Double Tap

Apple's Surprise and Shine event brought the foldable iPhone Duo, AirPods 5 and a quiet RAM boost for Apple Watch Ultra 4. Steven Scott and Marc Aflalo of YourTechReport pick out what matters, what could have been a press release, and whether the Duo can replace an iPad for someone who travels a lot.
Steven found most of the keynote boring. Marc liked more of it, starting with Live Rewind, which lets your Apple Watch catch the last 15 seconds of a conversation you missed. That raises questions about privacy, where the data lives, and why features like the expressive Siri AI voices leave out the iPhone 15 Pro. They also look at the Ultra 4 going from 2GB to 4GB of RAM, and Steven explains why VoiceOver has felt sluggish on his Ultra 3.
AirPods 5 bring active noise cancellation to the $129 model with no ear tips, and the wireless charging version adds volume control on the stem. Marc describes how the AirPods hearing features help him focus in noisy restaurants. Steven makes the case for wired USB-C EarPods when VoiceOver latency matters.
Then the iPhone Duo. Marc expects to buy one, because a 7.6-inch inner screen could let him leave his iPad at home. They cover the passport-sized design, Touch ID, the under-screen camera, MagSafe, and a closed thickness of around 11.2mm. iPhone Handoff, which lets two iPhones share one number, leaves open questions about carriers and cost.
The conversation ends on whether a Pro Duo is coming, why the iPhone Air will probably survive, and why the 17e is still a sensible pick for many buyers.
Chapters
0:00 – Intro and first thoughts on Surprise and Shine
1:44 – Live Rewind, audio intelligence and privacy
3:21 – Which devices get Siri AI features
4:36 – Apple Watch Ultra 4 RAM and the Series 12
7:53 – AirPods 5, noise cancellation and wired EarPods
12:52 – iPhone Duo first impressions and design
19:01 – iPhone Handoff and sharing one number
22:32 – MagSafe, cases and unconfirmed specs
24:18 – A Pro Duo, the iPhone Air and what to buy
Relevant Links
iPhone Duo: https://www.apple.com/iphone-duo/
AirPods 5: https://www.apple.com/airpods-5/
Apple Watch: https://www.apple.com/watch/
YourTechReport: https://yourtechreport.com/

----
Follow on:
YouTube: https://www.doubletaponair.com/youtube
X (formerly Twitter): https://www.doubletaponair.com/x
Instagram: https://www.doubletaponair.com/instagram
TikTok: https://www.doubletaponair.com/tiktok
Threads: https://www.doubletaponair.com/threads
Facebook: https://www.doubletaponair.com/facebook
LinkedIn: https://www.doubletaponair.com/linkedin
Subscribe to the Podcast:
Apple: https://www.doubletaponair.com/apple
Spotify: https://www.doubletaponair.com/spotify
RSS: https://www.doubletaponair.com/podcast
iHeadRadio: https://www.doubletaponair.com/iheart
About Double Tap
Hosted by the insightful duo, Steven Scott and Shaun Preece, Double Tap is a treasure trove of information for anyone who's blind or partially sighted and has a passion for tech. Steven and Shaun not only demystify tech, but they also regularly feature interviews and welcome guests from the community, fostering an interactive and engaging environment. Tune in every day of the week, and you'll discover how technology can seamlessly integrate into your life, enhancing daily tasks and experiences, even if your sight is limited.
"Double Tap" is a registered trademark of Double Tap Productions Inc.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Honda Scenic Audio set out to describe the view from a car window for blind and visually impaired passengers, using computer vision and generative AI. Steven Scott and Shaun Preece revisit their 2024 conversation about the app, built with Perkins School for the Blind, and ask whether poetic AI scenery description is something blind people actually want.
This episode is supported by Pneuma Solutions. Creators of accessible tools like Remote Incident Manager and Scribe. Find out more at https://pneumasolutions.com/
Honda announced Scenic Audio in April 2024 as a beta. You hold your phone to the window, it works in any car, and it narrates the passing landscape in storytelling language instead of practical directions. Steven thinks back to a Rocky Mountaineer train journey from Banff to Vancouver where he'd have loved more description. Shaun wonders what it would make of an ordinary drive through town.
