Hello friends, family, lists and all other contacts that I have managed to find over this last hour.
I'm writing to you all to ask for your help. As some of you know, some of you don't, but recently Vodafone has gone and completely discontinued the "way finder access" gps solution that many blind people use. For those of you that don't know what this is then let me briefly explain. Wayfinder was developed as a gps solution for blind people to use on their mobile phone. It has been developed to work with what ever screen reader you are using on your phone whether it be Mobilespeak or Talks so it isn't dependent on 1 specific bit of software to run. Wayfinder access or as it is more commonly known as WFA, is an internet based gps solution. It connects to a centralised server for any route calculation. This means among other things, that any map updates that are available are all done at the server end which means that you as the end user automatically have "free" access to those maps when ever you connect. You aren't charged to upgrade your maps because no maps are stored on the phone. Unlike products developed from companies such as http://www.humanware.com/en-united_kingdom/home or http://www.gwmicro.com this gps solution costs less than £300 to purchase where as the products as shown in these web links cost well over £1000. which for your average person is not a reasonable price. As yet we do not know why Vodafone have officially discontinued wayfinder access, all we know that it has been discontinued. So we are asking for your help. Below is a link to an "official" protest site that has been launched. The idea is to get as many signatures as possible between now and the 15th of March and then we will send this off to Vodafone to see what can be done. Please help us by signing the petition and spreading the word. Contact your friends, family, work colleagues, anybody and everybody you can think of. Your assistants, time and effort taken with this matter is appreciated Many thanks. http://www.talknav.com/protest Vodafone... get blind pedestrians back on track! Released in April 2007, Wayfinder Access was the first GPS application that was accessible for blind and low vision users on their mobile phone. A breakthrough! an affordable product that made blind persons more independent by informing them about their surroundings and allowing them to walk any route they wanted. Vodafone recently bought Wayfinder Systems and discontinued Wayfinder Access. Most blind users don't have an alternative, so they will lose access to all the freedom GPS navigation can offer them. The few alternatives to Wayfinder Access are at least 3 times more expensive and often don't run on a mobile phone, requiring the user to carry around and maintain a lot of extra expensive equipment. In many countries, no alternative for Wayfinder is available at all. As you will see, discontinuing Wayfinder Access would put thousands of blind pedestrians off track! Please help us make clear to Vodafone that they are heading the wrong way and sign our petition! Please also pass on the link to this page to other persons to ensure we get as many signatures as possible! --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gam...@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.