12 Feb 2025

On FOCAL POINT:

• Amanda Heal, Author; Advocate and public speaker, has an offer to support professional women in shifting from feeling unfulfilled; unmotivated; and unappreciated to living a life of purpose and passion that makes a real difference.  
• Rebecca Young, CEO for Access 2 Arts, with news on many audio described and accessible shows and events during the Adelaide Fringe and Festival
• Maureen O Reilly, from the Vision Australia Library, with invitations to a number of in-person and online events - including an In-Conversation with renowned author Emily Maguire and outstanding news for VCE students in Victoria and year 12 students in Queensland and more. 
• Andrew Flatres, Braille Product Manager from Humanware, shares highlights from ATIA (Assistive Technology Industry Association) Conference just held in Orlando.

Resources: 

• Amanda Heal: [e-mail]
• Access 2 Arts: http://www.access2arts.org.au
• Vision Australia Library: https://www.visionaustralia.org/services/library/news 
• ATIA Conference: http://www.atia.org
• Humanware: http://www.humanware.com

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

S1 (00:15):
Good evening and welcome to Focal Point here on Business Radio.
Radio 1190 7 a.m. in Adelaide, online at VA radio,
VA Radio Digital in Adelaide and Darwin through the Community
Radio Plus app. Look for Vision Australia, Radio Adelaide. Your
favourite podcast or streaming service will also find us. Peter
Greco on behalf of Philip Vanderbilt and a big curio

(00:37):
to Wendy McDougall listening in say fabulous to be here.
This program coming to you from Garner Land and if
you're around the Garner Lands, I hope you're keeping cool
and maybe have got a cold drink with you. Coming
up very, very shortly, we'll catch up with Amanda Hill,
who is looking to add some purpose and passion to
your life. So if you're a particular professional person, stay listening.

(01:00):
Amanda's got a great offer for you. Then catch up
with Rebecca Young from Access to Arts. The fringe. The
festival all about to get underway. What's successful? What's sort
of described? Very soon we'll find out from Rebecca. Then
we will catch up with Maureen O'Reilly from the Vision
Australia library. Lots of good things happening there. A chance

(01:21):
for you to get involved with that as well. Doesn't
matter where you live, you can still get involved. And
Andrew Flatters will join us from here. And where the
Asia conference has just been on the Assistive Technology Industry Association,
their big conference in Orlando. Andrew was there. He'll give
us his impressions. If you're listening through 1190 7 a.m.
in Adelaide and 8:00 for your listening pleasure. Lizzie and

(01:44):
Sam are here with studio one. In fact, blow me down.
They're here right now to tell me what is on
studio one tonight.

S2 (01:54):
How do you cope in the world of love and romance.

S3 (01:58):
With Valentine's Day coming up on Friday? We ask a
few friends about their experiences dating.

S2 (02:04):
Join us at 8:00 for studio one.

S1 (02:08):
Well, Amanda Hill is an author for good at technology
as well, and is hoping to maybe help you find
your passion and purpose. Amanda, always great to catch up.
Thank you for your time.

S4 (02:18):
Thank you for having me.

S1 (02:19):
Now you've got a rather interesting, I guess, proposal to
put to some professional women who may be interested.

S4 (02:25):
Well, yes, I, I my vision is to take five
professional women on a 90 day journey to discover their
life's purpose so they can find more fulfillment and meaning
in their lives.

S1 (02:41):
What made you decide to do this?

S4 (02:43):
Well, I worked as a lawyer for 17 years. I
was suddenly made redundant. I sold skin care for a while,
did that badly, retrained as a speaker and coach, and
along the way I discovered my own life's purpose, which
is to inspire and encourage others Lose, and I realized

(03:04):
just how much meaning and direction and passion that gave
my life. And so I thought, well, why not help
other people do the same? So I wrote a book,
and now I'm have turned the book into an online
course and coaching program.

S1 (03:20):
Yeah. We've spoken to you about the book, which I
know was a very, very well received. So in a sense,
it's kind of your lived experience of knowing that there
is more to life than what you might be doing
right now. Not you.

S4 (03:31):
Personally.

S1 (03:32):
But other people.

S4 (03:32):
Absolutely. Yes. It's it's very, very practical. It's got, um, yes,
tips and stuff that I've picked up along the way
and I've learned from others. And yeah, so it's kind
of an expanded and improved upon version of the book.

S5 (03:46):
Do you think it's one of those things.

S1 (03:47):
Where often you hear about you don't know what you've
got till it's gone? Sometimes maybe you don't realize what
you're missing out on until it's pointed out to, you know.

S4 (03:55):
Well, absolutely. I mean, I've just been puttering along with
my job and just gradually over time, I was starting
to feel really like disheartened. Disillusioned. I was dreading getting
up for work each day. My work didn't fulfill me.
I felt like I was sort of really being ignored
and and that nothing I really did made a difference.

(04:18):
And after discovering my life's purpose, it was like, yay!
I have a reason to get up every day, and
I'm excited about it. And my days just fly by.
And you know, nothing is everything is is bright and
shiny and happy. And I mean, well, I mean, of
course there are tough times, but it's my purpose is
like my, I guess, guiding light, really. It keeps me

(04:41):
on track and shows me where to go and gets
me up when things get down. And.

S5 (04:46):
Yeah, and, you know, you talked about.

S1 (04:48):
The fact that, you know, you're kind of not finding
work fulfilling. I guess that also meant you probably weren't
working as well as you could. You weren't as productive
as you could be. So it's a bit of a
sort of a vicious circle.

S4 (04:58):
Yes it was. I was, as my motivation got lower.
I couldn't understand why I never got promoted. And I
was at that stage because I was unmotivated and unhappy.
It's like, well, I'm not going to do a job
more than you're paying me to do. And my so
my supervisors were saying, well, why should we promote you
if you're not stepping up and show us, showing us

(05:19):
you can do the job?

S1 (05:20):
Of course. Uh, sort of, uh, part of that might
be the fact that, uh, you are a person with
a vision impairment, and maybe that might have played a
role in not getting a promotion, but that might be
a topic for another day.

S4 (05:30):
Yes, definitely. Definitely. Yes. It can of worms in that one.

S1 (05:35):
Indeed. So how does the kind of work. Well, you
talked about 90 days. Uh, is there a magic about
90 days or you know, how did you come up
with this?

S4 (05:43):
90 days. Seems like I didn't want it to be
too long, and I didn't want it to be too short.
And I've coached people through the book one on one,
and it took around 90 days. It's to go through
all the all the chapters of the book and in
this case, all the modules of the course. So there
are 1010 modules which take you through all the different, um,

(06:06):
aspects of discovering your purpose, examining your present, examining your past,
and examining your passions and dreams. And also there's like
mindset stuff about dealing with change, um, growing your confidence
and courage, um, building resilience, you know, even even a
little bit on, on mastering your finances. And as the

(06:29):
person goes through those modules, they also have, um, three,
one on one coaching sessions with me, plus a 90
minute Discover Your Purpose session at the end. So yeah,
90 days just seem to be kind of the sweet spot.