Shaun's bigger question is whether true real-time description exists yet. Steven points to the Be My Eyes demo of GPT-4o describing ducks on a pond, and argues this app sits alongside tools like Be My AI and Google Lookout.
Phil Hruska of Honda explains how the project grew out of Honda's focus on inclusivity, with guidance from Dr. Josh Loebner, who is blind himself, on involving disabled people from the start. Sandy Lacey of the Howe Innovation Center describes interviews with around 30 blind and low vision people, and why testers enjoyed details they hadn't realised they were missing. The Alabama Institute for Deaf and Blind and Honda's Enable associate group also took part in beta testing.
Honda's R&D history comes up too, from ASIMO to office chairs that move out of your way, along with Shaun's wish for self-driving wheelie bins. Back in 2026, the hosts reflect on how much AI tools have changed since this was recorded.
Chapters
0:00 – Welcome and a classic from the archive
2:38 – Honda Scenic Audio explained
3:51 – Honda's launch video
5:27 – Would you use it? Scenic trips and everyday drives
8:12 – Real-time description and the Be My Eyes GPT-4o comparison
11:54 – The Honda and Perkins partnership with Phil Hruska
16:07 – Listening to blind users and Honda's R&D projects
19:56 – What testers said about the app
22:46 – The verdict: Honda Cynic
25:43 – Looking back from 2026
Relevant Links
Pneuma Solutions: https://www.pneumasolutions.com
Be My Eyes: https://www.bemyeyes.com
Lookout by Google: https://support.google.com/accessibility/android/answer/9031274

----
Follow on:
YouTube: https://www.doubletaponair.com/youtube
X (formerly Twitter): https://www.doubletaponair.com/x
Instagram: https://www.doubletaponair.com/instagram
TikTok: https://www.doubletaponair.com/tiktok
Threads: https://www.doubletaponair.com/threads
Facebook: https://www.doubletaponair.com/facebook
LinkedIn: https://www.doubletaponair.com/linkedin
Subscribe to the Podcast:
Apple: https://www.doubletaponair.com/apple
Spotify: https://www.doubletaponair.com/spotify
RSS: https://www.doubletaponair.com/podcast
iHeadRadio: https://www.doubletaponair.com/iheart
About Double Tap
Hosted by the insightful duo, Steven Scott and Shaun Preece, Double Tap is a treasure trove of information for anyone who's blind or partially sighted and has a passion for tech. Steven and Shaun not only demystify tech, but they also regularly feature interviews and welcome guests from the community, fostering an interactive and engaging environment. Tune in every day of the week, and you'll discover how technology can seamlessly integrate into your life, enhancing daily tasks and experiences, even if your sight is limited.
"Double Tap" is a registered trademark of Double Tap Productions Inc.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Audio description was built for blind and partially sighted viewers. RNIB brought broadcasters to London to ask whether sighted audiences want it too, and what that would change for the rest of us. Steven Scott reports back from the Audio Is King event, before the show turns to Clipman, an Audacity 4 warning, and the Anthropic resignation that put AI extinction talk on every front page.
RNIB surveyed more than 1,200 sighted people and found roughly 42 percent already knew what audio description is. Steven and Shaun compare that with audiobooks, which stayed a small shelf of expensive CD boxsets until Audible made them mainstream and quality improved for everyone. The same could happen with description, listened to on a commute or at the gym, if discovery improves. Shaun argues the real barrier is presentation: burying it in a languages menu keeps it hidden, and the name itself may need rethinking. Described video, the term used in Canada, came up as a clearer alternative.
Behind the slow progress sits a familiar problem. Accessibility teams inside broadcasters are small, and every department arrives at the priorities meeting asking where the value is. Steven makes the case that description could be an offering rather than a cost, pointing to companion podcasts, to what television could learn from audio-first storytelling, and to AMI's integrated described video, where the script carries the picture instead of a separate voice. He also pays tribute to Sonali Rai at RNIB and to audio describer Marie Campbell, whose voice Steven recognised live on stage.
Two warnings follow. Audacity 4 rebuilds the interface in Qt and, in testing, screen reader access is badly broken, so stay on the version you have. New iOS and macOS releases land next week, and the advice is to wait a month and read the AppleVis bug report first. On a brighter note, Clipman from Andre Louis now runs on Linux and offers a self-hosted server, so encrypted clipboard sync works across Windows, Mac, Android and iPhone without a cloud account.
