The Institute for Innovative Blind Navigation will bring together experts and consumers to address key needs of the blind rehabilitation culture. As our society changes from an analog, industrial age infrastructure, we are forced to redesign or reinvent institutions. IIBN will be a catalyst dedicated to this transition process; dedicated to the creation and restructuring of institutions in the blindness field. In each of the initiatives outlined below, we follow a formula for initiating change. The groups that we bring together are long term design teams charged with creating blueprints for change. They are charged with seeing their plans through to fruition.
All major agencies and many professionals and consumer groups have websites. These internet pages contain addresses, phone numbers, mission statements, and links to other relevant websites. From time to time there is an effort to put richer content on the web; ebooks, curriculum guides, policy papers, and historical documents. But the promise of the World Wide Web is unlimited, and the power of digital publishing has hardly been explored. The Institute for Innovative Blind Navigation will pull together key web masters and library (research document) teams to establish a system to take full advantage of the promise of knowledge management in cyberspace. In the beginning, the focus will be on wayfinding technologies for individuals who are blind. Over time, the scope and depth of the projects will spread across the entire field of blind rehabilitation. The effort to assemble the knowledge base of an entire discipline is too huge for any one institution to undertake. It will require the combined energy of multiple teams working over many years to establish and then maintain this very large initiative.
This approach would have the following advantages:
01. A single agency would not have to organize, finance, and manage this project.
02. Agencies could concentrate on and manage specific areas using a common searchable format.
03. The database would get so large, so comprehensive, and become so organized and manageable that it would be justified to charge usage fees which would then pay for further development and/or staff management expenses.
04. This would create important and challenging jobs (knowledge management in cyberspace) for visually impaired or blind individuals.
05. This is a cohesive force for bringing the agencies of the world under one cooperative venture. This might lead to further collaboration and to a common political force.
06. Having curriculum guides, training manuals, web books, forms, academic summaries, medical and rehabilitation documents, historical archives, state of the art white papers, and special web portals for blind children, deaf blind individuals (etc.), available on the web, in a searchable database designed to be user friendly, will empower teachers, parents, and consumers. It will be a continual source for life long learning; for staying current as knowledge and technology continue to exponentially explode.
Technology has gotten exponentially cheaper, faster, more powerful, and smaller. This has resulted in wearable technologies; smart, networked processing systems (with communications capabilities) that become part of clothing. IIBN will bring together world famous experts and consumers to explore the implications of this revolution. This team will create a blueprint for forging wearable technology into new wayfinding tools for the blind and visually impaired consumer.
This approach would have the following advantages:
01. This initiative will result in a "space suit" for the blind and/or visually impaired consumer. It will be a cyborg system with upgradable modules. This will jump start the entire wearable computing revolution (for everyone, not just for visually impaired individuals)
02. This is the platform that will enable the consumer to interact with and control smart environments.
03. This platform will also interact with smart helper systems (smart robots, smart vehicles).
04. This platform is the beginning of bionic capabilities that go beyond correction. The blind may have capabilities from time to time that exceed those of the sighted. Blind perception may evolve to be something equal to or greater than visually mediated perception.
05. This platform will be the substrate for interacting with internal area networks; chip systems implanted in the body.
The profession of orientation and mobility is about the study of spaces; the safe, efficient, and accurate negotiation of space by individuals who cannot use the innate vision system. As technologies get more complex, cheaper, and ubiquitous, there will be an increase in the need for sophisticated consumers who understand how to use the new tools and networks. In other words, environmental literacy is fast becoming a challenge for both consumer and teacher. There is a need to understand the broad picture, to highlight the challenges, and to create blueprints for addressing infrastructure change. IIBN will bring together experts in various segments of this emerging field of study to begin the long process of institutional adjustment.
This approach would have the following advantages:
01. Smart environments (spaces) are evolving very fast for the sighted world. This initiative would monitor this evolution and coordinate work with key experts to make the smart spaces usable for blind individuals.
02. This initiative would work to make a standardized interface between the blind space suit (wearable personal area network) and smart environments
Robotic helpers are "things in the environment that can move on their own, safely and efficiently". These smart helpers will be networked to smart environments and to smart consumers, and they will be able to communicate. This category can include toys or it can refer to large vehicles like cars. It can be about androids or about vacuum cleaners. IIBN will assemble a team of experts and consumers to study the new discipline and to consider the implications of exponentially increasing sensory, cognitive, and physical developments in these new tools.
This approach would have the following advantage:
This initiative would monitor the evolution in robotics and coordinate work with key experts to make the smart helpers usable for blind individuals.