxi or bus or car, whatever. But I suppose one of the things, and I think, Oren, I mentioned it to you the other day, was that I. It's been 2009 since I was at Csungas. So, you know, that's a long flight for you.

It's a long. Like it's eight or nine hours.

It's a. It's just under 11.

Oh, my God.

Ten and a half hours. Yeah. But we got direct flight and all that. That was great. By the way, funny thing about the plane. I was on the plane just getting on. I just said, you didn't do your.

Funny voice again, did you?

I didn't know. No, I didn't.

Next to you.

No. But I got a text, I got a text, would you believe, from Steven Scott of the Double Tap podcast. And he said to me, are you on the flight to la? And I was thinking, well, I'm on a flight from Dublin to la. Is he, I wonder, is he? He must be on the same flight. So I said, yes. And he said, what row are you in? I said, I was in 22. And next thing I hear, Stuart, Stuart. He was in 23.

No way.

Himself and Sean Priest and another colleagues lady called Jane, they were behind us and then we were all hurtled into wheelchairs when we got to the other side because in America you cannot, you dare not walk. You know, I told you guys, I told you. And in fact, and they were quite, they were quite, they said to us, listen, you either get in the wheelchair or we can't assist you. But one of the things, Sorry, just.

To cut you off. How come they were flying from Dublin or was there?

Because it's easier. They did the smart thing. They went into Ireland to clear U.S. customs.

Oh, Customs.

So they flew from Glasgow earlier that day into Dublin, had a couple of hours wait and then cleared customs. And it is much easier to do that in Ireland. Some of my colleagues flew in from the UK and had a lengthy queue.

I think Ireland is one of the only countries or one of the very few countries that you can do, you can do your pre clearance clearance check before you leave the country of Orange, which in this case was Dublin. So you can get in to LA and you can just get off the plane and walk out. Whereas other countries have to go through clearance when they get off the plane in America.

So I mean, that was interesting. Got there, etc.

And started going, are you having already an interview with Double Tap or.

Yes, I did go on their podcast the next day because of course they were looking for guests. So that one of their shows a couple of weeks ago. Mr. Stewart, double tap podcast. And there's a couple of people in the, in the show, there's a kind of a live show with a couple of sort of an audience in the Marriott where the conference was on. Now we weren't staying in the Marriott, we were across the road in the Hilton. But the, the, the hotels are very near each other and it was quite an accessible route over, so that bit was fine. But it's been the last time I was in CSUN was 2009. Now, admittedly, I was a lot younger, maybe I was a bit more tolerant. Maybe these things didn't impact me as much. But I've been used to going to exhibitions like Sight Village, Site City, which is even better for sighted guides, I would say. And, you know, in general, you know, tactile strips. Lots of accessibility.

Yeah. So you had all this for season, obviously.

Well, you would. You would think. Would you have to say, no, there was nothing for season. They don't have sighted guides. They don't have. There's no tactile strips. There's these huge. And, you know, everything in the States is huge, humongous, as they say. Hotels, big ballrooms.

Yeah.

And you're walking along and someone goes, you get. Be careful, you're gonna walk in. But don't. Don't. Like. Doesn't come over to you, say, be careful, you're gonna walk into something. Be careful, you're gonna walk into something. Keep going, go on, go.

You're.

Oh, my God.

How do you know if they're talking to you or not?

Well, exactly. I kind of just assumed they were. A guy yelled at me. I was walking from the Marriott over to the Hilton one day, and this guy goes, careful, you're gonna walk in. There's a. There's a planner in your way. Keep going, go on, go on, go on, go on. I said, oh, my God. Anyway, I hate that, but it was very frustrating. So there is an app called Good Maps. Good Maps indoors. You guys might.

You've talked about this before. You like it.

