Audio Player Blind Bargains Qast 126: A Qast with Parallel Sprinkles

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• Blind Bargains Qast 126: A Qast with Parallel Sprinkles

Joe is cruising far away from civilization, so Shelly Brisbin stopped by to hold down the fort. Shelly and J.J. talk Sonos speakers, Apple updates, and smart gadgets amongst other things, and find many parallels between all of them. Emails, a tip, and One More Thing round out this lively episode, so strap on in.

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In the News

Lots of VoiceOver Fixes in iOS 11.2

Apple s no good very bad week in security updates and this

Virgin Atlantic has launched in-flight entertainment for blind people and J.J. says he'll give a review if someone buys him a ticket.

House and Senate tax bill impact on blind people, from AFB

Kathy Ann Murtha book on using JAWS with Facebook

A list of books on web accessibility, from Web Axe

Discussion: Sonos, or how to blow lots of money on Audio

Before Alexa, before Google Home, and well before HomePod, Sonos revolutionized the smart speaker market with its line of connected speakers. Now with options starting at under $150, they may be within reach of many more people. Shelly and J.J. talk about their setups, the Sonos apps for phones and computers, and other things to consider.
Shelly has even integrated her Alexa things with her Sonos speakers for voice-enabled musical bliss. If this talk has you wanting to buy in, check out Amazon's Sonos page which will enable you to prime some speakers to your abode in a couple of days.

Tip: Ibotta

J.J. recently wrote about Ibotta, an app which will give you cash buying products and services you may already be using, such as Uber and online shopping. You can use this link to get $10 for signing up and redeeming your first offer.

Soundoff

From Juan Avila

I heard about Rich Caballaro. He and I went to the Louisiana Center For the Blind together in 2012-2013. I didn't get to interact with him for very long, as he arrived at the center when I had a couple months of training, and he was always spending time with his girl friend. He seemed like a nice person who was kind to everyone, and had a lot of love for technology. I remember that he asked for my oppinion about a tech instructor, and it was almost like Rich said "I'm going to be better than that instructor." And later I heard Rich was going to be an instructor for a center in Iowa, so I imagine , and trust that he did a good job. After graduating from the LCB a group of us formed a chat team on an app called "HeyTell" in which we would tell each other our progress in life, our endevours, and new tech we wanted. I remember Rich wanted the greatest and latest iPhones with the greatest capacity like the 6+ gold color. And everyone would tease him about it. "iPad phone?" Can I get one too? etc. After a while people were getting bored of talking on the group chat and eventually nobody talked on it. Someone said they would put us on What's App, but by then I decided that I had better things to do
than to listen to what someone far away had for dinner each day. Life is a complex thing, and I never know who I might see again. I will miss Rich.

From Twitter:

@mehgcap: I've had Fantastical for years, but when I first tried it, I didn't much like it. After hearing @blindbargains Last 125, I'll have to try it again. Plus, the demo used the Ava voice I like so much! Nice to hear someone else using
@skipper8210: Care to join the speculation on rumors of an iPhone SE2? I'm more excited about this than the iPhone 8 or X.

-One More Thing

Shelly is here, so we give some nods to her podcast The Parallel including this segment where we talk about what Joe is eating right now and far flung smarthome gadgets.

Joe's back next week, or at least we think. IN the meantime, check out Shelly's great book on iOS Access for All which will include an upgrade to the iOS 11 version as long as you buy it from somewhere other than iBooks. Have a great week everyone.

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