S1 (06:43):
And what about as far as, uh, going to be
a little bit maybe confronting in a, in a sense
if maybe you kind of come across stuff that, you know,
maybe that is obvious, but you didn't want to face potentially.

S4 (06:55):
Yeah, potentially with.

S1 (06:56):
Um, part of it anyway.

S4 (06:57):
Thought of it wasn't confronting. I wouldn't say it was
confronting for me, but it was eye opening. I'd say
eye opening because, um, when you do a lot of
deep work and there's a lot of deep work involved,
you watch a 15 minute video and then you go
off and, you know, do some, you know, deep self-reflection.
And I certainly learned a lot about myself. So you

(07:19):
people who do the course will learn a lot about themselves.
But I wouldn't necessarily say confronting more eye opening.

S1 (07:25):
That's a better word. Um, so how does it work?
Is it one on one? Do I kind of, uh,
go away and do it by myself and sort of
get back to you for some support along the way?
How does that all work?

S4 (07:35):
Pretty much yes. So there's two components. There's the video
online video, part of the course where, um, where you
watch a video, like you watch a video and then
you'll do an exercise and then you'll watch a video,
and then you'll do an exercise. And by the end
of the module, which might have three videos in it,
then you'll book in with a coaching call with me,

(07:55):
and we'll work for an hour and unpack all the
stuff you've done in your exercises and deal with any
roadblocks you might be facing or difficulties. And then you
go off and do the next module.

S1 (08:06):
And that is it mainly aimed at a professional woman.

S4 (08:09):
Yes, yes. I mean, I don't have anything against men.
I'm happy to work with men, but I picked professional
women because that's what I was. And I felt that
they would be the easiest people for me to relate to. And,
you know, they could relate to me because we're sort
of coming from the same background as it were.

S1 (08:32):
And I guess you say similar experiences maybe talked about,
for example, not being promoted or not feeling valued. I
guess you can kind of share in those sort of
experiences as well.

S4 (08:42):
Definitely.

S1 (08:43):
Yeah. What about as far as kind of, um, the
accessibility of what you do? How easy is it to access?
You talked about videos and that sort of thing.

S4 (08:52):
Well, I'm building the course out on Kajabi, and I
did a lot of, research into Kajabi, and it is
really quite accessible on a phone, on a mobile phone
and also on a computer. Okay, I'm doing another course myself.
I've done a number of courses on kajabi. So, um, yes,
everything is is accessible. It's accessible for me to build
out and it's more importantly accessible, more accessible for the

(09:16):
the clients. Everything is just like tick boxes, and there's
nothing actual visual in the videos. It's just, you know,
I know sighted people like to see someone talking and
they like to see text on the screen, but there's nothing,
absolutely nothing someone, anyone would miss by not looking at
the screen.

S1 (09:33):
What about as far as, um, I guess sort of
along the way, you know, getting feedback or people think, oh,
I'm not quite sure. Maybe, maybe this isn't for me,
or I might need a bit of a break from it.
I mean, can you kind of opt out? You know,
if if things don't go the way you wanted them
to go?

S4 (09:50):
Potentially. I mean, ideally, ideally someone would go from beginning
to end, but, um, you know, we're all humans. We
all have lives. Things happen. So very happy to be
within reason, you know, flexible with with people's life circumstances. Yes.

S1 (10:04):
How about as far as, uh, the sort of cost
of it goes? Are you happy to talk a bit
about that?

S4 (10:09):
It's. Well, it's kind of a tricky thing because it's,
it's kind of a little bit tailored. So the cost
can potentially vary from person to person. There is an
investment involved and it's, it's, you know, a reasonable investment.
But it's, you know, there's a great deal of value
in the course and it is life changing. And yeah,

(10:31):
so there is an investment, but I don't think I
want to give you an exact number.

S1 (10:37):
And is that because if you pay for something you're
more likely to see it out? If, if you say, look,
I got this free offer for everyone, then people are
going to take it up. Don't really, uh, aren't really
committed to it and that sort of thing. So. Exactly. Yeah.

S4 (10:50):
You have hit the nail on the head. It it is,
it is priced Christ so that someone who who buys
that will go. Mm. Okay. I've invested in this course.
Now I'm actually going to do it. I mean, the
number of $37 courses, you know, $195 courses I've enrolled
in and I've done half and just quit. But then

(11:11):
if you have a larger investment, you're much more likely
to value it more highly and put more into it.

S1 (11:18):
You've been going for a little while. What sort of
feedback have you got? So I know your book was
very well received, and I was actually lucky to get
a I might have been a discounted version of the book,
which I enjoyed reading. I mean, that's obviously a good
sort of litmus test for what you're doing.

S4 (11:33):
Yes, I've, I have had very good feedback on the book. Um,
the course is just starting, which is, uh, so, you know,
anyone who enters in will actually get a substantial discount
for the first five participants. Um, I think it's. Oh,
what is it? It's not quite it's not quite 50% off,
but it's, you know, it is quite a substantial discount

(11:55):
that they'll get. Being for the first five participants.

S1 (11:58):
What the the early bird gets the worm. I mean,
if we go around Australia on the Australia Radio Network
and indeed around the world on the internet, does it
matter where people live or where women live if they're
not necessarily in Australia? Does that matter?

S4 (12:11):
No, not at all. Not at all. Um. Can be
I can. The videos are, of course, self-paced, so you
can watch them at any time. But, you know, I'm,
I've been dealing with people all over the world in
various roles that I've played for years. So, you know, I've,
I've been known to interview someone at midnight because they
were in America and, you know, whatnot. So, yeah, very

(12:33):
happy to be flexible anywhere in the world.

S1 (12:35):
What about how it's changed you or how it's developed you?
I'm going to assume you're probably, you know, better rounded,
better equipped than you were when you started this. And
and then, you know, 17 years ago or four years
ago or whatever.

S4 (12:47):
Oh, I'm, I am a completely different person to what
I was when I was made redundant from my legal
career in 2014. I'm happy I'm fulfilled. I'm working at
my best. I, you know, jump out of bed each
day when the alarm goes off because it's like, yay!
I get to inspire and encourage more people today. This

(13:07):
is great. So yes, I'm I am a completely different
and much more productive. Yeah, completely different person than I was. Yes.
And that's what I hope for. What other people will
or I know that other people will achieve.

S1 (13:20):
And that energy is so important, isn't it? You know,
if you've got good energy, if you're emitting good energy,
I'm not sure if that's the right word, but you
know what I mean. If you're giving off good vibes
when you're working with people, they pick up on that
and kind of can capitalize and be energized themselves from it,
particularly if they're feeling a little bit down.

S4 (13:37):
Absolutely. Yes, absolutely.

S1 (13:40):
All right. Now, what about as far as if people
wanted to find out more or maybe spread the word,
perhaps if someone listening in might know a woman working
in the professional area that might think, I think, um,
this person might benefit. And you're talking about any kind
of profession. I mean, you talked about yourself being in law,
but it doesn't.

S4 (13:58):
Any kind.

