"Do we want that 'click-click-click' sound when we open it?"
November 9, 2019 4:56 PM Subscribe
Via KQED's The California Report Magazine, listen to (and read about) five blind people living in or visiting California: Geerat Vermeij, an evolutionary biologist who studies the evolution of mollusk shells, Noel Runyan, an engineer who builds his own accessible technology (including a vibrating gun sight), guitarist Ioana Gandrabur, architect Chris Downey, and sensory consultant Hoby Wedler, who helps design the sound of everyday products from food packaging to doors. The stories come from Chris Hoff and Sam Harnett, who have partnered with San Francisco's LightHouse for the Blind and Visually Impaired (previously) to produce The World According to Sound podcast where people can explore the sounds of beer brewing, mosquitoes doing their thing, arachnids getting amorous, cheese making, Spanish lottery numbers being sung out, giraffes after dark, Voice Over run through its paces, and a sonification of Wikipedia's data among over 90 others to date in short, 90-second episodes.
Giraffes hum!! Who knew?
That makes me happy.
posted by BlueHorse at 5:38 PM on November 9, 2019 [1 favorite]
That makes me happy.
posted by BlueHorse at 5:38 PM on November 9, 2019 [1 favorite]
For reasons unknown, my eighth grade science teacher had me read Vermeij's autobiography. I really have no idea why, but it clearly made enough of an impression on me that twenty years later, I read this post and thought "wait, is that the guy who wrote that book?"
posted by hoyland at 6:44 PM on November 9, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by hoyland at 6:44 PM on November 9, 2019 [1 favorite]
blind... engineer... builds his own... vibrating gun sight
what
Accessibility is awesome, but I'm not sure I understand the logic behind tools to help blind people shoot guns. I don't even mean that in some smartass way about safety, as he is clearly doing that in a controlled environment on a gun range and no one is in danger.
It's just a level of gun culture I cannot even fathom to "practice" a skill that you cannot take into the outside world (game animals and human assailants seem exceptionally unlikely to wear tech to help you target them) and can't examine the results of your practice with.
Just a whole lot of trouble for the satisfaction of having your buddy say, "Yeah bro, you shot the shit out of that."
He must really fucking love guns.
I'd hang out with him in his rock polishing studio though.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:50 AM on November 10, 2019
what
Accessibility is awesome, but I'm not sure I understand the logic behind tools to help blind people shoot guns. I don't even mean that in some smartass way about safety, as he is clearly doing that in a controlled environment on a gun range and no one is in danger.
It's just a level of gun culture I cannot even fathom to "practice" a skill that you cannot take into the outside world (game animals and human assailants seem exceptionally unlikely to wear tech to help you target them) and can't examine the results of your practice with.
Just a whole lot of trouble for the satisfaction of having your buddy say, "Yeah bro, you shot the shit out of that."
He must really fucking love guns.
I'd hang out with him in his rock polishing studio though.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:50 AM on November 10, 2019
what
Actually, shooting in the vision-impaired class has just been added as a Paralympic sport by the IPC.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 9:02 AM on November 10, 2019
Actually, shooting in the vision-impaired class has just been added as a Paralympic sport by the IPC.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 9:02 AM on November 10, 2019
I definitely want to live in a world where vision-impaired people can pursue any passion they want. I find the idea of clinging to the limited aspects of shooting available to them to be emblematic of a weird relationship with guns, but I do recognize they aren't hurting anybody and that it isn't about me anyway. So you know, good on them and all.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:30 AM on November 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:30 AM on November 10, 2019 [1 favorite]
There are definitely better places to focus my contempt for gun culture than stumbling into ableism. Sorry for being a jerk.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:57 AM on November 10, 2019
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:57 AM on November 10, 2019
I find the idea of clinging to the limited aspects of shooting available to them to be emblematic of a weird relationship with guns
It's an understandable reaction to the unhinged blood Saturnalia that is US gun culture. I'd included the mention of the gun sight up front because it was sort of headlined in the link itself anyway, and (as someone who's of the opinion that gun ownership should be restricted in a spectacularly draconian fashion) I thought "Meh, he's just plinking with a .22 at a range. Doesn't quite rise to the level of NRA debauchery."
That said, I really like Hoby Wedler's description of the Miele vacuum cleaner startup sound. We've got the same one, and I used it today thinking "Damn. He's right. It IS satisfying."
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 5:49 PM on November 10, 2019
It's an understandable reaction to the unhinged blood Saturnalia that is US gun culture. I'd included the mention of the gun sight up front because it was sort of headlined in the link itself anyway, and (as someone who's of the opinion that gun ownership should be restricted in a spectacularly draconian fashion) I thought "Meh, he's just plinking with a .22 at a range. Doesn't quite rise to the level of NRA debauchery."
That said, I really like Hoby Wedler's description of the Miele vacuum cleaner startup sound. We've got the same one, and I used it today thinking "Damn. He's right. It IS satisfying."
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 5:49 PM on November 10, 2019
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But watery pipes was soothing.
posted by clavdivs at 5:11 PM on November 9, 2019 [1 favorite]