It wasn't until I engaged myself in a personal hassle with The Toronto Sun recently that I was forcibly reminded of two things - one, that "the public be damned" is an attitude that still prevails in some newspaper offices and that if you want to complain, the Ontario Press Council may sympathize, but often can't really go to bat for you. Perseverance and general bloody-mindedness are the techniques you really need to get some sort of intelligent response from the paper involved.

Using an article by R. Fish, published a decade ago, as a point of departure, the authors propose that no significant advances in high resolution devices in vision substitution systems have been made since then. They claim that this lack of progress is a consequence of researchers failing to exploit the implications in certain of the theoretical insights on perception. They suggest alternative theoretical approaches which may help to move the work forward, as well as presenting new design criteria. Tactile substitution systems are proposed in preference to cortical implant work, and electrocutaneous transfer is offered in preference to vibrotactile techniques, which are seen as the major reason for the very limited resolution achieved by existing approaches.

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c. H i s t o r i c a l l y , i n n o v a t i o n s i n communication techniques have i n v o l v e d a m a n i p u l a t i o no f time and space. To draw an analogy from r e l a t i v i t y t h e o r y , assuming a number o f a l t e r n a t i v e time t r a c k s a r e l a i d o u t l i k e p a r a l l e l r a i l r o a d t r a c k s , t e c h n o l o g i c a l i n n o v a t i o n s i n communication have made i t p o s s i b l e t o move from one t r a c k t o another. Although t h e n a t u r e o f ideas, t h e substance o f c o m u n i c a t i o n does n o t change, t h e means by which, and t h e speed w i t h which these ideas can be conveyed, stored, r e t r i e ved, and disseminated, and t h e number o f people t o whom t h e ideas a r e a c c e s s i b l e has changed d r a m a t i c a l l y . The i n v e n t i o n o f w r i t i n g enabled man t o add new dimensions t o time and space, d imensions n o t a c c e s s i b l e t o p r e l i t e r a t e man, t o l i s t e n t o those l o n g s i n c e dead and t o speak t o those n o t y e t born. As S c h r a n noted: Along the p a t h o f h i s t o r y , u p the l o n g i n c l i n e , perhaps t h o u s a n d s o f y e a r s beyong t h e b e g i n n i n g s o f l a n g u a g e , l a y a n o t h e r landmark: w r i t i n g . Having l e a r n e d t o s e p a r a t e sounds from their r e f e r e n t s , man now l e a r n e d t o s e p a r a t e t h e m f r o m the s p e a k e r a s w e l l and s u b s e q u e n t l y made t h e m e v e n more p o r t a b l e . . .As l a n g u a g e a r o s e from t h e need t o a b s t r a c t upon e v e n t s and e x p e r i e n c e , s o m u s t w r i t i n g h a v e come from the need t o a b s t r a c t upon p i c t u r e s and t o make word-signs l a s t l o n g e r than the f l e e t i n g second d u r i n g w h i c h t h e y c o u l d be h e a r d . 'The i n t r o d u c t i o n o f t h e t e l e g r a p h represented what has been termed a "quantum jump" i n t h e speed o f i n t e r p e r s o n a l t r a n s a c t i o n , and t h e telephone had an even more s i g n i fi c a n t impact on t h e space-time r e 1 a t i o n s h i p o f people : " T h e r e i s a d i f f e r e n c e o f some t w e n t y s e c o n d s b e t w e e n a f r i e n d i n Vancouver and a n e i g h b o r i n M o n t r e a l . To many p e o p l e this t i m e d i f f e r e n c e i s i n s i g n i f i c a n t , and t h e s p a c e d i f f e r e n c e d o e s n o t r e p r e s e n t a barrier.^'^Latham concludes t h a t t h e phenomenon o f t h e telephone has l e d many people t o t h i n k o f t h e w o r l d as "a s p a t i a l --u n r e l a t e d t o t h e f a c t o r o f d i~t a n c e . "~ Researchers a t t h e I n s t i t u t e o f t h e F u t u r e i n C a l i f o r n i a b e l i e v e t h a t computer conferencing creates an d l t e r e d S t a t e " a l t e r e d c o m u n i c a t i o n s t a t e " by e n a b l i n g people t o escape t h e normal bounds o f time E n a b l e s Escape and space. V a l l e e , Johansen, and Spangler observe...

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