S1 (13:59):
Of profession. Yeah, yeah. All right, so what's the kind
of first step?

S4 (14:02):
Just shoot me an email at, um, because the program
is called purpose, vision future. And so just shoot me
an email at info at Purpose vision. Com and I
will message you back and we can, you know, possibly
book in a call and, or, you know, short call
to see if we're a good fit and go from there.

S1 (14:22):
I was going to ask you about that actually at
the beginning. So you kind of do a bit of a,
an idea of what the person is that that is
applying and kind of get a bit of a feel
as to what they're about and indeed whether what you're
proposing might work as well. You kind of, uh, get
a sense someone's, uh, sort of intentions, if I can
put it that way.

S4 (14:40):
Absolutely. Yeah. After emailing, uh, maybe a message or two
back and forth, then we we I booked them on
a 15 minute call and we just, you know, get
to know each other a little bit. I can give
them a little bit of information and then if they
want to proceed, we can go from there. If they're
not a good fit, then I can possibly recommend them

(15:01):
to someone else.

S1 (15:01):
Okay. So if you think, well, actually what I'm offering
isn't probably going to work for you. You have to
assure people that you're not going to call them, lead
them up the proverbial garden path.

S4 (15:10):
Oh, gosh. No, I'm I'm not here. I mean, of
course I'm here to make money. We have to pay
the bills. But my primary purpose is to serve, and
I if my program is not going to serve someone.
In fact, I had a conversation with someone just the
other day and we were talking away. And I went,
you know what? I don't think you're ready for this.

(15:31):
So I gave her some information to help her from
where she was at, and we parted ways and everything
was rosy.

S1 (15:39):
And your experience in this area kind of you can
you can pick up on those sort of things. Yeah, yeah.
All right. Give us your email address. And also, I
guess it doesn't matter what sort of age a woman is,
as long as that kind of, uh, professional. Um, that's
kind of a prerequisite, if I can put it that way.

S4 (15:56):
Yeah. So basically, if they're feeling that they're lacking meaning
and fulfillment in their lives, that's the person, the sort
of person that I'm looking for. And they're they're willing
to invest in themselves and they're willing to to do
the work. Uh, absolutely. Uh, so my address is info
at Vision Futures. Com.

S1 (16:16):
Alright. We'll put that up with our show notes. And
always great to catch up. You got a you have
got a good energy about you I can say that. So, uh,
good luck with it. And well, I guess in all seriousness,
if one person benefits from it, it's been worthwhile.

S4 (16:28):
Absolutely. And thank you so much for the opportunity.

S1 (16:30):
It's mad to hear their, uh, who's they're offering that
to a very generous thing there. So maybe if you
or someone you know could benefit from that, get in
touch and we'll put all that information up with our
show notes as well. Well, I reckon I say this

(16:53):
every year that Rebecca Young has Christmas in December and then, uh,
barely turns around and it's Christmas again because the French
and the foreign. Rebecca Young is the CEO for access
to us. Rebecca, welcome. Happy New Year and great to
have you back.

S6 (17:07):
Thanks, Peter. It's great to be back. And we are
certainly off to a flying start to the year.

S1 (17:12):
You probably don't really get much time off because, well,
I guess the other thing is you probably do a
lot of planning beforehand so you can have a bit
of a break.

S6 (17:19):
Absolutely. Our, uh, our friends and festival season planning definitely
starts back in October and November. But, yeah, it's a pretty, uh,
short break over December because, uh, everyone is keen to
get going.

S1 (17:32):
And you're getting going with the flying start. I guess
starting with the fringe. Uh, poster. Uh, you got some
good news about that?

S6 (17:39):
Yes, absolutely. So we have a wonderful access partnership with fringe.
And one of the A things that we do as
part of that, um, partnership is, uh, we, I suppose,
donate the, uh, audio description of the French poster every
year because we know that, uh, all of the fringe
merchandise and signs and all of the advertising featured an

(18:04):
incredible new piece of artwork each year. Um, so I
think it's only fair that the community can access the
audio description and find out a bit, a bit more
about what the artwork looks like.

S1 (18:14):
And how can we do that?

S6 (18:15):
Well, you can do that on the fringe website. Um,
and I believe you can also do that on the
Access to Artwork site.

S1 (18:22):
You could do it on your access because I have
done it, but, uh, I was on the fringe as well.
That's kind of cool. And I mean, that kind of partnership,
if you like that collaboration that is so important, isn't it?

S6 (18:33):
It really is. Um, and through, um, that partnership, we
also describe each year the First Nations cultural tours that
they do at the beginning of fringe, which is a
beautiful opportunity to walk through the Botanic Gardens with a
First Nations guide and find out a little bit more about, um,

(18:53):
the Ghana culture and their connection to land and plants
and how it all comes together.

S1 (18:59):
What can we hear about the Welcome to Country at different, uh,
events and stuff? But I guess this is kind of
taking that a little bit further and kind of, you know, really, uh,
getting getting right into it rather than just, uh, you know,
sort of a ceremonial thing.

S6 (19:12):
Absolutely. It's, um, it's really getting to, um, have a
guide to take you around. And those tours are amazing
because they're talking about plants, so they're quite tactile and
there's smell, and you can feel different, different plants and
leaves and really, um, and obviously our audio describers, uh,
walk around with the group, um, and describe things as

(19:34):
they go, but it's that lovely, um, sort of two
way event where, um, patrons can ask questions of both
the guide and of the audio describers if they want
more description of certain elements.

S1 (19:45):
We talked about lived experience in all walks of life,
and kind of that is one, isn't it? When you've
got someone with that background that can kind of be
part of it, that gives a lot of cred.

S6 (19:54):
Absolutely.

S1 (19:55):
You've got some good news regarding one of your staff members.

S6 (19:58):
Yes. Uh, our, um, delightful Abby Madden, who's our training coordinator, was, uh,
lucky enough to get a leadership scholarship with Actnow Theatre,
so that is fantastic. It will give her some opportunities
to work with other, um, sort of leaders from different
intersectional groups within arts and culture. So that will be

(20:19):
really lovely for her.

S1 (20:20):
Well, I'll just pick you up on a word. They're
not lucky enough. No. Good enough, I think. Bec.

S6 (20:24):
Yes.

S1 (20:25):
Yeah. Well, congratulations, Abby. That's a wonderful recognition. I guess
it kind of, you know, puts an exclamation mark to
the people that you employ as well. If I could
put it that way.

S6 (20:35):
Absolutely. I am incredibly fortunate to have an excellent team
with a diverse range of lived experience and lots of
great skills and lots of interesting backgrounds as practicing artists
as well, which really helps to bring their work to life.
Because not only are they incredible access consultants and arts workers,

(21:00):
they're also, um, all artists in their own right.

S1 (21:03):
As you said before, it's a small team, but a
very quality team, which is very, very important.

S6 (21:08):
Yes.

S1 (21:09):
All right. We'll give people details as to how they
can get in touch. Yeah. Before we wrap up, what
about some of the things that are on at the moment?
Something pretty cool is happening at the art gallery. I
actually spoke to someone who went to this over the weekend, uh, this, um,
radical textile exhibition.

