Not everyone enjoys the thick slabs of glass that came with the Smartphone Revolution. Some out there would prefer to hold a candy bar styled phone with, gasp! physical buttons. Sam Seavey, Consultant for BlindShell, explains to J.J. that a person doesn't have to give up modern features when considering the purchase of a Feature Phone. The upcoming launch of the BlindShell Classic, an Android based phone now heading to the U.S., contains on board speech and a high contrast display. To learn more about this new phone, and see when it arrives to your phone provider of choice, visit the BlindShell Classic website
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Hide transcriptTranscribed By Grecia Ramirez
Direct from Anaheim, it’s blindbargains.com coverage of CSUN 2019, brought to you by AFB AccessWorld.
For the latest news and accessibility information on mainstream and access technology; Apple, Google, Microsoft, and Amazon offerings; access technology book reviews and mobile apps and how they can enhance entertainment, education, and employment, log onto AccessWorld, the American Foundation for the Blind’s free monthly online technology magazine, www.afb.org/aw.
Now, here’s J.J. Meddaugh.
J.J. MEDDAUGH: CSUN 2019 in the Exhibit Hall, one of the Exhibit Halls. I am here with Sam Seavey. This time, he is here as a consultant of BlindShell with an updated simple, but smart, phone.
Sam, welcome back to the podcast.
SAM SEAVEY: Thank you very much for having me.
JM: So we had an interview with BlindShell a few years ago, but the product never really reached the U.S., and now, it looks like it’s going to do that. It’s an updated smart phone. I’ll let you tell me about it.
SS: Yes. So it’s widespread in Europe. I believe they’re selling in over 15 countries. So they decided to do – launch here at CSUN for the U.S. market, and I’m happy to help them do that.
It is – this is the BlindShell Classic. So it’s a fully featured phone that is built into a – with physical buttons, has a nice large screen. It’s not a touch screen, and that’s on purpose. You know, touch screen, sometimes can – people can get -- confusing with touch screens. But it has, for the low-vision – it’s specifically designed for the visually impaired.
For low-vision users, it has a large, high-contrast screen with very simple icons that are -- it’s customizable. The colors right now, it’s white on black, but you could customize that with all the colors that we’re familiar with: Yellow on black, blue and white, things like that. Large icons, and it’s fully vocalized. So –
COMPUTERIZED VOICE: Call, one of nine. Messages, two of nine. Contacts, three of nine.
SS: As I cycle through the main menu here, you’ll hear it talking. Everything talks on this, 100 percent. So it’s super easy to use. As I mentioned, physical buttons. So for the visually impaired, it’s super easy to use.
JM: Describe those buttons and the layout of the phone. It kind of reminded me of an old Nokia.
SS: Exactly. That old 90s style. It’s a candy bar phone – so that’s what they called those old styles. It has the full numerical keypad, and the directional keypad as well. Then, there’s the hang up button -- the call button, the hang up button, and then there’s two menu buttons, which – by default, they’re the volume up and down. One of those, though, if you long press that, it will do voice dictation and also voice control. So I can long press that, and then I can say, call grandma, and it will place that call for me as long as she’s in the contacts. If I’m in a text message field or an Email, I can long press that and dictate the message. So you don’t have to try and type out your whole message on that -- those numbers key pad. Super easy to use. Full-featured. So we’ve got alarm clock, weather, calendar, GPS, timer. It’s got an FM radio, internet radio, the – even has an SOS button on the back – physical button so if something – somebody gets into trouble, they can press that and it will make a phone call to their SOS contact.
And has some low-vision features built in as well, so like, color identifier. You could – we ship it with some QR codes, and you can scan the QR code and assign a voice label to that QR code. So then, you can label everything in your house: All your medication, all your spices in the kitchen, all your clothing and use this to identify those things.
JM: So what type of customer are you targeting, because you have people that use iPhones, you have people that use simple phones. Are you trying to come somewhere in the middle?
SS: This is really ideal for the older generation. They didn’t grow up with technology, they’re losing their vision later in life, and their flip phone maybe doesn’t work for them anymore. They need something more accessible, but they don’t want to bother learning a smart phone. So this is going to be perfect for them. And it doesn’t have to be for the visually impaired. You can actually turn the voice off, and then just have a high-contrast, large print phone with physical buttons for the elder generation.
JM: Which carrier will it work with?
SS: Right now, as I said, this is the initial launch in the U.S. here. We haven’t officially fully launched. That’s going to be another couple of months. But right now, it’s confirmed working 100 percent on GSM networks, so that’s AT&T, T-Mobile, Cricket, Boost, I believe is GSM. And when it fully launches, it will be working with the CDMA networks, Verizon, Sprint, those networks.
JM: What ports are on there for connectivity and charging?
SS: You have a micro-USB charger, which is pretty standard these days. You’ve got a headphone jack.
JM: Hey.
SS: Yeah. Headphones come in the box, but it’s also Bluetooth enabled, so if you have a Bluetooth headphone or a Bluetooth speaker, you can use that as well.
JM: And what’s the battery life like?
SS: Battery life? Easily, you can get about two days. Since it’s not a smart phone with a big old screen on it, you’re not going to be draining the battery like -- you know, as quickly. So really good.
JM: And it is pretty light too, when you hold it?
SS: Yeah. It’s not too – not big at all, slide right in your pocket, nice compact form factor.
JM: Is it based on Android? Is it just -- restrictive to the apps that are on there? Can you load on your own?
SS: Nope. It is based on Android. Android is running there somewhere, but you never even see Android, which also adds to the ease of use. And so you can’t add any apps to it. It’s – so it’s not a smartphone. It’s just a full-featured phone. But the guys at BlindShell are always taking feedback and adding new features all the time.
Free updates for life. You just get a little notification saying you’ve got an update, and you install it. Pretty easy. And they’re happy to add new features in the future.
JM: What are you expecting the price of this to be in the U.S?
SS: We’re looking at about four hundred, four hundred fifty. But as I mentioned before, it’s brand new. Still trying to figure all that out, talk to venders, talk to distributors, talk to mobile carriers, see if we can work out deals with them as well, the VA, things like that.
JM: And you expect it to be available this summer?
SS: Absolutely. Yeah. I – they’re projecting within the next couple of months.
JM: Great. If people want to get more information, what’s the best way to do so?
SS: Contact – you can go to blindshell.com and get information there.
JM: Thank you so much, Sam. Good to have you on.
SS: Thank you.
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Joe Steinkamp is no stranger to the world of technology, having been a user of video magnification and blindness related electronic devices since 1979. Joe has worked in radio, retail management and Vocational Rehabilitation for blind and low vision individuals in Texas. He has been writing about the A.T. Industry for 15 years and podcasting about it for almost a decade.
