Software makes iTunes accessible to blind

Thanks to a technological advance, Jim Denham, the assistive technology coordinator at the Perkins School for the Blind, who is visual impaired, can sit at home by himself and browse among the thousands of audio books, podcasts and albums digitally stored on Apple’s iTunes.

 

The breakthrough was announced yesterday at Perkins, a storied school in Watertown.

This new software transforms the written information on an iTunes-linked computer screen into speech or Braille. It was developed from an agreement between Apple, the Cupertino, Calif.-based computer company, the National Federation of the Blind and Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley.

Blind rights activists had noticed that blind people couldn’t independently access iTunes or iTunes U, an online program that allows students at some universities to connect to course lectures and lab demonstrations.

“We want to make sure that everybody, including people with disabilities, have the opportunity to access this cultural and educational information,” Perkins School for the Blind President Steven Rothstein said.

The groups worked out an agreement with Apple that led to development of the new software, and a $250,000 donation to the Massachusetts Commission for the Blind, which will be used to purchase some of the new software.