There’s plenty of posts and testimonials about Steve Jobs, as there should be. I wanted to say here how much he truly did for the worldwide community of people with various disabilities and learning differences. Apple’s ease of use and its features that help all of us, but particularly help people with disabilities was never really touted that much but made a huge impact. Just like the brilliance of much of Apple’s technology, the power of it’s “disability features” went further and further into the background, and so became easier and more powerful.
If you watch the video of the new iPhone personal assistant Siri, you may barely notice that the woman listening to her message (instead of reading it) and then replying (and Siri putting and sending her spoken words into text) via text message, is blind (she’s reading braille).
Steve and Apple have done so much for me, and for my students who learn differently. We wish the family well.