S6 (21:24):
Yes. Um, radicals textiles is super interesting at that gallery.
Lots of really interesting pieces of work there. And obviously
some audio described tours, um, which is fantastic. Um, with
our wonderful describers. And there will also be audio descriptions in, uh,

(21:45):
next door to the art gallery, um, at the SA
museum for the incredible new um Galloway Hoard, which has
come over from Scotland, and it's an exhibition of, um,
Viking treasures. Okay, so I was lucky enough to go
to the opening on, um, Friday night and get a

(22:05):
little sneak peek of that, but our describers have been
doing lots of work on recorded descriptions for that, and
we would, um, which aren't open yet, but we'll be
very soon. Um, and we'd love feedback on how that goes,
because we've tried a new thing with adding some, um,
directional information from each audio description as well, so that

(22:25):
it helps you to get to the next exhibit.

S1 (22:27):
Okay. A bit of, uh, well, you know, organization like maps, uh,
do things like that or in a different sort of way.
So I guess it's just kind of adds to, you know,
once independence and just sort of, uh, getting their familiarity
with their surroundings as well?

S6 (22:42):
Absolutely. So, um, yes, but that is a super exciting exhibition,
and I'm really looking forward to hearing people's thoughts about
the audio description, because it will be beautiful.

S1 (22:54):
For people listening to those with that exhibition in the
art gallery. It's also going to have, uh, Auslan and
also there's going to be a quiet session as well,
relaxation as well.

S6 (23:03):
Absolutely. The art gallery is doing lots of things with that,
and there are some incredible pieces of work in there.
One of my favourites is one, um, I've been quite
familiar with for, um, many years, which is an incredible
tapestry done by women from the deaf community, um, of, uh, fingerspelling.
So each of the, each of the letters of the alphabet, um,

(23:25):
and I know that was a centrepiece at two, six,
two South Terrace.

S1 (23:28):
The old. Yeah.

S6 (23:29):
The old, uh, deaf.

S7 (23:31):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

S6 (23:32):
So, yes. And there's a lovely young deaf man, William,
who has done some, some, uh, great interpretive, uh, videos
around that piece of work as well.

S1 (23:42):
Oh, how cool is that? Well, actually, I don't want
to make it about me, Rebecca, but having gone to
Townsend back a few years ago and we had the
kids who were deaf or hearing impaired in the school,
we learned finger spelling as well, which is a great
way to communicate. And, you know, they might have had
a bit of an idea about Braille, and we had
a bit of an idea about fingerspelling. So talk about
intersectional work, things coming together. That was kind of a

(24:04):
bit of a bit of that in a nutshell as well.

S6 (24:06):
Absolutely. Well, as you know, Peter, I was yes, I
worked at Townsend House in uh, deaf can do and
can do for kids for many years. But I would
say my fingerspelling is slightly rustier than it should be.

S1 (24:19):
Oh well.

S6 (24:19):
Probably.

S1 (24:20):
Yeah, it's probably the sort of thing that a bit
like riding a bike back. Maybe if you use it
after a while it would kind of come back. But I,
I certainly remember through some of the letters actually. And uh,
if you've got young people in your, in your family that, uh,
sometimes learn this sort of thing either for fun or
at school, you can kind of, uh, be refreshed as well, but, uh,
it's enough about it's enough about aspect. Now I see that, uh,

(24:42):
Catherine Fitzgerald's, uh, exhibition is not the Pepper Street. Is
that closed yet, or is it opened in January?

S6 (24:48):
I believe it's still open.

S1 (24:50):
Yeah, I think so.

S6 (24:50):
Moment. Um, and she's again done a great job with
recorded audio descriptions for that. She's done I think it's
something like 60 audio description she's done as part of that, uh, exhibition.
And it was you know, it was actually, you know,
a beautiful story because I first met Catherine walking into
the launch of fringe several years ago with her, um, mother, Marjorie,

(25:14):
who's a patron of the fringe and a long time, um, uh,
incredible person in arts and culture. And so I, uh,
but I hadn't met her before and sort of mentioned, uh,
to Marjorie that I liked her dress, which she had made.
And she got chatting to my husband, who decided to
waltz her around while we were waiting in the line.
And I got chatting to Catherine, who said, oh, all.

(25:37):
I've been wanting to do this new exhibition and I
want to put more access in, and I didn't really
know where to start. So can I come and have
a coffee? And from that coffee, she has trained as
an audio describer, um, and is now providing all sorts
of incredible access in her exhibition. So it was a
just a lovely chance meeting that has led to some

(25:59):
really incredible work down the track.

S1 (26:01):
Well, if people kind of want to do the right
thing and, you know, just the opportunity comes up and
then people take advantage of it.

S6 (26:07):
Absolutely, absolutely. And look, we find most of our audio
describers are artists themselves in a lot of ways, which
really gives them the understanding of how to describe the
work technically, but also often that beautiful turn of phrase
that makes it lovely to listen to as well.

S1 (26:24):
You know, there's another event coming up this Saturday night
at Hart's Mill.

S6 (26:27):
Ah, yes, there is amplify, which will be a really
great event. Um, we've just finished putting together an access
guide for it, but amplify sigh is a music festival.
An accessible music festival. So, um, really aimed, uh, firmly
at people with disability, um, and lots of different types

(26:48):
of access there, as well as lots of artists playing
with lived experience. There should be lots of fun.

S1 (26:56):
But, uh, I learned so much from your newsletters and
your website, etc.. Are you aware of this show coming up? Uh,
I'm not sure how to pronounce it, but it's got
the word hag word hag in it, and it's kind of, uh,
you know, the the changing meaning of hag over the years.

S6 (27:12):
Oh, no, I am not across that one, but.

S1 (27:14):
Okay. Um, well, it's in your newsletter. No, you don't
you can't read everywhere. But it's really fascinating because the
word hag for women is, well, you know, sort of
insulting and and quite denigrating, but it kind of talks
a bit about how, uh, it originally started, which I
thought was really, really fascinating. So.

S6 (27:31):
Yeah. Absolutely. And, you know, one of the things we
talk about a lot when we're doing training with organizations
is how communities take back language that's traditionally used to
denigrate them. Um, and, you know, take ownership back of
that language. But also, we spend a lot of time
talking to people about how it's not appropriate for them
to use that language if they're not part of that community.

S1 (27:53):
Well, yes. I hope people didn't take that the wrong way,
but I learn about it every day. But it's good
to point that sort of stuff out. And just before
we give you the details, we actually spoke last week
to Tony Doyle, who's very, very excited about his vistas
and visions of a blind man coming up on March
the 1st. And, uh, well, he said it was the
only show at the fringe, but I think he might

(28:14):
have been taking a bit of poetic license about that.

S6 (28:18):
Possibly a bit of poetic license. But, um, I was
fortunate enough to, uh, to get a sneak preview of
Tony's work, uh, late last year, and, um, it is
absolutely excellent. So I would, uh, would really encourage people
to get along to that.

