Posted on 12/11/2017 10:54:10 AM PST by Swordmaker
Ping for Android Ping List and general interest.
What continues to amaze me is that my bare-bones flip phone can send and receive audio, send and receive texts, be used as a digital camera for both still and moving pictures, has volume control, has a number of screensavers available, can access the Internet, and send and receive email. It probably has other features I have not figured out yet, like separate ringtones for everyone on my contact list, and instant messaging, all for the low, low price of $35.00 a month.
Even the most basic of hearing-aids, which I need badly, cost 15x that amount, and does little more than amplification, volume control, and noise-cancellation if you’re lucky.
My medical insurance does not cover this, and there is no way I can afford it, so I continue being a nearly deaf musician.
At least I am in good company...Beethoven was deaf too!
They will use entanglement phenomenon.
I'm a lifetime chip-maker. I don't know how they can justify those outrageous prices. I don't know how they can maintain them either.
I do suspect something illegal.
I just ordered some new "domes" for my girlfriend's hearing aids (not a musician but went to too many rock concerts in her youth and was right up front near the huge amplifiers) and they included a flyer for the same type of hearing aids that cost her that 15X you are talking about, except theirs are only $249. . . made, of course, where the one's you and she pay 15X for are probably also made, in China. Specs seem to be the same. Look exactly alike and the "domes" are factory originals for the 15X ones. I suspect the hearing aids are factory originals too. She got her hearing aids at Costco on my membership. Work great. Digital, with Bluetooth connectivity (easy iPhone and Android settings and control) to cellular phones and other devices. Go figure.
Controlled market. The audiologists got themselves licensed by the states early on. . . where before they were unlicensed and anyone could sell hearing aids, trumpets, gimmicks, etc. Once they were licensed, they naturally prevented just anyone from selling their panoply of devices to aid hearing. . . and jacked up the prices, regardless of the wholesale pricing. . . and draconian fines and jail time awaiting anyone caught competing with them, enforced now by guys and gals with guns (all state enforcement agencies have guns now since 911) and that allows them to legally charge all that the market will bear.
Look in your local listings and see how few audiologists and hearing aid centers there are competing against each other in large metropolitan areas. . . not many for a large populace of hearing loss consumers. They have gatekeepers on who can enter the retail market for selling hearing aids. Even Costco doesn't discount much in this area.
$249 is even a stretch for me...but if they actually WORK, would be worth it.
So, you think I have made a valid point?
Yeah, but does your flip phone do “foveation”?
We must all need foveation. Whatever that is.
We must all need foveation. Whatever that is.
Covfefefoveation.
“foveation”?
Sounds somewhat prurient to me!
I'd say "I hear you" but I would be lying. The stupidity of youth:
I'm surprised I can hear anything. The constant tinnitus is a problem, though.
Absolutely. It's not a technology problem...those are simple electronics that can be made for almost nothing.
Government regulations, licensing or monopoly is the problem.
Sounds vaguely pornographic, if not scatological. . . or it will make you go blind or bald. . .
“hearing aids”
My friend needs some. I’ve tried looking overseas for good and cheap, but didn’t have luck.
I suspect a trip to China and a pair of broken ones would be fruitful.
Apparently we DO need "foveation" or we would not be able to read FreeRepublic pages because we could not focus on the words on the screen. It comes from the way the eye moves to concentrate the image on the area with the most cells that can pick up detail, the fovea.
"Foveated imaging is a digital image processing technique in which the image resolution, or amount of detail, varies across the image according to one or more "fixation points." A fixation point indicates the highest resolution region of the image and corresponds to the center of the eye's retina, the fovea."
Your hearing aid is a certified medical device, you would not believe the added work and administration needed to get something certified. This easily can take a $10 device in terms of parts and make it a $500 device..... You phone doesn’t have to jump these hurdles
Don’t fall for the scam.
My father went into one of those hearing aid places and they told him there was no risk because if he didn’t like it he could return it.
What they didn’t tell him about was the 15% restocking fee.
With all that power...
I read a thought that just about sums it up. Goes something like this...
If I told you fifty years ago that man could have a device he would carry around in his pocket that would give him access to all of the information in the world, yet he would use it to watch cat videos and argue with people he did not know, would you believe me?
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