The KNFB Reader: Its History and Evolution

by Gary Wunder

Many articles have been and will continue to be written about the magic of Braille. Less well covered is the magic of print and what it has meant to be a blind person who cannot read it directly and the need and yearning for the secreted-away information.

I can’t count the number of times running my hands over what to me were smooth surfaces. Their texture would vary a bit since the smoothness of a written newspaper was rougher than what people called the shiny magazine. I noticed that the texture of book pages could be different, but my fingers could not discern any patterns that would let me read what my parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles would read and make come alive for me. Dad read me the news; mom read me the product catalogs. If it was a product I was interested in receiving for a birthday or Christmas gift, maybe she would read it to me once, twice, or even ten times if I could get her to do it. Woe be to the person who had a good story, for I never tired of hearing them read.

I decided that if I were ever to write a science fiction book, one of the first things it would contain would be a reading machine that would unmask print. In 1975 a pioneering inventor named Raymond Kurzweil demonstrated an early version of his product to James Gashel, the head of our Washington office at the time. Jim got a demonstration for then-President Jernigan, who subsequently introduced it to the leadership of the National Federation of the Blind. It wasn't long before demonstrations of it appeared in the Braille Monitor based on Ray's presentation before the national convention. I could see my dreams coming true, print almost being hearable and touchable, and I knew I was living in exciting times and was a part of a cutting-edge organization.

Time moved along, prototypes became products, the cost of those products dropped from $50,000 to $30,000 to $20,000, and eventually they became affordable for some of us to have at our local library. When the product was able to run using an off-the-self scanner and a personal computer, some of us could even have this technology at home. What a magical time in which to live—one in which I could walk into the public library, rejoice in the scent of all those books, and realize that they didn't just belong to someone else but were mine to read as well. I got a library card, checked out four books, scanned them, and then proudly posted them to Bookshare.

To some extent print had been conquered, but only if one was in the right environment. A leaflet handed to me on the street was still unreadable. A memo passed out at a work meeting was the same. The information was right in front of me but not really. A sign on the door conveyed no information except that there was information I couldn't have. Would that ever change? The science fiction reader in me said it certainly would; the realist in me said it wasn't likely to be soon enough to help me.

On October 22, 2001, many assembled for the groundbreaking that would begin our dream of building the Jernigan Institute. At that ceremony President Maurer talked about what the blind needed and how, through our organization, we might get some of those things. One he talked about was a handheld reader, something that could be taken to the print rather than the print being taken to it. What made this different from science fiction was that he wasn't talking about something that would happen in 2050; he and Ray Kurzweil, the restless genius, were discussing publicly whether such a machine would be commercially available in four years or five. What would it cost? What would it look like? No one really knew, though President Maurer did hold a little box he thought might approximate the size of the unit, one he called a pocket-sized reading machine.

Ray Kurzweil and the NFB started putting action behind those publicly spoken words nearly a year later when President Maurer approached the officers and Board of Directors with the proposal to start building software that would run on smaller machines. No machine was yet available to undertake the task of capturing a picture, processing the poor image that was likely to come from a user who couldn't easily focus, and then do the optical character recognition. But Ray Kurzweil believed that the power of technology would double every eighteen months, and that meant that by the time the software had been developed and tested, there would indeed be the hardware to run it.

By 2004 we had a version of the software that would run on a PC under Windows and used a camera. What magic to hear the click of a camera and within two or three seconds hear the reading begin. In a year the software was running on a smaller machine, and by 2006 the KNFB Reader was being produced and sold. It was not exactly pocket-sized, but it was handheld, it was portable, and it was, without a doubt, a reading machine. The machine consisted of four discrete parts: a camera, a PDA, a circuit board that connected those devices both electronically and mechanically, and a leather case. The discrete parts all arrived at our headquarters separately, and Will Schwatka, the voice of the Federation in so many reading projects including this magazine, was the project manager charged with assembling them. He was assisted by Lou Anne Blake and none other than David Patrick Maurer, the son of Marc Maurer, our Immediate Past President, and Patricia Maurer, our organization’s First Lady. Each member of the team got a bin and oversaw the product assembly, loading the KNFB software, and then testing each unit. Will Schwatka remembers the excitement of working with such groundbreaking technology. "I remember taking one of the units home, showing it to my friends, and watching as they marveled at this organization I was working for that did such cutting-edge work. After giving them a demonstration, some of them wanted to know if they could buy stock in the new machine." Will remembers his work fondly as "one of the coolest jobs I have ever had."

