Why is IMCommunity important?
Do the Math
- 10% of Us population experience hearing disability
- Each one of them is in a daily communication with at least 10 people.
- This project will effect the whole population of US and beyond.
Who are HOH people?
Most of them are a part of your families, friends, or professional network.
They
- Grew up and live in a normal hearing community
- Do not know sign language
- Are very shy about their difficulties
- Give up oral communication in many situation
- Experience frequently an attitude "you do not hear since you do not want to hear"
- Find it difficult to express their communication needs
- May give up opportunities to participate, enjoy life, learn and develop
What is happening today
HOH people experience discrimination
- The quality of their real time communication through regular phone and relay isn't good enough
- Most educational institute are not well equipped to provide access for the information of lectures
- Most public lectures do not provide caption or a text of the lecture
- Many customer service departments hang off or are impatient when connected through relay
- When looking for a job, many companies request phone interview and close the communication when there is a request for alternative ways of interviews
- Many restaurants are too loud for people who are HOH to enjoy a conversation
- Have huge expenses purchasing hearing aids and special assisstive devises
Inspiration - A better future for people with hearing loss
IMCommunity promotes
- Democracy, equal opportunities, freedom and self expression
- New possibilities to communicate, develop, learn, work, share, and contribute
- Developing of innovative technologies to benefit a wide range of users
- Education regarding strategies for effective communication with people with hearing loss
How did it all started
IMCommunity is a community project that started on January 2007 by Esther Inbal Ph.D., an Educational Technology Consultant with a wide support of people educators, artists, technology people, health care providers and the general public.
A. Equal Opportunities For Communication !!!!
When IMCommunity started with a vision of empowering communication for Hard of Hearing. Following our research of current and new technologies, a bigger possibility seemed to be available - the possibility of equal opportunities for communication. This can be a transformation of the state of being of people with hearing loss and a way to allow a full participation in all aspects of life.
We decided that the first tool to use, is a simple technology, widely in used in some companies, very powerful and inexpensive. The Instant Message Technology (IM). We vision a world in which IM will be a part of everyday life and everyday communication with everyone - similar to phone. It will be used in all customer service departments, in contacting anyone, it will be in every advertisement and in every business card. Wherever you will see the option of calling, you will have an option to chat. The technology is there, some improvements will be welcomed and most important education the public, guidelines and law enforcements are needed. Instant messaging boosts communication and allows easy collaboration and is becoming more and more important in personal and in corporate environments. IM facilitating quick, safe, and persistent exchange of information such as URLs or document, options we do not over the phone
IM for HOH and for everyone
Using IM Instant message, the HOH person is equal to the person he communicate with. It allows the HOH to understand 100% of the information. Therefore it allows the HOH person to be relaxed in his/her communication. In professional setting it allows a quick access to all needed information in equall way to any otehr person and without the need for a special equipment or services.
In a personal setting it allows a spontanious communication, have fun, and share jokes. Usually the content of the chat is much more meaningful than the content of the phone. Kids and young people love it - so do I.
Why phone and relay are not good enough for the hard of hearing community?
Phone calls sometimes are clear and sometime not, always challenge the HOH to deal with missing links without the help of visual clues.
Phone calls could be better if the following qualities will improve
- clarity of the sound
- quality of the line
- quality of the phone
- humidity in the air
- the speed of the speech,
- knowing the context
Phone calls are a state where a HOH person needs to cope with many missing links, they demand more energy and concentration. Sometime HOH people will get tired of it. In this case they will tent to talk more rather than to listen. They will try to make the call as short as they can. It may cause the other person to be frustrated.
Be aware that HOH people always wish to have more rather than less communication and feel bad when they request you to repeat what you have said. Most of my friends developed the sensitivity and the intuition to make the phone calls successful. My sister Nili is one of the best communicators - we talk over the phone daily and for a long time. It is very rare that I ask to repeat.
What she does is:
1. Talk from a good phone line. (There are differences in clarity between different lines and phones)
2. Makes sure there are no background noises or interference ( TV, talks, etc.)
3. Speaks clearly and a normal way
4. Is sensitive and confirm I get names or address correctly
5. Welcomes my request to repeat and will repeat what she says using different words
6 Will never say "never mind it is not important" when I ask her to repeat
Why relay isn't the best solution?
The relay services, are relatively slow. People who talk with the HOH doesn't know what is happening in cases where it takes time to the caption to appear on the screen. It is frustrating. Also they are not used to a slow speed of the conversation. Practice in maintaining communication based on keywords and techniques for speed reading may be helpful.
"If captions will appears on every single phone for hard of hearing and non hard of hearing people - it will give the normal hearing person a better understanding what is happening. It may be simple to add the caption option to each phone call once the speech to text technology will be used for captions" Such an option will be useful also to store, search, repeat and manipulate phone info.
For some people the idea that there is another person listening to the converstation (and typing the relay) effect the feeling of intimacy in the conversation - Automatic conversion to text will solve this problem.
Most of my friends hate relay and would encourage me to use it only for emergency or in request for info I can't find in another way.
Yesterday I got the latest technology - Captell. It works in a better speed based on VCO technology. It means that I can choose that the person with whom I talk may not know that I am using a relay. It is better but still it is slower than a normal conversation.
Promoting the Use OF IM as a major tool for communication
Key Questions:
- What will encourage the use IM ?
- How can we promote businesses and government agencies to adapt IM as they did for phones and e-mail?
1. Need special download and setting process. What seems easy to tech people can frustrate others.
Why wouldn't IM become a part of the e-mail software with same password and login name?
2. The different IM programs are not talking to one another.
Why can't MSN messenger users talk with AOL IM or Skype users? why can't we do with IM what we do with e-mails and phones?
3. Why most of the companies did not adapt IM as a part of their website?
Good Role models
Fidelity gives an option to chat with customer service representatives
NYC public library set the option of chat in their web site.
Google - You use same login information for e-mail and for chat and both options are user friendly
No comments:
Post a Comment