2011 Access Awards Winners and Nominees

After tabulating hundreds of votes, we are pleased to announce the winners of the 2011 Blind Bargains Access Awards. For each category, you will find the winner as well as the other worthy nominees. Congratulations to all of our winners and nominees.

1. Best New Product or Innovation. This award goes to the best new product or innovation of 2011. The product or innovation must have been introduced during 2011.

Winner: Apple iPhone 4s
Other nominees: GW Micro GWSkype/GWConnect
LookTel Money Reader for iOS
Quartizer Projects The Qube
Serotek DocuScan Plus

2. Best Company. This award is for the best company serving the blind community. They must have been in business for at least part of 2011.

Winner: Apple
Other nominees: Dots and Dogs
GW Micro
NV Access
Serotek

3. Best Screen Access Program. This award goes to the best screen reading or magnification product of 2011, regardless of the operating system. This includes both computers and mobile devices.

Winner: Apple VoiceOver
Other nominees: Freedom Scientific Jaws for Windows
Gnome Project Orca
NV Access NVDA
Serotek System Access

4. Best Hardware Product. This is for the best hardware product for the blind or visually impaired. It must have been released or upgraded in 2011.

Winner: Apple iPhone 4S
Other nominees: Apple iPad 2
American Printing House for the Blind Book Port Plus
HumanWare Brailliant
HumanWare BrailleNote Apex

5. Best Software Product. This is for the best software product for the blind or visually impaired. Screen readers and mobile apps are excluded since they have their own categories. It must have been released or updated in 2011.

Winner: GW Micro GWSkype/GW Connect
Other nominees: Q-Continuum Hope
Quartizer Projects The Qube
RS Games Client
Serotek Corporation DocuScan Plus

6. Best Mobile App. This is for the best app for a mobile phone platform for the blind or visually impaired. Screen readers are excluded as they have their own category. The app must have been released or updated in 2011.

Winner: LookTel Money Reader
Other nominees: Benetech Read2Go
ROC HCI Group VizWiz
Serotek Corporation iBlink Radio
Zooble TweetList

7. Best Accessible Game. This is for the best accessible game for any operating system. It must have been released in 2011.

Winner: Ananse Productions Stem Stumper
Other nominees: A Sharp King of Dragon Pass
Blind Adrenaline Yacht
RS Games 1000 Miles
RS Games Apples to Apples

8. Best Blindness-related Website or blog. This award goes to the best website or blog serving the blind community.

Winner: AppleVis
Other nominees: AudioGames
Fred's Head from APH
SeroTalk
White Cane Day

9. Best Blindness-related podcast or radio program. This award goes to the best podcast or radio program serving the blind community.

Winner: SeroTalk Podcast
Other nominees: Blind Cool Tech
SeroSpectives

10. Best Store for Blindness-related Products. This award goes for the store, online or offline, that best serves the blind community.

Winner: Independent Living Aids
Other nominees: American Printing House for the Blind
Blind Mice Mart
Dots and Dogs
Future Aids Braille Superstore

11. Must Follow Twitter Account.. This award goes to the Twitter username most worthy of being followed.

Winner: @applevis
Other nominees: @blindperspectiv
@fredshead
@rs_games
@SeroTalk

12. Person of the Year. This special award goes to the person who has most influenced the blind community or blindness in general in 2011.

Winner: Steve Jobs
Other nominees: Mike Calvo
Kevin Chao
Joanmarie Diggs
Tommy Edison

Background

The 2011 Blind Bargains Access Awards was administered in two phases. An open-ended nomination form was first presented to readers. From these forms, the top vote-getters in each category were picked for the voting round. Winners were determined solely based on vote totals.

Blind Bargains and other properties by A T Guys, LLC were excluded from the contest.

No monitary value is attached to any awards given.

All decisions by the Blind Bargains staff are final.