deafbiz.com

I found this website via LifeHacker which focuses on Informercial Scams.

I see DirectBuy TV commercials all the time. I recalled a very similar high-pressure sales pitch when we first bought our house. I can’t recall the company name except it started with “C”. At the sales pitch, they told use we must join today or forever lose the opportunity to save money. Well, my B.S. antenna shot way up and I said I needed time to think. The salesperson suddenly became cold to us and we were quickly shown the door.

So I had a hutch that Direct Buy was a reincarnation of this defunct company. Sure enough, the complaints listed at Infomercial Scam described the same high pressure sales pitch.

Here’s one of the complaints that caught my eye:

4/15/2007 - Karen writes:
We are a deaf couple from Phoenix, Arizona. We called them for an appointment for showroom etc. They said we would have to bring an interpreter(sign language) The supervisor (guy) was very rude to us. We cancelled it. Thank God. Later we found this website and learned more about Directbuy scam. Please do something to shut it down ! Contact the TV media- 20/20 !!!

Good thing they walked away. Supposed they had a UbiDuo? That would’ve solved the communication issue but then would they have fallen for the sales pitch anyhow?

This is a casting call for websites related to deafness and hearing loss using the Open Source program called Joomla! . I have an opportunity to be interviewed and to showcase my other website DeafJoomla.com, which has a list of deaf websites using Joomla. Currently, the list is pretty sparse and I know there’s a lot more out there so please help make my work easier by sending me URLs of your Joomla website and in return the website will get a valuable backlink as well as free PR.

You can also use the contact form on this website to send the links.

One time about 2 years ago, I forgot to set up a VCR taping of the “Amazing Race” second to last episode to find out who was eliminated. The only place to find the episode was on BitTorrent. I managed to download the show (really huge file!) and watch it on my PC. Only one problem. It wasn’t captioned or subtitled. I guess the person who was gracious enough to upload the show was either hearing or there’s really no simple way to burn CC on the shows.

Fast forward to today:

BitTorrent to Launch Movie, TV Downloads

So when I see this news making the big splash today, I just had to write to BitTorrent to inquire if the movies and television shows will be closed-captioned or subtitle. I’ll keep you posted if they replied to me.

If anyone else has the inside scoop please spill it out in the comments.

Update: As soon as I submitted the email, I got an instant notification that someone is going to read my email. A minute later, I got another notice that the matter is solved and is now closed. I guess is that there’s no closed-captioning or subtitle available. I will neither spend my time nor $$ to test it out.

These are the new websites approved and published at Deafbiz.com. I am grateful that a few have filled out the submission form, which makes my job easier to to promote their websites sooner.

U.S. Deaf Ski & Snowboard Association (USDSSA)
Prism Mortgage Inc
Christian Vogler: Research
New Jersey Registry of Interpreters for the Deaf (NJRID)
Deaf Women and HIV/AIDS in Africa
GUAANEWS
United States Flag Football for the Deaf
AJ Hlibok Cost Constulting
Wolmah Webs
BiblioMarket

Found a new free services that will transcribe voice calls to email or SMS

Jott 

It has a very eye-catching Flash animation demonstrating what it can do.

I contacted customer services asking if this would be suitable for a hearing person to call Jott and leave a message to be transcribed for a deaf person to read via email or SMS and the answer was “Absolutely! This is a great idea for accessibility”.

My concern is the time between the Jott phone call and the transcriibed message. Probably not something you would do if time is of essence.

If you’ve tried using it, please share the experience in the comment box.