AT&T’s FaceTime Blocking Hurts the Deaf

fury said:
It is a common misconception that deaf people can just take texting for granted like others do. Written word is more like a second language to someone who thinks in ASL.

Ever tried to communicate in a language you didn't learn natively?
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Can't tell if serious. Those that can hear do not learn to read and write before they learn to speak, and yes virtually every European and most educated Americans can communicate in a second language just fine, myself included.

And no, texting is not as efficient as just speaking just as I imagine ASL is faster than texting. So grab your wallet and pay for it or shop for a competitor. Even us poor able-bodied people frequently have to deal with crappy bundled plans where we buy stuff we can't use to get what we want that is bundled in.

I don't listen to 99% of the channels on my satellite radio, I don't watch most of the shows except HBO/Showtime out of the hundreds, etc. No need to cry for being treated the same as everyone else.
 
Fail said:
Son, I'm deaf, and deaf people prefer to communicate with each other using American Sign Language, and to do that, it involves actually being able to look at someone, and speaking that way via webcam, videophone, or FaceTime is far more efficient than trying to have a conversation via text message.

You guys get to communicate using your voices and hearing, deaf people do it differently, and it isn't about "catering", it's simply about providing equal access to communication.

You should WANT others to be able to share their ideas, information, and thoughts with each other, it's part of what makes American society function so well, the free exchange of ideas.

I don't know how to help the view that you seem to have, but if you ever happen to become deaf or suffer from profound hearing impairment, you will be glad that those avenues are available for you to communicate with.

Notice my post is nearly flawless and that I communicate pretty well? That's because I DID learn to adapt to my disability, in more ways than you can imagine. It no longer controls or defines me, I am it's master, I use it when it serves me, and I take off my hearing aid when I want complete silence.

Needless to say, I sleep like a baby at night.

Is that good enough for you sir?
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I know you were responding to another post, but you brought up an interesting statement: being about "equal-access to communication." But this is somewhat of a moot point since this service is available to all customers regardless of being deaf or not, only with a fee. Much like how just having a cell phone is available to everyone if they pay their monthly fees--does that mean it's also unfair for deaf people to have to pay to use a cell phone too? The access to communication is entirely equal--pretty much everyone is welcome to have it, you just need to pay for it. And the fees assessed are ignorant to whether someone is male, female, deaf, mute, whatever. The access is equal, but it's not free--as is most everything in the world.

Regardless, as mentioned before, there are entirely free-to-use services (at this time) that are a direct substitute to facetime, such as Skype. And TBH, Skype is a bit nicer and easier to use IMHO.
 
Ducman69 said:
Can't tell if serious. Those that can hear do not learn to read and write before they learn to speak, and yes virtually every European and most educated Americans can communicate in a second language just fine, myself included.

And no, texting is not as efficient as just speaking just as I imagine ASL is faster than texting. So grab your wallet and pay for it or shop for a competitor. Even us poor able-bodied people frequently have to deal with crappy bundled plans where we buy stuff we can't use to get what we want that is bundled in.

I don't listen to 99% of the channels on my satellite radio, I don't watch most of the shows except HBO/Showtime out of the hundreds, etc. No need to cry for being treated the same as everyone else.
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Do not use Fail and myself as benchmarks for deaf writing and speaking skills. This is an example of how majority of them talk:

http://memphisdeafcommunity.org/deaf_bad_grammar.htm
 
Azhar said:
Do not use Fail and myself as benchmarks for deaf writing and speaking skills.
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So rather than taking personal responsibility to educate themselves and learn proper grammar, you suggest what, that AT&T make FaceTime free for the deaf?

Kind of moot regardless, as most texting I do is in "text-speak" and not proper English regardless. "Zup, goin out? No wai! K, LOL, bye."
 
Ducman69 said:
So rather than taking personal responsibility to educate themselves and learn proper grammar, you suggest what, that AT&T make FaceTime free for the deaf?

Kind of moot regardless, as most texting I do is in "text-speak" and not proper English regardless. "Zup, goin out? No wai! K, LOL, bye."
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Do yourself a favor and stop talking.
 
pigwalk said:
Can you summarize that? Don't mean to be rude, but I had a hell of a time making sense of that. I'd imagine it has something to do with how sign language compares to regular grammar or something?
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Beats me. I went to public school, so I've dodged that bullet. :p
 
pigwalk said:
I'd imagine it has something to do with how sign language compares to regular grammar or something?
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Different languages have different grammatical structure (examples: English: How are you? German: How goes? Spanish: What's going? Mandarin: You are?) is the jist of it. It would obviously behoove the deaf to be able to communicate in the written language of their home country, and ignorance is hardly an excuse to demand special treatment from private companies. FaceTime is bundled for everyone w/ AT&T, bundles sometimes include things not useful to you, that's life.
 
And yes, their writing is based on their "spoken" language, which is ASL. As we write how we speak, they also write as they sign. There's two types of sign languages: ASL and English. ASL is shorthand. English is, well, like how you and I speak.

There have been many efforts to ban ASL in deaf schools but it has never come to pass. I would support the ban with open arms. There's nothing wrong with English sign language. It doesn't take THAT much longer to include words left out in ASL. For example, we say "my name is Travis", they would sign "name Travis". That's why it's so bad.
 
It wouldn't kill apple to enable the service without sound for the deaf accounts within the limits of their data plan. That way they can continue to charge everyone else a premium to just have the full service.

They can even claim they are disallowing sound to minimize the data usage assuming FaceTime uses data to transmit voice which if it works over wi-fi probably does.
 