S1 (28:34):
Well, I would add to that, encourage people to get
along and heckle because I think Tony would like heckling.
I think he'd like I think he'd like the opportunity
to respond.

S6 (28:42):
Well, you know, if you heckle, he knows there's lots
of people there, right?

S1 (28:45):
Oh, exactly. Yeah, that's a great point. But, um, how
can people get in touch if there's so much more
on and what we'll do and what I'll do is
get in touch with you and maybe see if we
can speak to some of the shows that are coming
up during the fringe of the festival as well. So
give them a bit of publicity. But in the meantime,
how can we get in touch?

S6 (29:02):
You can check out our website, which is Access to
Arts with the number two. Org and you can give
us a call on 84631689. But do remember we are
a little part time team. So if you want to
chat to someone and no one answers, definitely leave a message.

S1 (29:22):
And you will be called back.

S6 (29:23):
Yes.

S1 (29:24):
Great to catch up. It's going to be fantastic. Particularly
the night. It's going to be fantastic, right? Throughout the year. Uh,
this is kind of just the start of it. Look
forward to keeping in touch right throughout the year.

S6 (29:33):
Look forward to talking more. Peter and I wish everyone
an excellent, fun festival season.

S1 (29:39):
Yes, well, I think the weather's just going to be
cooling down enough to enjoy, so it should be good fun.

S6 (29:44):
Let's hope.

S1 (29:44):
Thanks to the CEO for access to us. Access to us.
As always, all that information up with our show notes.

S8 (29:54):
Yo, Holmes! What up? What up with you? What we
gonna say? What we gonna do? Where are we gonna go?
What are we gonna see? We're going to the library.

S1 (30:03):
Well, it's back for a new year. Our regular catch
ups with the Australia Library. Moreno. Moreno Riley is on
the line. Maureen, welcome. Happy new year.

S9 (30:13):
Happy New Year to you, too, Peter. I hope you
had a wonderful Christmas break.

S1 (30:18):
I had a nice break. Yes. You know, I just
thought I didn't do too much exciting. But, uh, always
good to, uh, have a bit of a switch the
brain off and come back and all. Refresh. Now, um,
you've come back all refreshed with a number of activities on.
You've got something coming up, Valentine's Day.

S9 (30:33):
Ah, we do indeed. We have a wonderful way to
spend Valentine's Day with Emily Maguire. So this Friday we
have our in conversation. So it's our first major event
for the year. And Emily is going to be discussing
her latest book, rapture. So it will be really exciting.

(30:53):
Emily's written many books and many, many, many articles, but
her book An Isolated Incident was just shortlisted for the
Stella Prize, the Miles Franklin Literary Award, the Australian Book
Industry Awards, Literary Fiction Book of the year, and she's
already being just talked about everywhere. It was astonishing. And

(31:16):
because I was obviously going to read it, I couldn't
get a copy of it at any of my libraries.
I couldn't get a copy in my local bookstore. So
I think it's going to be really very exciting to
talk to Emily about why she thinks that this book
is really causing such a furor everywhere.

S1 (31:35):
What's the secret sauce? It's the question, isn't it? What
makes it so good?

S9 (31:39):
That's it. And that is really fun. We actually had
a little bit of a chat to her when we
did an in conversation with her father. Les.

S1 (31:46):
Oh, yeah.

S9 (31:48):
June last year. Yeah, yeah. Yes.

S1 (31:50):
Of course. I'm. Now I'm connecting the dots. Yeah. I
left was tremendous, by the way. I'm sure I did.
Thank you for arranging, les, but what a what a
what an amazing individual. And what a wonderful story that
les told about himself. Yeah.

S9 (32:03):
So Emily helped him in transcribing and so forth his book,
and also joined him as a little cameo appearance on
his in conversation. So now she gets to have a
starring role on Friday. Well, it's online via zoom and
it's at 3 p.m. till 4 p.m. and that's Melbourne time.
So our our lovely listeners on the West Coast and

(32:26):
Northern Territory and Queensland need to remember that we are
on daylight saving time in Melbourne, but it's 3 to
4 p.m.. You just need to register to get a
link and you can put questions into the chat for Emily.
Or you can just listen to Emily and I have
a lovely chat for an hour.

S1 (32:45):
We'll give you contact details before we wrap up and
also put the link to register on our show notes,
but that sounds fantastic. And for those that might not
be aware, these are very, very popular. And they're also
they're also accessible afterwards if you can't actually get there
on the day.

S9 (33:00):
They are indeed. So all of our conversations. So this
one with Emily and even the one with les that
we ran last year, are all on the Access Library website.
So all of our library members can go in there.
You search under podcasts and you look for the in
conversations and all our conversations, including the Melbourne Writers Festival

(33:22):
last year. They're all there. So you can just listen
at your leisure.

S1 (33:25):
And obviously for budding writers, or maybe someone that is
thinking of Think of maybe maybe making a career of
it or writing just for a hobby, but. Or if
you just like hearing about, uh, a good, uh, writer
and the way they kind of operate.

S9 (33:37):
Yeah. I mean, I often I'll be interviewing Emily and
I'll be asking her about, you know, how she goes
about the writing process, how particularly after you have such
a successful book, you actually, you know, get back in
there and think, no, no, I'm not a one hit wonder.
I can do this. And you know, all those little
demons that play in your mind, I suppose, how she

(33:58):
manages to work through those and put out such amazing
pieces of literature.

S1 (34:02):
Terrific. Alright, well, that's, uh, Friday. Uh, we'll give details,
as I say, before we wrap up, where would you
like to go to next?

S9 (34:09):
Well, we also then have a new program, which is
coming out the following week on the 20th of February,
and this is our sun kissed summer book chat with
our librarians. So we are having a quarterly book chat
with our librarians. So for our summer edition we have
Sarah Bladon, who's coming. Sarah is our manager of the library,

(34:33):
and she's going to review two books for us. And
she will basically channel her inner Margaret Pomeranz or David
Stratton and sit there providing a review of that most
recent read. So she's going to review two books, but
also not just saying what it's about, very much discussing

(34:55):
the author, their previous works, and no holds barred appraisal
of the novel that she's been reading. And then after
Sarah's done her two, I get to do one. So
I'm actually going to chat about, um, Emily's rapture, given
I've just finished reading that, and then all of our attendees,
assuming they want to, are then invited to also do

(35:18):
a review on the book that they've most recently been reading,
or even a favorite book that they've read. And Irrespective
of the depth and breadth of their bookshelf. It's just
everyone choosing one book and one author and having a
chat about, you know, what's good, bad and ugly about

(35:38):
it with the idea that by the end of that
one hour, everyone will walk away with at least one
book that they think. Yep, that sounds great. I want
to read that. That's really up my alley. So they'll
at least have myself and my colleague be. Sarah's going
to do two books, and then all the other attendees

(35:59):
that are comfortable doing it, providing a review of a
single book. So it's a bit like a book club,
but instead of all of us talking about the same book,
we'll all talk about a different book.

