Greetings Economists,
First off sorry about the mix up the other day sending my unsubscribe
message to Pen-L. Sent my temporary unsubscription to the wrong address.
Had to go out the door for Los Angeles in a hurry, and of course got tangled
up.
Charles J. wrote an interesting set of remarks about software to which
various people responded. I like what Charles has to say quite a bit. I
went to Los Angeles to a conference on disability and technology held yearly
by the local state university. While Charles' remarks make some sense
concerning about how shoddy software one encounters really is, I thought I
would add in some disability perspective that go beyond Charles'
perspective. First to quote Charles,
Charles,
27 March 2002 02:09 UTC
Re: software
You might think that the WINTEL duopoly and its minions try to coordinate
cycles of planned obsolescence.
However, my own observations lead me to conclude that the software and
hardware are often out of sync. Sometimes the software is not optimized to
make best use of the hardware; sometimes vice versa.
...
I still think what most home and small office users need are relatively
modest hardware platforms dedicated to well-designed suites of software,
with optimization to run as efficiently and trouble-free as possible.
Doyle,
One would hope to have trouble free software for one's needs in computing.
However let's take an example of "Augmented Reality" as discussed in this
months Scientific American. The basis of such computing is that one wears
the computer. For a disabled person who is visually impaired the
performance of the computer...
Sci Amer., April 2002, Vol 286 # 4,
By Steven K Feiner Augmented Reality: A new Way of Seeing,
page 50,
"Getting the right information at the right time and the right place is key
in all these applications. Personal digital assistants such as the Palm and
the Pocket PC can provide timely information using wireless networking and
Global Positioning System (GPS) receivers that constantly track the handheld
devices. But what makes augmented reality different in how the information
is presented: not on a separate display but integrated with the user's
perceptions. This kind of interface minimizes the extra mental effort that
a user has to expend when switching his or her attention back and forth
between real-world tasks and a computer screen. In augmented reality, the
user's view of the world and the computer interface literally become one."
Doyle,
While the above quote is informed by a visual bias, the basic concept
applies as well to a blind person who needs navigation aids accurate down to
the centimeter for traveling in the real world. Aids capable of labeling a
space with information as the blind person faces the space and integrate
into space itself. These sorts of performance demands require the computing
device function in the real world for the average user.
The requirements for this sort of system flow along with 'Web Services'
business applications. That is as one goes about where one lives
communicating the commercial structure of space is important in real time
and moving human beings. This sort of demand upon computing is more than
just a modest hardware platform. Universal signage would be necessary for
blind people, but also advances the interests of web services for ordinary
sighted people.
The upshot of my thoughts here is that mobile computing for the average
person, much like carrying a cell phone is more than a modest hardware
platform. Otherwise though, Charles' remarks reflect my own thoughts on
what the Capitalist economy offers up to people. One can't do much about
that as a working class movement while capitalism is in power. For the
capitalist, if wearable computing becomes necessary to do work, there will
be opportunities to analyze what people work with in their daily lives.
Where workers aren't served well as disabled people usually aren't, what
does it take to strengthen the working class. Especially given many ways in
which wearable computing offers new ways of organizing workers we might ask
what sort of organizing questions could be better answered.
thanks,
Doyle Saylor
