#016: Show me the Echo

Hello lovely listener, and welcome to 67 minutes of fun, as the Blind Guys, Clodagh and their lovely guests are back to entertain you! On the last show, you'll remember that we had a great chat with Dave Nason from Sky. At the time, Jan and Stuart set Óran a little bit of homework, so has he done it? We get straight down to business and find out! The Blind Guys like to check in and talk about the weather - sure why not, doesn't everyone! Anyway, we're feeling Spring in the air and Jan has only gone and had solar panels installed on his roof. The question now is could he share some of his newly acquired solar power with the other guys so they could all benefit from cheaper energy bills? Stuart came across a great story on Twitter recently about a model railway museum in Hamburg Germany. While the museum was closed during the Covid-19 restrictions, they were busy creating something truly unique. Have a look at the video that accompanies the news piece and hear for yourselves. If you're a regular listener to the show you'll know that accessibility on the BuyMie shopping service has been something of a talking point, especially for Stuart, who uses it every week. Well, the ongoing conversations with BuyMie are bearing fruit and Stuart has a quick demo to show us how accessibility has improved with the most recent app update. Well done to all at BuyMie for their very hard work. We mentioned Óran's homework earlier on, and his promise to review Sky's new accessibility solution. Well he didn't just review it, but did a really super Job and it appears that Jan and Stuart are a bit jealous! Sky have brought accessibility to a whole new level and are to be highly commended for the work they have done to date. Jan's kids would love a feature where they could watch a programme with their dad, and while Jan is enjoying the show with audio description, his kids can watch the regular version. Good news from Óran is that this could be in the works in the future. Robin Christopherson and Shaun Preece are two aficionados of the podcasting world. They can be found on podcasts including RNIB Tech Talk and Doubletap Canada, but they also have their own Echo Show podcast, and, Robin has been running the hugely successful Dot to Dot for the last few years. We were delighted to hang out with the guys and find out about their shows and all the cool things they've been doing with their echo devices, as well as some other chat too. After all that talking, and there's a lot of it, Clodagh is along to read our emails, or should we say read an email. We've only time for one this week but it is an hilarious blind travel story. We'd love to hear yours, and indeed anything else that you want to tell us about by emailing [email protected] or on Twitter to @BlindGuysChat. Don't forget that we'd love you to record an audio message and send it to us. We might even play it on the next show!