S1 (36:11):
All right. I'm being the devil's advocate here, Maureen. Maybe
if you hear about a book of the guy that
doesn't appeal, I can scrub that off the list. I mean,
that's another way of looking at it, maybe a bit negatively,
but a different way of looking at it.

S9 (36:23):
No, but I think that's actually a good way of
looking at it, because one of the very, very frequent
phone calls that we get into the library is, what
should I read? What have you got that's a new release?
Or I really like this author, but I've read all
of their works. Can you recommend another author or. I
really like the genre of crime fiction. What have you

(36:43):
got that's within that genre? So it's a great way
for people to populate their virtual bookshelf and to get
a list of reads for the new year.

S1 (36:54):
And a good time to do it. I mean, people
might have, you know, had their fill, if you like,
or used up all their titles that they might have
wanted to read during the holiday period. So yeah, kind
of a fresh start to the year as far as
your reading approach goes too.

S9 (37:08):
I also think it's one of those things. I mean,
I love going into, um, a bookshelf, a bookshelf, a bookshop,
and just browsing and looking at the little promos I
have on different books. And it's like an online, online
way of doing that. So you don't actually go into
a bookshop or into a physical library, but you have

(37:29):
that same experience where you can get motivated to try
a new book, read this author, see what else that
author has had. And instead of just reading the, you know,
the promos on the back of a book, which are
always very positive, actually listening to people who might say, actually,
I thought it was fairly repetitive. I thought it was

(37:51):
similar to a book, you know, or I thought it
was actually a bit predictable, the ending. So you get
to actually have a nice warts and all analysis of
the books that people have read.

S1 (38:04):
Yeah, that's a great way to put it. You know,
you don't have any, uh, sales person trying to sell
it to you. Now that's the 20th, which is the Thursday. Again,
people can register for that.

S9 (38:14):
They can indeed. So they just need to go on
to our website, which is Vision Australia. Library. And if
you scan down to the What's on section, you will
see all the little event tiles. And you just pop on.
These are all free events and you register and you'll

(38:34):
be sent a zoom link. And then you just need
to click on that zoom link and join us. And
the 20th of Feb, uh, that one's actually conveniently sitting
over lunchtime. So that's from one till 2 p.m.. So
even if you're working or you've got a busy morning
with commitments, everyone needs to have a break over lunch
and you can just make a sandwich, nice cup of

(38:57):
tea and sit down and get some inspiration for some
new books.

S1 (39:01):
All right. And also, uh, that's uh, again, uh, Eastern
Daylight Saving time that you're talking.

S10 (39:07):
It is indeed. That was going to be my.

S9 (39:08):
Very next reminder that we do have daylight saving time
in Melbourne, just to confuse the rest of the country.
So you need to make sure that you're factoring in
that hour. Otherwise, you're going to arrive an hour late.

S1 (39:21):
All right. You might be having lunch at a very
unusual time. I'll be having breakfast actually, in Perth when
that's on, but that's okay as well.

S9 (39:28):
Morning tea, depending what time.

S1 (39:29):
You get up. Yeah that's right. Yes. I think we probably, uh,
all do it different ways. Is there one more thing
you'd like to tell us about? Because we're running out
of time, as we always do.

S9 (39:38):
Yes. There's one more thing that we have up, which
is our Felix Library, which is our beautiful children's library.
They're having a showcase webinar on the 13th of February.
So that's this Thursday coming up. And that's designed for
parents and teachers and educators of children with a disability.

(39:58):
So we're welcoming everyone to join us. It's just a
half hour from two till 230. Again, that's Melbourne time
and it's to let everyone know what library services are
available for children with a print disability. So whether your
child or your student, um, has blindness, low vision, dyslexia,

(40:19):
a cognitive or a physical disability, Ability, what resources that
we have in terms of tactile reading, source resources that
you can borrow and access through the Vision Australia library.
So that may be our Felix kits, our print braille,
our audio, our decodable readers. So many things that we

(40:41):
can equip teachers and parents with to help them in
supporting literacy for those children, so that at an early stage,
they can all enjoy the magic of stories, but also
that they end up with that lifelong power of literacy.

S1 (40:59):
It is such a powerful point, isn't it, as you say,
for kids to kind of and also, I mean, the
other thing is like, they feel included. They're feeling like, well,
if their siblings are reading or into that sort of
stuff or, you know, they're right, they're part of that
as well.

S9 (41:12):
Well, and the Felix books are beautiful. They are a
tactile book. And then there's an audio recorder with them
so that they can actually listen to the story while
they're feeling all the different elements of the book. And
then there's usually a little toy that goes with it.
So if the book's about dinosaurs, it'll have a little
dinosaur in there, and they're just a wonderful kit that

(41:36):
gets sent out to the families. And then when they've
finished with it and they've listened to it, as long
as they want, they'll send it back and can request
another specific book or a type of book. Or they
might say, oh, I love the Harry Mcclary's. I'd like those.
And it's just exciting. You know, they have new books
that just arrive on their doorstep for them.

S1 (41:57):
Terrific. A great way to introduce them at a nice
early age. Penny coming up. And we'll we'll chat to
you right throughout the year with the different activities. So
if people want to find out more about anything.

S9 (42:08):
One more in very quickly.

S1 (42:09):
Ah yes. Nicely.

S10 (42:11):
Yeah.

S9 (42:11):
I just want to remind all of our parents, of
our students that are entering their VCE A year this year.
So all our year 12 students with a print disability
that we have all of the VCE, which is the
Victorian English and English as an additional language texts within

(42:33):
the Vision Australia Library. We also have all the Queensland
Curriculum Authority, English and English as a language text within
our library. And then for the remainder of the states
across the country, we actually have the majority of them,
but we don't have that 100% coverage at this point.
But we're actually working with the other states to do

(42:55):
that for them as well. But I really I wish
the best of luck for all of our year 12 students.
But I want to tell them that particularly Victorian and
Queensland students, all of their texts are in our library.
And for all the other states, I really encourage the
parents and the teachers to have a look and check

(43:16):
whether or not their children's texts are in there as well.

S1 (43:19):
But it's such an important message because access to information
in a timely way is critical, isn't it?

S9 (43:24):
Oh it is. I mean, we already had the 2026 books,
all organised for Victoria and Queensland, and we're reaching out
now to the other states as well, because we really
want to equip our library members and what is such
a difficult year for everyone that they've got all the
advantages possible.

S1 (43:44):
One less thing to worry about, isn't it?

S9 (43:45):
It is. And I think there's enough things to worry
about in that year. 12 year.

S1 (43:50):
Maureen, how can we find you?

S9 (43:51):
You can find us online at Vision Australia. Library. Alternatively,
you can phone us on 1300 654 656, and any of our
team will help you by either populating your bookshelf with
the books that you may want, or telling you how

(44:13):
you can become a library member.

S1 (44:15):
Maureen, great to catch up! Happy New Year! We look
forward to catching up with you throughout the year.

S9 (44:19):
I can't wait. I have a great year.