The episode closes on Jacob Coxon, who resigned from Anthropic this week saying neither Anthropic nor OpenAI is acting responsibly and that both are racing toward self-improving superintelligence. Colleagues publicly agreed the risk is real. Steven and Shaun weigh how seriously to take percentage odds on human extinction, why biological weapons and infrastructure hacking changed the shape of the fear, and why the story has been met with near silence inside the blind tech community.
Chapters
0:00 – Please don't kill us all
0:19 – RNIB's Audio Is King event and audio description for sighted audiences
24:32 – Clipman gains Linux support and a self-hosted server
29:08 – Do not install Audacity 4
33:14 – New iOS and macOS updates: wait a month
35:52 – Jacob Coxon resigns from Anthropic
Relevant Links
RNIB: https://www.rnib.org.uk
Clipman by Andre Louis: https://github.com/OnjLouis/Clipman
AMI: https://www.ami.ca
Twenty Thousand Hertz: https://www.20k.org
Audacity: https://www.audacityteam.org
AppleVis: https://www.applevis.com
Anthropic: https://www.anthropic.com

----
Follow on:
YouTube: https://www.doubletaponair.com/youtube
X (formerly Twitter): https://www.doubletaponair.com/x
Instagram: https://www.doubletaponair.com/instagram
TikTok: https://www.doubletaponair.com/tiktok
Threads: https://www.doubletaponair.com/threads
Facebook: https://www.doubletaponair.com/facebook
LinkedIn: https://www.doubletaponair.com/linkedin
Subscribe to the Podcast:
Apple: https://www.doubletaponair.com/apple
Spotify: https://www.doubletaponair.com/spotify
RSS: https://www.doubletaponair.com/podcast
iHeadRadio: https://www.doubletaponair.com/iheart
About Double Tap
Hosted by the insightful duo, Steven Scott and Shaun Preece, Double Tap is a treasure trove of information for anyone who's blind or partially sighted and has a passion for tech. Steven and Shaun not only demystify tech, but they also regularly feature interviews and welcome guests from the community, fostering an interactive and engaging environment. Tune in every day of the week, and you'll discover how technology can seamlessly integrate into your life, enhancing daily tasks and experiences, even if your sight is limited.
"Double Tap" is a registered trademark of Double Tap Productions Inc.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Apple's iPhone Duo, iPhone 18 Pro and Apple Watch Series 12 arrived at the September event, and Steven Scott, Shaun Preece and returning guest Michael Babcock came away distinctly unmoved. Here is what the new lineup actually offers blind and low vision users, and where all that money goes.
The headline is the iPhone Duo, Apple's first foldable. It opens like a passport to a 7.6 inch inner screen, with a 5.4 inch display on the outside, a variable torque hinge and speakers that adapt to how you hold it. There is no Face ID, though Touch ID and Apple Watch unlock are there, and the camera sits behind the screen. Pricing starts at $1,999 US and $2,999 Canadian for 256GB, rising to $3,199 US for two terabytes. The team agree it could be genuinely transformative for people with low vision thanks to magnification and side by side apps, while VoiceOver users may find the extra screen real estate hard to justify. One change worth knowing about: the dock and app tabs move to the right side of the screen vertically, which will take some relearning.
The Apple Watch gains what Apple calls audio intelligence. A Siri recap feature pulls back a transcript of the last 15 seconds of conversation, useful when a server rattles off the specials, and a double press of the digital crown starts longer note taking that can be tied to a schedule so it never listens at the wrong moment. Michael compares it to his experience with wearable recorders and the Plaud Note, and explains why Apple's private cloud compute makes him more comfortable than the alternatives.
Elsewhere, AirPods 5 bring a claimed 50 percent improvement in active noise cancellation without going into the ear canal, with a version offering volume control on the stem at $149 US. Apple Watch Series 12 focuses on a redesigned heart sensor, longevity metrics and a Quest Diagnostics tie-in for blood work, prompting a frank exchange about whether more health data helps or simply creates anxiety. The iPhone 18 Pro starts at $1,199 US and climbs steeply from there.