Azhar said:
And yes, their writing is based on their "spoken" language, which is ASL. As we write how we speak, they also write as they sign. There's two types of sign languages: ASL and English. ASL is shorthand. English is, well, like how you and I speak.

There have been many efforts to ban ASL in deaf schools but it has never come to pass. I would support the ban with open arms. There's nothing wrong with English sign language. It doesn't take THAT much longer to include words left out in ASL. For example, we say "my name is Travis", they would sign "name Travis". That's why it's so bad.
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LOL...

I love this thread so much.

First, let me comment on the article and stuff.

I used to have an iPhone on AT&T's TAP plan (everything sans voice plan) and this scheme would not clearly benefit me in any way as I already do not have any voice plan and if I wanted to add a voice plan, my TAP plan would cease to exist. Secondly - it's data, who are they to say that data from xProgram is any different from xProgram2? It's just friggin data and I am sure that everybody of all disability or not would agree on. One should not have to pay additional for tethering to use the chunk of data already available nor should any specific program be excluded from the block of data that the customer's already paying for.

On the English / ASL part. You CANNOT write ASL, it's just dumb. I blame the school system for the clusterfuck they contribute to the writing skills and levels of such hearing impaired people, myself included of course.

ASL is a "spoken" language in the sense that one speaks it in sign language and it has their own rules and such. Nonetheless, some numbnut thinks it's perfectly alright to write down ASL straightly down as if it were signed as such as provided by your example.

English - My name is Jon.

ASL - Name my Jon

If one were to write it down, of course it's going to be a clusterfuck. I grew up learning English, granted I may have a little issue here and there but I was never taught or conditioned to write down ASL on paper. I have two "first language" and they are ASL and English, for the reason I use ASL to communicate via the "spoken method" and I use English via the "written method."

There are several deaf people on this forum of which have great English skills and as quoted in one post earlier - the majority of deaf people cannot write for shit if their life depended on it. They are conveying on paper as if they were using ASL and that's WRONG OF THEM.

/rant

Anyways - I am sure that no matter who, any exclusion of a program from the usage of the data block that the customer has already paid for is dumb, would agree with me on this fine point.

There's also the "TAP" plan which are available to the deaf/hard of hearing customers as they don't need to have the voice plan and AT&T's move on excluding FaceTime from the normal data block usage harms those who are on the TAP plan. And in this sense, deaf / hard of hearing people are perfectly correct to complain and bitch as they are excluded from having a voice plan on their TAP plan provided to them by AT&T.

So there, you have my view on this.
 
I'll chime on my views as a young deaf adult.

I communicate primarily orally and lip-read fluently. I do also communicate using ASL since my wife is deaf and we both prefer communicating in ASL since its effective, fast and reduce misunderstanding between us.

I started learning how to use ASL in 2004 but before that I grew up in my childhood communicating in English and relying on lip-reading. I can promise you that ASL is a completely different language which omits the important keywords for example: as, and, etc but like in a whole sentence. I've seen my other deaf peers in college that grew up completely immersed in ASL but their written English skills are lousy because in their mind they are thinking ASL and putting it down exactly what they think into English.

Anyways I'm still grandfathered in my Verizon unlimited data plan and I view that as a very important part of what I use when I need video calling for emergencies since it's the fastest and most effective way rather than texting. Carriers know that people are starting to use video on their phones and will make sure they make buck off on it somewhere.
 
Jon855 said:
There's also the "TAP" plan which are available to the deaf/hard of hearing customers as they don't need to have the voice plan and AT&T's move on excluding FaceTime from the normal data block usage harms those who are on the TAP plan. And in this sense, deaf / hard of hearing people are perfectly correct to complain and bitch as they are excluded from having a voice plan on their TAP plan provided to them by AT&T.
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AT&T goes out of their way to offer a special plan just for the deaf.

This doesn't include an extra feature, FaceTime, but is available to the deaf with the exact same plan that is available to everyone else.

So they are right to complain that they aren't getting a special deal on Facetime on their already special plan made for them? Treating everyone equally is hardly grounds to bitch about discrimination IMO.
 
For those who think that people with disabilities doesn't deserve a equal chance at least to be with the mainstream culture. I pity them because I don't want to wish them ill fate if all of a sudden they go blind or lose their hearing. The whole point with Americans with Disability Act (ADA) is not to give people with disabilities preferential treatment but level the playing field. I don't expect handouts but all I want is for people to have a understanding of how a specific person of a disability lives their life. Put them in your shoes or you will be going through the real thing if something catastrophic happens.
 
BAC4D00R SP1D0R said:
For those who think that people with disabilities doesn't deserve a equal chance at least to be with the mainstream culture.
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You and I can both go to an AT&T store, grab identical phones and plans, and chat on FaceTime with one another paying the exact same rates.

I agree everyone deserves equal treatment, but what is unequal here?
 
Ducman69 said:
You and I can both go to an AT&T store, grab identical phones and plans, and chat on FaceTime with one another paying the exact same rates.

I agree everyone deserves equal treatment, but what is unequal here?
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I think he meant level playing field in general, not this specific topic.
 
I use A T and T, and I pay 0 for voice minutes, it isn't included, I have a 3GB data plan and unlimited texting, my rate is $36 a month including tax.
 
Verizon is forcing all customers to transition to their shared data plans, so in essence, they are doing the same thing AT&T is doing. AT&T is simply asking that if you are going to use Facetime over cellular, switch to the shared data plans. I don't see how this is any different.
 
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