I love Good Maps, and I like the people behind it. So they mapped the whole event. Now it is indoor navigation, remember? So you have to use your phone's camera because it relies on the feed from your camera to track where you are. So you put in, say, I don't know, Vispero. Say for Jan. We put in Vispero. I want to go to the Vispero booth. I'm standing in the lobby of the Marriott. Huge, big lobby. And I'm passing the registration desk, and it's saying to you, keep going. Turn left. And then it says, turn round. But in the meantime, you have to hold your phone out for the camera to see where you're going. And I walked into at least three people. Nearly lost my phone because, you know, knocked out of my hand. So that was a kind of an experience. But I suppose my whole point of telling you this is that culturally is a very different experience. And I don't Know, I don't remember see some being like that back in the day. Now, I suppose the last time I was there, I used to kind of. I definitely had. I was with somebody at the time who could see. This year we were kind of different groups and we did our own thing a little bit more. There was bits, there was meetings and stuff going on, but walking around the exhibition floor on your own was, for me, it was certainly challenging. It's just very different over there. So I think what were the.

Sorry to cut across you, but what were the Americans who were there saying? Like, were they agreeing or were they just like, oh, this is just standard?

No, I think this is standard. I think a lot of people and I mean, remember there's the, the. I don't want to say the NFB are the only. Because there's that, but there's a lot of. There is a certain school of thought in the States where we don't need sighted help. We are independent, we will do our thing and it doesn't matter, you know, and they, they almost embrace this independence. And some people say things like, it's just, you know, great to immerse yourself in this room full of blind people. Doesn't matter how many people you crash into, you'll get to where you want to go. I just don't really subscribe to that book.

And then. But there is a commercial solution?

Well, I don't know. There wasn't. Like I was trying to use AIRA in there, but Ira, I guess if you were, if you had paid Ira, you could use it. But they weren't, they weren't an Aira zone, so they didn't do anything for the exhibition.

So how far did you get then with good maps? What was good maps able to do for you?

Well, it certainly brought me to the right hole, but it was so loud in there. Obviously you're trying to pull the phone up to your ear listening to it. I didn't have headphones because I was afraid. I didn't have my AirPods on. I was afraid I'd lose them. And on the sec, on the, the Wednesday then I walked around with a colleague of mine and, and we sort of decided we wanted to go to six or seven places and it was so much easier.

Would glide also be here an option? You know, this Hoover.

Maybe in the future and I will talk about light in a sec. But maybe in the future it would.

Just combining things, you know.

Yeah, I, I spoke to, we had a, we had a meeting with the light guys and I spoke to one of the co founders and we were.

Chatting about who was here at the podcast as well.

Oh yeah, yeah. Well, I spoke to Amos, but I also spoke to his colleague Luke, Luke Buckborough, who's the other co founder. And Luke said, you know, that we were just chatting about, you know, Glide. And he was saying, last time, this time last year, we had people, we had a guy with a remote control, they had it on a tablet, they were, you know, using Glide. Yeah. This year, obviously it was, it was driving itself. But he was saying, you know, in five years time, you know, we're wondering, will there be this vision of everyone walking around, see some with their glides and you kind of go, yeah, it just might work. Because in that situation, walking you, steering you around, getting you not running into people, it might be just ideal. Obviously they're, they're working away. I think they're making good progress. They're not set on their September release date because obviously it's a bit flexible whether it might go a little bit back towards the end.

Did they release already some units or.

No? No. Okay, so they're still.

You could pre order things, you can.

Pre order for the moment. They were saying September. I think they're maybe not quite committing to September now. I think they're going to, they're going to release it when it's ready. Bear in mind. So I'm not a guide dog user and I think you guys would have a very different experience and be very interesting, of course, to talk. So I, he walked along beside me and said, right, off you go. And I walked with this thing, pushed it, and what I found was I could push it as fast as I want. I walked along with it and I felt quite like confident and you just go with it. If it goes a bit to the right, you go to the right. If it goes to the left, if it walks into something, obviously it stops. So he was like, he, he brought me into a, into the side of a stand. He said, no, you've just walked into the side of a booth and stopped and then you lift it up. It's very light. It was lighter than I thought. Handle, Handle phone.