For my part, I remember buying a machine and flying home while experiencing my first look at an in-flight magazine. On that flight I learned two lessons: the machine could read a magazine, but not everything the machine could read was worth reading.

Though we had a portable reading machine, it wasn't ideal. The more technology we use to deal with blindness, the harder it is to decide what to carry and what to leave at home. With the KNFB Reader, there was the machine and then two chargers: one for the PDA and one for the camera. If I had to choose among a phone, a book or book reader, a device to read print, and either a laptop or notetaker, would there be enough print to justify a reader? Sometimes my answer was yes, and sometimes it was no.

But that technology Ray talked about kept evolving, and soon the KNFB Reader was on the cell phone. The Nokia N82 had a five-megapixel camera and a brighter Xenon flash. The phone also had a computer fast enough that within two or three seconds of the flash came well-articulated text, and the accuracy was surprisingly good. A reader in our pocket was real. Now I and other KNFB users didn't have to make a choice between phone and reader; they were the same.

Sometimes technology change is beneficial, and at other times it is just plain inconvenient. For blind people the iPhone was a breakthrough that has made tremendous changes in the way we can benefit from portable technology. Having out-of-the-box screen reading was the model we wanted, and the thought by Apple that went into making touchscreens a blessing and not a barrier rocked our world.

Unfortunately, the 2009 introduction of this device presented a big problem for the KNFB Reader. Of course, many of us wanted an already accessible iPhone, but the camera used in the initial versions lacked the resolution we needed and didn't let us control important elements in getting an image that could be recognized and put into text. Once again the KNFB Reader was a standalone one function machine and something of a frustration for those of us who wanted the power of the iPhone and Android devices that soon followed. As these other smartphones became available, Nokia's interest in maintaining the phones we loved faded. Finding sources and convincing people that the phone that ran the software would continue to be supported required significant effort.

Our desire to have the KNFB Reader run on a smartphone and specifically at first the iPhone was intense, but we could not simply wish technology development forward, especially when that technology belonged to someone else. It wasn't until 2014, almost five years, until the iPhone brought sufficient camera resolution and the ability to control it with software that a version came to market. Jim Gashel has stories to tell about being at an Apple store all night so he would be first in line for the newest version. Finally, our waiting paid off, and we were able to get an image we could use. The KNFB Reader indeed was then able to be on popular and readily available smartphones and the newly available computer power they contained. Our unique Field of View Report was eventually replaced by a simpler tone for focus, and our pictures got better. So too did the recognized text we read.

Having a product on the market challenged and stretched us from the beginning. We had to dedicate resources to development, and Mark Riccobono, our newly-elected President, established a special LLC for the KNFB Reader. We had to figure out a way to market it and asked Michael Hingson to undertake the task. We had Scott White handling our bulk sales to schools, rehabilitation agencies, and private agencies that wanted to help bring portable reading to the blind. Rachel Olivero was involved at every level in this process, being one of our most faithful testers and helping to set our direction as the product moved forward. Joel Zimba handled technical support and spurring on the development of the product. Hai Wyn Lee was one of our most helpful testers and brought along many good ideas that found their way into the product. In addition, almost one-hundred NFB volunteers were involved in our work and spent countless hours testing, troubleshooting, and talking up this new technological miracle.

But the NFB is not so much in the business of business. We are advocates, and a part of that advocacy is being pioneers. We prove something can be done, and we aren't disappointed when someone does it better. In a generous move in the spirit of providing what we can to blind people, the National Federation of the Blind Board of Directors decided to provide the KNFB Reader without charge in its NFB-NEWSLINE® application. Though the version does not offer some of the interfaces in the full version, it does allow for the same scanning and reading for which this product is known.

Unlike when we began the effort to develop a pocket-sized reading machine, blind people now have Microsoft SEEING AI without charge, and several commercial offerings with good recognition and responsiveness are available for less than thirty dollars.

The time has come for us to turn over the KNFB Reader to Sensotec, one of the developers that has been with us in this since the beginning. This company will change the name of the app, will take over its maintenance, and offer whatever upgrades it wishes. Owners of the KNFB Reader need not worry; their product will be supported.

Like the Speakquilizer, the KNFB Reader will be remembered for not only demonstrating a product but bringing it to the market for blind people. In keeping with our tradition, when things evolve, we move on to another challenge to improve the lives of blind people.

I am proud of what we did, grateful for being allowed to live through it, and glad for whatever small part I played in testing and eventually buying our machines. When dreams come true, they must be replaced; thank you NFB for opening a space for a new science fiction dream and making my day-to-day interaction with the world just a little bit fuller and considerably easier.