S1 (44:22):
Thank you guys. That's a very enthusiastic and bubbly Maureen
O'Reilly from the Vision Australia Library. All that information up
with our show notes.

S11 (44:31):
You're listening to Focal Point on Vision Australia Radio.

S1 (44:34):
On VA radio digital.

S11 (44:36):
And online at npr.org.

S1 (44:38):
Hope you're enjoying the program. Well, Asia has just been
on the Assistive Technology Industry Association's conference. Andrew was there
from Humanware. He's the product manager. Andrew, great to catch up. Welcome.

S12 (44:54):
Thanks, Peter. Thanks for inviting me.

S1 (44:55):
How was it?

S12 (44:56):
Wow. Uh, well, apart from the lovely temperature of Orlando. Um,
it was actually a fantastic show, I have to say. Um,
probably one of the busiest Asia that I've. That I've
been to. And it's great to see the attendance or
the attendees increasing year by year, you know, compared to
last year. And of course, we had the breakup of
the Covid days. day. So it's really good to see

(45:18):
that many people are attending these, these conferences as, as
it means so much right to those that are supporting
users that are visually impaired or just need assistive technology
to obviously, those that actually come and want to try
out some software or hardware pieces, which is equally important.

S1 (45:36):
So who's there? Who's there? Both kind of exhibiting and
also consuming, if I can put it that way.

S12 (45:41):
Yeah, I guess majority of the attire kind of conference
is really based around the education sector. Um, I don't
know if that was the intended path, but that's kind
of how it's been. So there's a lot of teachers
of the visually impaired that we speak to a human wear.
Of course. Uh, and then just those that are supporting
other assistive technology. So it's really kind of the foundation

(46:03):
around it is based around education and many different organizations have,
you know, of course, are involved showcasing what they have
to offer.

S1 (46:11):
What impressed you? Anything in particular that kind of sort
of a take home message?

S12 (46:15):
Well, I think there's a lot to explore. I mean,
from if we look at just the kind of the
low vision, uh, visually impaired sector, blind sector, what really
surprised me was the lack of braille. So we say,
which is very unusual. I mean, you obviously have predominantly
the humanware Braille devices. Uh, braille displays. And of course,

(46:35):
you have the American printing house there. So all the
way from Braille displays to, of course, monarch. Um, but
very little braille display. So there was no braille displays
from the, um, the sparrow, uh, which was, uh, very unusual.
They just really had their low vision magnifiers and CCTVs displayed.
Then you've got the, uh, company that advertised the euro

(46:59):
Braille or the B note, shall we say. So this
is a B note based. It's a note taker and
displays B note is based around a windows note taker.
And you've got, um, the old inside one company. Uh,
that They are, or they are pushing the new inside Supreme.
So those that you may not be aware, there's the

(47:21):
windows note taker tablet that was that was glass had
indented keys. And now they've introduced a newer version which
is these inside Supreme which is actually using physical keys.
And I assume that they're kind of based around their fee,
but that they had from the predecessor. Um, they've gone
down that direction. But apart from that, that was really it. Uh,

(47:43):
there was no kind of orbit technology there. There was
no Selva, which was the, the Hims products. Um, so yeah,
that was that was very surprising. But nevertheless, there was
a lot of new organizations, kind of new products that
were being launched. And I really go there around obviously
about sessions. So I do a lot of sessions that we,
we base around like Humanware. But I also like to

(48:06):
have a view around the conference to see, okay, well,
what other technology, whatever, um, barriers that, um, are being
tackled that we could potentially implement at Humanware. And that's
what we've done in the past from many, many collaborations
and opportunities that we've worked together with other companies to
include software pieces or even hardware pieces into our product portfolio.

(48:30):
One example I will give is, is things like the
dolphin partnership that Humanware has. So we've we've collaborated with
dolphin for over seven years now, I believe maybe a
little bit more just on the adding the Easy Reader
library into our products. So we have the Easy Reader

(48:51):
Plus app that's on our note takers that allows you
to access books. And then, of course, you've got the
art that also is integrated with their software development kit.
So for me, it gives me a great opportunity to
see what else is out there, to see if there
are things that we can partner with. And it's just
great to see all this lovely, wonderful assistive technology, things

(49:11):
that you, you don't even think of.

S1 (49:13):
Pardon the pun, but should we read anything into the
fact that there wasn't a lot of brow stuff around,
or was it just kind of one of those years,
if I could put it that way?

S12 (49:21):
Well, I don't know, maybe. I mean, I think it's during,
you know, we look at the market now in the
assistive technology market. It is a tough market. I have
to say. It's very tough. You know, we've been very
fortunate at Humanware. We've had, um, very good partnerships that
we've been working together with, such as the NFB, sorry,
the NLS, um, the National Library services with our braille displays.

(49:44):
So there's an NLS reader, then, of course, we've got
our partnership with the American Printing House, um, which, you know,
really is a good, solid foundation. And, um, I think
it's difficult out there in times at the moment. I
think for every assistive technology company, it's very difficult times.
And that's probably why we're seeing less and less Braille

(50:05):
or less and less, you know, other involvement in kind
of Braille. But at the same time, it's it's also
a good time to time to be in bras because
there is a lot of products to choose from. So, um,
maybe that's the problem. Maybe there's too many products to
choose from, and those that you know are less fortunate
that haven't really been successful. Um, but, you know, from
a human point of view and my point of view

(50:26):
where Braille is kind of in our DNA. Um, I
love new products. New braille products. I love to see
new technology. Certainly, CSUN is one of the bigger major events,
which is more of an international. And definitely I would
I would assume that you'd start to see a lot
more Braille stuff, uh, start to see new technology. Uh,

(50:48):
there was one gentleman, one young lad, actually, from a
university who was showcasing some new Braille technology. So I
had a chance to discuss what was he introducing and
what the university project was introducing. And again, it's one
thing that we've always done at Humanware is really try
to promote new technology. If there is a way of

(51:09):
reducing Jusin price on on Braille. You know, we want
to be involved. Um, of course. I mean, at the
moment when we look at technology, the piazzo technology is
by far the best. If there is a way that
we can make that cheaper and there's a way that
we can not sacrifice, you know, the trade off, then sure,

(51:29):
we definitely want to get involved. So we're always looking
for those kinds of opportunities with universities. And to be honest,
our industry is kind of like a massive startup industry,
like it's where a lot of a lot of universities
from all over the world want to try and tackle
all the barriers, right? They believe that, you know, that

(51:52):
over 250 million blind people, that they have the answer.
And it is a very tough industry to start as
a startup, you know. So, um, but it's at the
same time, it's good to get those people involved because
we want to try and help them if we believe
that there is, a market for for the new technology.

(52:12):
Have we believe it's tackling a barrier. Then we want
to know. Um, and that's why, you know, I particularly
loved going to these conferences to not only speak with
the wonderful teachers out there and really get a feel
of what we're doing. Are we on the right path?
Are we doing things right? Are we doing things wrong?
It's also a good opportunity to see other potential partners

(52:34):
and new start up companies coming through the line to
see if there's things that we can we can work
together on.