No batteries inside or light batteries?

Well, there is, yeah, there's probably light batteries. I'm not sure what the, what way they're using that, but this thing of like he was saying to me, you're going to be coming up, there's a whole group of people in your way, and next thing you feel this thing going, just moving you slightly to the right and slight to the left of it.

Wow.

So that was interesting.

You mean like a little. There's a little vibration or.

No, it would actually steer me. So the. So the whole. The wheels would move and I would move with it. The key thing was to move with it. It was.

So you're propelling it, but it's.

I'm propelling it, but it's steering. So it felt a bit like. In fact, I was saying, because people who. Who sight guide me sometimes say, and I'm very conscious of it now, that I tend to push people along. I don't mean to, but maybe I just. I don't know. So I was thinking maybe this is like, you know, I'm being sighted guided by this glide thing, but I can push this along and it's steering me. And I was. Yeah, I was kind of navigating around these people.

When you say navigated you around some people.

Yes.

Was it. Does it know how wide it needs to turn left or turn right? Because not only it's, you know, it's not turning for itself, it's turning for you.

There's. There's two cameras on it. There's one at the top near the handle, and there's a lower one. It didn't walk me into anything. Now, I don't know if some of the people see this guy coming with a glide and got out of my way.

People diving into the bushes.

But one of the things I will say that I was. I was kind of thinking about this after I did the demo and it was only. I only was on it for maybe two minutes, but I was reflecting on this actually on the way I've actually airport. And I was saying when I was walking around with my cane in the exhibition hall, I was obviously very cautious. I had no idea what was in front of me. So I was walking quite slowly and I decayed out in front of me. I was walking significantly faster with glide. I was walking the way I'd walk out here on the roads in areas I know with my cane, which is, you know, relatively. And I thought that was kind of interesting.

This is in a place that you've never been before.

Yes. Yeah. Now, of course, I'm sure it'll have its issues, but I like my first experience and I didn't know what to think. I wasn't sure what I was going to think because I'd heard so much about it. It was really like I was kind of thinking, okay, would I use it in the middle of Dublin city? I don't know. And when I say I don't know is. I don't know what I'd look. I'm not sure what it would look like. Maybe, maybe in a way society needs to embrace glide because it'll be very different, obviously, to people with canes and dogs. But would I use it in that type of a big exhibition area, Our massive lobby? Absolutely.

Do you remember that you used to have like an elderly grand aunt who. Who had one of those. Instead of a rollator things? No, not a relator, but instead of a Hoover, they had like a little like run it over and back on the floor and it would pick stuff up.

A UBank.

That's what I think it looks like.

We had one of them at home years ago. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's actually Claudia. It feels. Yeah, it probably. I'm trying to. It. It just felt like, you know, you're holding this handle and you're pushing it along. And the thing is, you set the pace, obviously. So. Yeah.

Which is great for someone like you because you do walk faster than average, in fairness.

Yeah. But I said. But if somebody wasn't so confident or just was trying out with this thing and wanted to walk slowly, then they can do the same thing. So brilliant. They can set the pace. So it was definitely.

But the wheels moved. The wheels turned.

The wheels turn. Now he was telling us that they are exploring with all sorts. That they have changed the wheels several times. They've changed the placement of the camera several times. They've changed the type of camera. So there's still a lot of. Of tweaking going on with the production of this thing. Yeah. And I believe there is going to be an option. I don't know if this will come as part of the device or not, but there will be an option for various sets of wheels for various different types of terrain. And you can change your wheels.

All terrain wheels.

Yeah, exactly.

Go mountain climbing or something.

Just like your tip for your cane, you know.

Exactly.

That's genius.

And they also said there will be. I think you guys have probably heard about this already, but there will be subscription model, you know, so you'll buy your Glide and then the subscription will give you access to GPS and I guess AI I think they said something about AI that was Glide.

What else was going on at season.

