[nagdu] Well everyone, time to give up our dogs

Wed May 23 01:46:40 UTC 2012

Doug,

Congrats on the iPhone! I remain envious. /lol/

Well, I know plenty of sighted people who could use this new navigating 
app for sure. As well as some blind ones. /lol/ I can see times where 
having something like the app described would be useful in finding my 
way around a large, strange building with my guide dog to keep me from 
running into stuff. I guess she kinda sucks, because if I just tell her 
to find Room 427 or something, she sometimes misses and only takes me to 
426... I'm kidding! She does find the restroom, drinking fountain and 
(most of the time) elevator or escalator. From there, she figures I can 
work things out on my own! She doesn't read street signs for me, either. 
What good is she? /lol/

Well, I'm glad PETA is happy that our guide dogs will be free now from 
their overburdened lives of productive, stimulating work and can go back 
to being pampered, lazy, overweight, bored pets! Oops... Is that my 
inner cynic coming out to play? /evil grin/

Tami

On 05/22/2012 05:28 PM, Doug Parisian wrote:
> So sad that the conclusions in the article describing this potential 
> most valuable orientation aid invest the system with powers and 
> features it cannot perform, rather than presenting a more palatable 
> and realistic description.  I can certainly understand why such a poor 
> presentation of an excellent concept would meet the understandable 
> resistance from so many. Damn, I love to have this for my IPhone 4S 
> which I have just purchased a week ago.
> Doug: will this new development prevent me from being a nowhere man?
>
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Larry D. Keeler" 
> <lkeeler at comcast.net>
> To: "NAGDU Mailing List, the National Association of Guide Dog Users" 
> <nagdu at nfbnet.org>
> Sent: Tuesday, May 22, 2012 6:51 PM
> Subject: Re: [nagdu] Well everyone, time to give up our dogs
>
>
> Animal friendly?  We don't want to put our dogs out of a job!  I prefer a
> cold nose over a gadget anytime!  Also, the4 more complex the gadget, the
> more things that can go wrong with it.  In conjunction with a cane or 
> dog it
> could be great!  I was involved in testing something like that and all 
> I got
> useful from it was what I was passing.  For instance, the Panda 
> Express.  It
> also told me about how far away it was but not what or who might be 
> between
> it and me.
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Margo and Arrow" 
> <margo.downey at verizon.net>
> To: "NAGDU Mailing List, the National Association of Guide Dog Users"
> <nagdu at nfbnet.org>
> Sent: Tuesday, May 22, 2012 6:55 PM
> Subject: Re: [nagdu] Well everyone, time to give up our dogs
>
>
> Oh, so, we just use guide dogs indoors and this is supposed to help us 
> get
> anywhere we want to go?  Uh, no, not!
>
> Margo andArrow
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Aaron Cannon" 
> <cannona at fireantproductions.com>
> To: "NAGDU Mailing List, the National Association of Guide Dog Users"
> <nagdu at nfbnet.org>
> Sent: Tuesday, May 22, 2012 6:51 PM
> Subject: [nagdu] Well everyone, time to give up our dogs
>
>
> Wow!  Just wow!  I'll let the article speak for itself.  Just be sure
> not to miss the priceless quote from PETA at the end.
>
>
> http://www.redorbit.com/news/technology/1112539355/indoor-navigation-system-gives-guide-dogs-a-rest/ 
>
>
> Indoor Navigation System Gives Guide Dogs A Rest
> May 21, 2012
>
> Helen Keller, perhaps the most famous activist for the visually
> impaired once said, “It is for us to pray not for tasks equal to our
> powers, but for powers
> equal to our tasks, to go forward with a great desire forever beating
> at the door of our hearts as we travel toward our distant goal.”
>
> Empowerment of the visually impaired took another step forward this
> month with the presentation of Navatar, an indoor navigation system.
> Navatar, which
> was developed by a University of Nevada, Reno computer science
> engineering team, is an improvement on existing systems because it
> relies primarily on existing
> smartphone technology and not on less practical and bulky sensors.
>
> “Existing indoor navigation systems typically require the use of
> expensive and heavy sensors, or equipping rooms and hallways with
> radio-frequency tags
> that can be detected by a handheld reader and which are used to
> determine the user’s location,” said Kostas Bekris, of the UNR College
> of Engineering’s
> Robotics Research Lab. “This has often made the implementation of such
> systems prohibitively expensive, with few systems having been
> deployed.”
>
> In conjunction with two-dimensional, digital architectural maps that
> are widely available, the smartphone-based Navatar uses the device’s
> accelerometer
> and compass to navigate its user. The system is able to guide people
> with visual impairments down hallways and into rooms through audible
> instructions
> similar to those given by GPS devices made for autos.
>
> “Nevertheless, the smartphone’s sensors, which are used to calculate
> how many steps the user has executed and her orientation, tend to pick
> up false signals,”
> said Eelke Folmer, who worked on the project.”To synchronize the
> location, our system combines probabilistic algorithms and the natural
> capabilities of
> people with visual impairments to detect landmarks in their
> environment through touch, such as corridor intersections, doors,
> stairs and elevators.”
>
> Folmer explained that Navatar ‘listens’ for voice prompts or a button
> push on a Bluetooth-enabled device from the user to confirm the
> presence of these
> landmarks. This means the system can work to assist the user in
> conjunction with their typical routine for navigation, including the
> use of a cane.
>
> On his website, Folmer noted that the system has a “high possibility
> of large-scale deployment” because it only requires a simple digital
> representation
> of an indoor environment can be sketched up with simple design drawing
> programs that could be downloaded from a building’s Wi-Fi network. The
> UNR team
> also performed a study involving 12 blindfolded and six blind users to
> demonstrate the feasibility of their system.
>
> While the system was able to track users within 1.85 meters of their
> actual location, the researchers were able to identify several areas
> for improvement.
> Based on feedback from test subjects, the team’s report said improving
> Navatar’s accuracy, making it able to repeat directions, and having it
> capable of
> working from within in a pocket are all improvement they are considering.
>
> For their work on Navatar, Bekris and Folmer recently won a PETA
> Proggy Award for Leadership in Ethical Science. PETA recognized the
> system as an animal-friendly
> achievement because of its potential to decrease the reliance on guide
> dogs for the visually impaired.
>
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