W
Friends, I have a need. A group of my friends and I (http://www.readassist.org) are trying to find a page turning device that actually works. I've seen the two that are on the market. One sells for $1000 and does magazines really well and other things not so good. One sells for $5000 and does everything, but pretty half-bad. There are two others, designed but never built for sale. There are also passive bookholders, but they are very hard to use, if you don't have full use of your hands. There are thousands of people with arthritis, and other diseases that have great minds but their bodies just won't allow them to read a normal book. Most of them can't afford to pay $5000 for a pageturner. And e-books and audio-books aren't available for everything, yet, or maybe ever. Readassist wants to find a decent page turning device for our friend Jimmy, and maybe for others who need one. We think we're probably going to have to build one. We have some great engineering help already, but we need more. That's where you come in. I am turning to this list, because there are enough motion control experts on it to stifle equines. <very big grin> And some of you are _true_ gadgeteers. Here are the criteria. The pageturner must be usable in any attitude, including overhead. It must be light enough to mount on the arm of a wheelchair. It must be operable by sip switches or prox sensors. It must be able to run on batteries, or AC/charger. It must be able to handle any "book" from a standard sized paperback to a trade tabloid magazine, without having to break the spine of the book. How would you solve this problem? Anybody who wants to cobble one up, I have a taker <grin>. No money involved, and no prize. Just the knowledge that you have made the world a little better for a person who truly deserves it. Thanks for listening. Walt Boyes Technical Committee Chair ReadAssist http://www.readassist.org