So just staying on a. On a navigation thing for a sec. I'll talk to you about these shoes from. And I'm gonna mispronounce this. So I apologize because people may. It's. I think they're called Azarish. And I think that I haven't pronounced them properly. They're a Japanese company, were making these inserts for shoes.

I've heard them about it.

They slip into your shoes like kind of insoles. I have to say they're very comfortable. You wouldn't know you're wearing these things. And on the outside of your shoes there's these little Bluetooth receivers, little round things click onto your shoes and you have an app that you sort of, you know, program in where you want to go and the things vibrate. And I mean it's interesting. If you want to turn left, your left shoe vibrates. If they're telling you to go back, your heels start to vibrate. But I was, I was doing a walk with her, with this lady, she. Lovely lady from. Yeah, this company. And we were walking in a dead straight line along the corridor of the hotel and the. My shoes, my toes were constantly vibrating like a really, really hard vibration. Really. And she said, that means that you need to keep going straight. And I said to her, is there any way of switching that off so that it would. As long as I don't exactly. If I feel nothing, I keep going until I'm told something. But I'm not sure that she really understood because English was, you know, a little bit of a challenge for this lady. So I think that might be interesting technology. It's still, it's being used in Japan. They want to roll it out to.

Other countries because in fairness, you don't want your toes buzzing all day long.

And I mean, I don't know, like, would you guys pay $600 for this thing?

Holy no.

On the other hand, a foot massage, I don't know.

Yes, maybe.

Maybe, yeah. Different story.

There was a whole rake of people doing various things around tactile and audio maps and diagrams. Making diagrams. Making STEM accessible, I suppose was one of the things then making mapping accessible. Using a very. A variety hardware and software solutions. Some tactile displays, some audio graphics, for example, some were web based applications, some were pieces of software on a computer. It's just I saw about six of them and I was kind of thinking it's all very interesting. I'm not sure there's room in the market for everyone. There was a lot of researchers there doing that kind of stuff and wanting to get people's opinion. And I suppose the other one I will talk about a bit is, is a braille display that I was talking to Jan about the other day.

Oh yeah.

From a company called New Haptics.

Yeah.

And the reason I, I will mention these is because there is a researcher, Sheila O'Moron, who is. She's originally from Kildare and she's working at the University of Michigan and she's not behavior. Anyway, I'll move swiftly on.

All right.

She is, yes, she's a researcher with this and she's been involved in developing this display. So one of the few things about this display it is first of all it's powered by or it runs on compressed air. So when I say that there's a pump that connects to it to, to, to power it.

Okay.

And the braille dots are powered by air so they pop up and down but it's.

Oh, so they're like little bladders like under your. Okay, very interesting.

Really nice consistency to the braille. And I mean to be fair, other companies have nice consistency as well with really solid braille dots but not too sharp because some of the solid dots are very raised, they're very protruded. But the other thing about this is it's a fully touch sensitive screen so you can like double tap on a letter so there's no cursor, routing keys. You tap on a letter if you want to root your cursor to speak.

That's awesome.

And it has a number of built in applications. So you just tap on a letter and it opens the application. They're hoping to bring it out later in the year. The first version will be desktop only and it will be. It's not a port. Well, I guess you could move it but it needs to be plugged in. It's not very portable. So it's going to be designed for somebody who wants to use a braille display at their desk. And I'm not sure that's going to be an easy sell in that market. You know, where nowadays we like to have a display that we can just pick up and you know, stick on the wrong somewhere. Yeah, it does have four lines multi line. Four lines of 32 cells per line.

Oh wow.

Nice keyboard on the bottom of it as well. And they do have connected keyboard. Connected keyboard. And they do have it running with jaws already. Okay. So they have a jaws driver for it.

So is it a full size keyboard or a quirky.

No, it's. It's a braille keyboard.

Okay.

A braille keyboard. Oh yeah.

