I’m sure most of you have read at least one news story about the iPhone by now. Only a wireless phone by Apple would generate all this massive publicity - I’m sure the Apple PR department is smiling right now.

Anyways, putting aside all the hype and excitement - the question remains: Is the iPhone a suitable device for Deaf users? Read on to find out.

Most of us would be skeptical about any product that got as much publicity as the iPhone got. However, all the excitement was justified - the iPhone really does deliver a very different experience in using a wireless device. The entire experience is different not only in using it but purchasing. All you need to do is visit an Apple Store or order it from the online Apple Store. Activation is a breeze especially if you have an existing iTunes Store account - you just need to enter your SSN. No sitting around in a store waiting. No waiting around a crowded booth at a deaf trade show. No more hassle from a stupid salesman. You buy. You take home. You activate it via iTunes. Thats it.


The user interface and hardware show Apple’s attention to detail. Using the iPhone is very common-sense and intuitive. You actually interact with the various GUI elements directly via the touch-screen interface.

No mouse, no stylus, no nothing other than your fingers. It’s one step closer to a Minority Report-like interface!

Enough about this stuff. Let’s get to what you came here for. Is the iPhone going to make a good pager for Deaf users? Let’s start with email. The iPhone is supposed to have “push” email via Yahoo! Mail according to the iPhone user guide.


However, in my testing with my long-time Yahoo! Mail account and another just-created account to make sure it wasn’t my old account that got messed up somehow - it doesn’t work at all. I’ve read reports of people getting Yahoo! emails pushed right to their iPhone, but it doesn’t work for me (yet). Strike one. Another annoyance is that even if you use regular POP or IMAP email with the iPhone Mail application, you can only have those accounts checked for new emails every 15 minutes! That’s the minimum. No lower. Argh. Strike two! When emails come in, the iPhone gives off a feeble single vibrate, thats it. No reminders. No repeats. No extra cycles. Strike three!! The email application is great, but with these three strikes against it, it’s not gonna be a good match for Deaf users.
EDIT: Yahoo! Mail now pushes to my iPhone. That’s an improvement. I don’t understand why it didn’t work for the past three days. I’m able to set other emails to forward to my iPhone’s Yahoo! email account, and they arrive instantly too. Now the email on iPhone is acceptable for Deaf users.

I don’t understand why you can’t configure the vibration when the Alarm feature of the Clock keeps vibrating until you turn it off or hit the snooze button!?!. I’d love to configure that type of vibration for incoming emails. Oh well. At least we know the iPhone will make a good alarm clock for Deaf users.

Text/SMS messaging is very nice, but you gotta pay up $20 extra each month for unlimited texts. It looks like iChat on a Mac, but isn’t the same. Too bad. You might try Mobile AIM to connect to AIM via SMS, but if you don’t have a unlimited plan, you will eat up all your SMS messages FAST and might be looking at a very EXPENSIVE bill at the end of the month! It’s mind-boggling that Apple hasn’t included iChat on the iPhone - it’s a natural fit. They might still be working on it or something. We’ll have to wait and see. Web based IM services are disappointing right now as well. Web based services won’t be able to vibrate the iPhone to let you know about a new incoming IM message too.
EDIT: Meebo.com has apparently fixed issues allowing iPhone users to send IM’s. However you still won’t get vibrations on incoming IM’s.

I’m not going to discuss the iTunes Music Store selling videos/movies/TV shows etc without captioning. That’s another whole beast. I did rip a Japanese DVD with English subtitles using HandBrake which allows you to embed subtitles into the resulting file, which can be imported into iTunes, then synced to the iPhone. It was very watchable and readable. ASL-based vlogs and podcasts can be moved onto the iPhone if they are in a compatible format. Or you can just use the included YouTube application and search using “deaf” or “ASL” as keywords to find ASL-based content.

Relay connectivity is another issue. Ironically, the iPhone can make TTY calls easily using two different methods, while connecting to relay is more complicated for the time being. The first TTY method is to use a hardware-based TTY and purchase the Apple iPhone TTY Adapter. However this will use minutes on your iPhone plan. The better way is to visit iptty.com via Mobile Safari and it apparently works very nicely in landscape mode. Connecting to relay is more complicated, and may require you to set up one of these services (WebShell, AjaxTerm, or Anyterm) in order to use IP-Relay’s telnet relay service (telnet to wireless.ip-relay.com:2510). It’ll be complicated, even if you use the 10-minute per session WebShell demo server, but it’s the best we’ll get for now until one of the relay providers wises up and writes a Web 2.0 interface to their relay services.

The virtual keyboard is quite nice, and if you ignore the fact it is virtual, you’ll find it is quite good. It does work better when in landscape mode (sadly only within Mobile Safari) because it’s wider and easier to use. However it’s not that great for typing on without looking at the screen. No tactile typing, and this isn’t great for deaf-blind or low-vision deaf users.

There is no data on whether the iPhone is hearing aid rated, so it’s safe to assume that it has not been tested. I’d strongly encourage you to test out an iPhone on both a WiFi and a GSM based call with your hearing aid due to the different frequencies of the wireless connection - this might be enough to make it hard to use your hearing aid effectively with the iPhone.

Service plans seem to be expensive for a Deaf user who does not need voice minutes on their plan. AT&T has a Text Accessibility Plan (TAP) for other phones which gives you unlimited data and 5,000 text messages for $30 a month. You are required to apply and have a doctor sign proof that you are deaf or hard of hearing, to qualify for this plan. Recent attempts to ask AT&T if this TAP plan would apply to the iPhone have not been successful, but as posted on DeafMac.org, AT&T may be working on getting TAP ready for use with iPhones. We will have to see.

The best part about this device is that almost every con I have found regarding the iPhone can be fixed in software. (Other than no 3G connectivity.) There is light at the end of the iTunnel. I won’t be keeping this iPhone for personal use because I don’t feel it is going to be useful enough to me as a deaf person at the time being - as well as a few other issues (no ebook reader, third-party apps, etc), but I will continue to test it until I have to return it in about 10 days. If you have any deaf-related questions regarding the iPhone, feel free to post it in the comments and I will try to answer in my wrap up review before I return the iPhone.