S1 (52:41):
How did the monarch go over? I know it's been
a little while.

S11 (52:44):
But.

S12 (52:44):
Yeah.

S11 (52:45):
It.

S12 (52:45):
Was. It feels like the monarch's been out for years, right?
I mean, I've been working for about five years, I think.
But monarch was released in September and it's now available
in United States, Canada, United Kingdom and of course, Australia,
New Zealand. Definitely going well in America. So America, there's
there's well over 500 plus units, you know, the the

(53:08):
quota or the federal quota system is a really good
system that they have in America when it comes to funding.
And when we look at places in Canada, UK and Australia,
the funding system is just not quite there yet. But
from from my point of view, I think there's there's
a lot of value that monarch is bringing to the
table that doesn't get measured from finances, shall we say,

(53:32):
when we look at the funding system in those other
places in Australia and UK, there's probably, you know, when
we weigh up all the metrics of how much they'll
cost to produce, it doesn't really get calculated. So they
a lot of times they can get off putting by
the price tag. But you know, when we look at Braille,
we're celebrating this year 200 years of Braille. We're also

(53:56):
celebrating 50 years of single line braille displays. Yeah. So
having now going from single line to multi line is
a fantastic kind of next milestone and making it more
exciting because there's a lot of people out there that
believe bro is is kind of not evolving or it's

(54:17):
it's kind of is old having devices like monarch. Um,
having devices like the Annie or Polly, which is a
self learning braille device. It's now making it more, uh,
relevant to to where we are in technology. Not looking
at the Perkins Brailler, for example.

S1 (54:38):
But it's so true, wasn't it? I mean, it's got
so many possibilities, you know, five years you've been working
on it's only been out for a few months, sort
of officially, but its potential is just unlimited, really.

S12 (54:48):
Exactly. And there's more to come from from the from
the monarch. There's a lot more exciting stuff happening. Of course,
there's the big talk about the the eyebrow. Um, so
this is the kind of making BRF, uh, more of
an Epub style that integrates all of your tactile graphics
and spatial, formatting. So that's going to evolve during 2025.

(55:10):
And then the other things that I kind of saw
a lot during is of course AI, which is the
massive buzzword right at the moment. Everywhere you go, it's
AI this and AI that. You know that. That is
one of the big things that we're seeing in this space.
And when we look at the enhancements that I bring
into assistive technology, it's fantastic. Um, you know, there's a

(55:31):
lot of people that are sitting on the fence when
it comes to AI. People think that, oh, it's it's
not great. You know, you don't get a a good response. Um,
and of course, AI is all about the data that
you input or the data that you kind of source
it from. Now, there's a lot of products out there
that's benefited from AI over the years. And so we
did a session actually at um human. We did a

(55:53):
session about AI because we are serious about integrating a
lot more AI into our products. Um, I mean, at
the moment, the one of the products that has AI is,
of course, the stellar Trek. Electric. And we we've seen
the benefits that come that way. And so we we
want to make sure what we integrate in is tackling
down those barriers. We don't want to just put in

(56:13):
AI just to say, oh, we've got AI. We want
to make sure that it is usable. And it's it's,
you know, tackling those, those barriers that we're still facing today.

S1 (56:24):
Itself is still pretty young anyway.

S13 (56:26):
Well, it's it's.

S12 (56:27):
Been it's I mean, I itself, believe it or not,
it's been out for about 70 years. However, it wasn't
until really 20 maybe 2020 when, you know, you started
to get the language modules of ChatGPT. Um, and that
kind of took off. And so from the ChatGPT, now

(56:47):
we're starting to hear about it more. Uh, we're now
seeing products integrated more. And I do think that it
will be here to stay one way or another. I mean,
there's there's a lot of talks about copilot. Uh, there's
a lot of talks about the Gemini from from the
Google side. I mean, that's kind of one area of
what I can do, but there's things that I can

(57:09):
bring to the table of for low vision products as well.
So we, we really looking into AI and that that
was a big, big talking point. And um, you know,
one of the other things that I looked at was
mass problem. How could we bring in mass? That was
an image, um, you know, or maybe it's a PDF
that has all of these equations. How can we then

(57:31):
bring that into devices and have they output of, of
Braille and making sure that it's translated correctly? You know,
of course that would involve AI. So there was a
few companies that I looked at and was integrating something similar. Um,
but not necessarily for our space, but for other, um,
for other assistive tech. Um, but yeah, I think that's

(57:52):
that's a good direction. Um, when we look at the stem,
how can we include AI, uh, for things like that?

S1 (58:00):
Andrew, we've got to go. We're out of time. But
thinks that. Great snapshot. I look forward to the next
time we catch up.

S13 (58:05):
All right. Thanks, Peter. Nice to be here.

S1 (58:07):
Andrew Fletcher, who's the product manager for Humanware. Tell us
about the Assistive Technology Industry Association. Their conference held very
recently in Orlando. I already described show of the week. Well,
here's one for the strong hearted. Maybe after Valentine's Day
with a loving heart. Saturday you back up with a

(58:29):
strong heart because on SBS, NITV. 830 Saturday evening we
are going to have The Shining, which is based on
Stephen King's novel of the same name. It is said
to be producers directors Stanley Kubrick's most scariest film. In fact,
it may well be the scariest film ever made. It

(58:51):
is rated Ma. Of course it is on ITV with
audio description. Very much needed for this particular show. 830
30 Saturday evening, NITV. The shining, starring Jack Nicholson. Rated
Ma all care, no responsibility. I hope you enjoy it.

(59:12):
If not, maybe find something else to do. Like listen
to this Australian radio. Some birthdays before we go. Tim
Haggis having a birthday. He thinks he's a good tennis player.
Thinks he's a good cricketer. We'll just say his name
is Tim Haggis. Ben Clare having a birthday? Good on you, Ben.
We spoke to Ben a few weeks ago about what
a tremendously passionate, articulate person about all things education and

(59:38):
Ben is about interesting chat with Andrew Fletcher about Braille,
and maybe not such a feature at Asha might to
pursue that in future episodes. And Sienna Trigiani having a birthday.
Sienna has been with us for years and years all
the way from what is it now, the 51st state
of the United States? Canada? So life is going well
for you, Sienna. A very happy birthday to birthday to you.

(01:00:01):
And speaking about birthdays last week, we talked about the
amount of people who had a birthday last week who
played blind cricket. Adam Morris had a birthday last week.
He let me know during the week he didn't play
blind cricket. Good to hear from you, Adam. Hope things
are going well for you. That's it for us. We've
got to escape very quickly. Sam Rickard, thanks so much
for your help. Pam Greene, as always, thanks so much

(01:00:22):
for yours. Reminding you as we like to do that
focal point is available on your favorite podcast platform. If
you like the show, please tell a friend on behalf
of Philip Napier and a big cheer to Wendy McDougall
listening in. This is Peter Gregor saying, be kind to yourselves,
be thoughtful and look out for others all being well.

(01:00:43):
Focal point back at the same time next week on
Australia Radio. This is focal point.