But you could put it like she was. Now it is quite big. I mean if you were using this in an office situation and you wanted to use your QWERTY keyboard, you'd really have to put your hands back, you know, because if you had the braille display right out in front of your desk, you'd have to lean your hands back to type on the keyboard. I'm not sure that would work.

And how high is it? How high?

It's probably. Do you know that the height of say the Knut display, it's similar to, similar to the Canute display but the braille dots are very different.

Yeah, yeah, of course.

So they're kind of interesting to watch because they've been doing this for a long time and they're talking about making portable devices. I'm not sure how they're going to do that with the pump situation.

And is the pump part of the thing or what? You've got to install that and have a.

The pump. They showed you on bicycle. You plug the pump in to the mains and then you plug the braille display into the pump. Now we were in the exhibition hall so I couldn't hear it. But I did say to the guy like if, if this was in an office, how. He said, oh, you wouldn't hear it at all. So what if you get a puncture though? What? What if you get a puncture on your braille dot?

Yeah.

You're in big trouble. But it is kind of. It's an interesting way.

Flat tire, end of the day. End of the day.

But it is. But it does show you as well how a lot of companies, and I suppose Jan will will probably know this in particular. A lot of companies try to really start out to try to produce low cost braille displays.

And this is low cost then.

Well, these guys wanted to do it initially for under $2,000. I think 2016, 2017. It's now going to be 10,000.

Oh my God.

10 for the four line.

So I don't know.

It sounds good but that just is very.

But I do have to ask at the. Just the. You two guys at this. And I, I know. I remember talking to Alan Davies at Site Village a couple of years ago about this.

Yeah.

And he was saying, yeah, multi, multi line braille displays. Is the market really asking for a multi line braille display?

Certain portions of the market are. I think so. I think schools are definitely asking for them, universities are. But I, I take your point.

Or I don't think I'd like anything more than two lines.

Yeah.

Of 40 or 32. But I don't think I'd want any more than that. But I'm happy enough with a single line still. But maybe that's just me, you know.

No, no, no, you're not the only.

One where you know the way. Obviously you want so many things in a Braille display, but one of the things you do want is portability and the more lines you add, you're going to compromise.

Exactly.

And also sustainability, you know, you don't want to get it connected all the time to an external power supply or whatever.

And I suppose the reality also is the more lines you have, more things are likely to go wrong with cells. You know, screen reader support for multiline is still very rudimentary. So yeah, I think people are looking at all this stuff and thinking about how it might work, but maybe the market's not just ready yet.

I don't know how Mr. Trump is. Is also playing. Is gonna play a role in this since the. The he wants to kill the Ministry of Finance of Education. You know, the Federal.

I, I and I. Yeah, I was.

And that's really. They are financing these kind of huge amount of Braille stuff and I think it's gonna be ruining a lot of.

Yeah, because I think people who, who may have been getting, you know, or maybe guaranteed getting Braille into their schools for education and you know, those Braille displays, if the Department of Education in the US is to be reconstituted or shut down or they're going to be done. Each state will look after their own thing. I definitely see that impacting Braille negatively for sure.

But also in general, the attitude among disabled people is also not so good, I would say by this ministry or administration.

As in the attitude to people with disabilities.

Yeah, yeah.

And also inclusion. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, yeah.

The inclusion is totally falling behind again, you know.

Yeah.

And the corporations are. Are just taking it like, okay, we can just dump that entire department.

Exactly.

Absolutely.

Which is shocking. In fairness, guys.

I suppose the last thing I would say about season I noticed just chatting to lots of people, everyone I felt very left out or an awful lot of people seem to have their meta Ray Bans with them and of course they all over there. So. Really. And then I was wondering, could I have used good maps through my metas?

I bet you could.

I wonder, was there a way.

I don't think so.

Oh really?

They can't use the camera.

No. Because they. They only use it for WhatsApp and Facebook messenger.

Okay.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well, maybe some.

Maybe.

And also was it. And it. Was there something with ChatGPT 2.0 that you could have it with a streaming video? You know, because that is something. What is?

Because that should I read about that I have not seen that yet. But yes, you're right. I have. I have. Or you could have used the Envision Ally app. You know, the new Ally app? Yeah, yeah, they. They had all. So you could say to Ally, you know what Booth is, you know, Freedom Scientific. And they would say they're at booth whatever 415, but I'm not sure they would. Then if you say to them, how do I get to booth 415? They give you a lender description and say, go turn left and then look for the sign.

But is it not. If you point out then the Ally from Envision and that you pass by that it will say that it will read the. The name of this stall. You know of it.

You stop at the stall, but.

But automatically without taking pictures.

Yeah. I'm not sure if it'll do it live.

I didn't.

I don't think it will yon. But Brian. Brian Dalton might maybe have to answer that.

Oh yeah.

I don't think so. Yeah. Mo might be able to answer. I don't. I don't think so. But I. I'm. But having not having Envision, I could.

Be wrong, but it could be some news. Oren or Stuart, you told me that Meta is gonna be open to the with AI, but.

Well, not yet.

Sure.

Yeah, we're told that Meta AI will be implemented or will be open in the EU over the next couple of weeks. Now, whether that impacts you guys with your Meta frames, we don't know.

I don't know.

And here's a little update from my future self. The look and describe feature will not be available in this rollout of AI from Meta.

They're bringing some AI into WhatsApp, aren't they? And Facebook messenger and. And some of the other platforms they run.

And would you be tempted at this stage if they did, Stuart, to get yourself?

Oh, yeah. Oh, definitely. Oren and I, I wondered even like being over there, I was thinking if I'd had those and I had maybe paid Ira for a week, would it have been worth it? And I think it would to be.

Able to Ira then also on the May dev. I don't think so.

I know it is.

You can use it. Yeah.

Yeah.

Then I could have. I could have gone into the lobby and just rang Ira and said, right, get me to Gordon's use. No, they are. Yeah.

Yeah.

So.

And also is then also with Be My Eyes. Is that also then via the Meta glass?

Yes. Yeah.

Oh, so it is technically possible to open it up.

I did somebody from. From Ira, actually, who was staying in the, in the same place as I was. And I just happened to see him in the lobby and he said, I said, oh, are you guys covering the exhibition? You know, they had a stall there. But he said, sadly, we're not an aira free zone over there. So what does that mean? It means that you can call them free without having to buy minutes.

Oh, okay.

If you go into, for example, Heathrow Airport is an aira zone. So you don't have to have any IRA van.

That's a really good idea actually.

So they have then operators sitting in the Heathrow terminal or something.

I don't know if they have operators sitting in the terminal or if they're in the States watching you on the, on the video feed. If you go to Walmart in the States, Walmart's an IRA free zone. So you can do your shopping with an IRA agent.

Wow, that's so good.

But I've seen this, this, this, this woman. I haven't seen her on YouTube for quite some time. But it's not only that they can see where you are, but like this woman with, she has a guide.

What you've had for breakfast.

Yeah, you know, this woman taught her. You've had, you know, our, the, she has a guide dog. She was very popular on YouTube for a while, but, but I, but I witnessed her use IRA at the very early stages. And she was in a shopping mall and she called an IRA agent. And this is when Ira had the glasses.

The actual, Their own glasses. Yeah, the Austria one. Yeah.

And she said, like, she called her IRA agent and she said, you know, I want to go to such and such a shop in this shopping mall. And not only were they looking at the camera where she was, but the first thing they were able to do was pull up a map and they say, okay, first of all, you're on the wrong floor, so we need to get you to an elevator. And you let me just find the elevator and then. Okay, so now walk, you know, 50 yards or 50 meters or whatever it was, and then turn left. And so, so I don't think it's just down to the actual cameras that, that you have on the, on the phone. I think that's kind of the great thing about the ir. So I assume that you could have an operator in America just pull up a schematic.

Yeah, There are multiple airports, which is fantastic.

Yeah.

But you're paying Molly Burke. You were talking about Molly Burke.

Burke, that's right. Yes. Okay.

Interesting stories, Mr. Stewart.

Yeah, there you go.

And how many.

Hangovers was it, you know. Well, I'll tell you something and I. I will.

Oh, now it comes. Yeah.

At the risk of being like. One thing I did realize about certainly being in the US or being in that area of the US Was so expensive.

Is it.

I drank a pint of Blue Moon IPA, which is very nice. It was 25, so I didn't drink many of them. I. I wish I was Claudia. I Wish I was 25 bucks.

Oh my God.

That's crazy. Yeah. So I didn't drink many of them. So there weren't any hangovers.

I was paying the bill there and.

We, we did not have actually, like from the time we got there, it was pretty much. Much full on. And I came back on the Thursday, so it was very tight time. So no hangovers. Yeah. You'll be glad. Okay.

No, no, no.

No Irish coffees.

It's glad to hear your story, Stuart. Yeah.

Thanks for. Thanks for having me on. It's an enjoy. It's just interesting to chat about it and I think, you know, if I go back again, I would certainly be just a little bit more prepared and maybe think about how I'm going to navigate.

I'm just having a. I just had a. A fantastic thought there and. And it could get Jan and I to see some. Come on is, you know the guys who are shouting out to you about, you know, watching your left foot. You're going to go or whatever. Well, if you had us with you and we were. We were left and right of you, we can effectively. Do you remember Crash test dummies? So once you hear us crashing into something, you know, you're Grant.

You just go ahead straight away a.

Big thing and like all three of you crash into it. That's that there's a flaw in your plan. Or. And I don't.

Yeah, but then we'd have you behind us clouded like laughing.

Laughing like crazy.

Or.

Or with a remote control.

With a remote. I. It's actually funny. It reminds me of something years ago. My, my, My twin sisters at the time, they're three years younger than me. My sisters. And I was about nine and my sister.

Hang on. How could it be three years younger than you if they're twins?

If you're sorry. They are my twins. I didn't. Sorry for not describing.

I only said it once.

I miss this, guys.

I was about 9 or 10 and my sister Neve, who I. I don't think she listens to the show, but she won't mind getting a name check. Niam was Guy Used to guide me and she said it would be so. I wish they had a steering wheel on your back.

That's so funny. You get one fitted. No, but that's a good idea though, because it's directly, you know. Because.

Yeah.

Often someone. Oren just takes my back. He just puts a hands. Hand on my back.

Yeah, yeah.

And so he can feel whether I'm going left, right or. And he always tells me I'm going too fast and I always feel like I'm crawling. So it's, it's very.

Well, I'm. I'm honestly now so conscious of walking with people that I'm pushing them. So I, I almost feel I'm dragging them along. I'm. I'm pulling them back now. I don't know. I'm dragging my feet so they don't push people.

So did you see a lot of guide dogs on the. On the floor?

Fair amount, yeah. Yeah. There was definitely plenty of them around. They were glaring at light, trying to bite the wheels of it.

Putting them out of business.

Yeah. Making them redundant. Having a protest at the light stand.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, no. Dirty protest. I hope not.

Yeah. Oh, it. That's good.

Well, listen, this has been great. Thanks very much, Stuart.

Thanks, guys. It's great. And it's great to chat to you all. And I do. I tune in every two weeks and love the show.

Now we're doing a show every week, so it's brilliant. So look, we're gonna leave it there. I think you had an email, clutter. But we'll, we'll leave it over for the next. The next show because this has been great.

Yeah.

All right, well, we'll leave it there, folks, and send us in an email. Don't forget, blind guys chat gmail.com. we'd love to hear from you. And we will see you in two weeks time when our special guest will be, I think, Kevin Sherwin and he'll be talking about your brilliant.

All the excitement. We do have to explain it to our American.

Can't wait for that. Can't wait for that one. Thanks, guys. Okay, bye.