Then there is the list of no-shows: no new Apple TV, no HomePod, no smart glasses, and no standard iPhone 18 until March. With Siri AI still not fully out, the hosts ask whether this is the year to sit tight.
Chapters
0:00 – First reactions to a boring Apple event
2:24 – The opening skit and Tim Cook's retirement
4:24 – iPhone 18 Pro, Pro Max and the price increases
12:09 – AirPods 5, noise cancellation and stem volume
14:01 – Audio intelligence and the watch that listens
24:00 – Apple Watch Series 12, heart data and longevity
31:26 – iPhone Duo: Apple's foldable arrives
47:54 – The missing Apple TV, HomePod and Siri AI
53:53 – Expected and dull: the final verdict
Relevant Links
Apple Events: https://www.apple.com/apple-events/
Earshot Podcasts by Michael Babcock: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/earshot-podcasts/id6770760602

----
Follow on:
YouTube: https://www.doubletaponair.com/youtube
X (formerly Twitter): https://www.doubletaponair.com/x
Instagram: https://www.doubletaponair.com/instagram
TikTok: https://www.doubletaponair.com/tiktok
Threads: https://www.doubletaponair.com/threads
Facebook: https://www.doubletaponair.com/facebook
LinkedIn: https://www.doubletaponair.com/linkedin
Subscribe to the Podcast:
Apple: https://www.doubletaponair.com/apple
Spotify: https://www.doubletaponair.com/spotify
RSS: https://www.doubletaponair.com/podcast
iHeadRadio: https://www.doubletaponair.com/iheart
About Double Tap
Hosted by the insightful duo, Steven Scott and Shaun Preece, Double Tap is a treasure trove of information for anyone who's blind or partially sighted and has a passion for tech. Steven and Shaun not only demystify tech, but they also regularly feature interviews and welcome guests from the community, fostering an interactive and engaging environment. Tune in every day of the week, and you'll discover how technology can seamlessly integrate into your life, enhancing daily tasks and experiences, even if your sight is limited.
"Double Tap" is a registered trademark of Double Tap Productions Inc.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

The Meta glasses microphone problem finally has a fix, and it was buried in a settings menu the Adventurer model never showed. Steven Scott and Shaun Preece explain exactly where to find it, why it should have been on by default, and what else has changed across Meta's growing glasses lineup, including walking directions and spatial audio that only work on some models.
There is also an honest conversation about the smart glasses privacy backlash, whether blind wearers should start policing where they wear a camera on their face, and whether Meta donating glasses to blind charities is cynical PR or a story worth telling.
Steven opens with a delivery disaster involving a cracked desk, a one man Amazon collection van and a refund that left him paying someone to take the thing away. From there the show turns to the Meta glasses, where a software update has finally surfaced the microphone troubleshooting toggle for the Meta Adventurer model. It was always available on the Ray-Ban Meta glasses, which never needed it. Turning it on resolves the muffled, inaudible calls that Steven and listener Gordon had been chasing for weeks. Shaun and Steven also compare notes on settings that reset themselves, the Meta AI app becoming harder to navigate, and the fact that these glasses are no longer one product with different frames. Walking directions have rolled out in the US and Canada, spatial audio is missing from the Ray-Bans, and only some models carry an action button.
Richard from Louisiana calls back after his previous question about Bixby. He has stuck with TalkBack on his Samsung phone, describes it as an interrogation technique, and has been trying to connect Audible and iHeartRadio to his glasses without success. Shaun walks through where the connect button actually lives in the apps list. Richard also reports that Meta's walking navigation beats Google Maps in his neighbourhood, accurate enough that a left turn instruction lands within twenty counted steps. His wish to say "get me an Uber" to his glasses leads into a discussion of agentic AI, computer use tools already helping blind users fill in inaccessible web forms, and how long it might take Apple and Google to bring that to the phone.
Gavin in Edinburgh raises the privacy question. He still wears his glasses, but swaps to Bose Frames around a pool and would never wear them near a changing room. That prompts a wider debate: Meta now blocks recording if the notification LED is covered, some people have drilled the light out entirely, and mainstream coverage keeps mentioning the benefit to visually impaired users. Steven argues the fear is running ahead of the evidence and says he has no plans to stop wearing them. The PR question follows, tied to a story from a recent Zero Project event about companies choosing a ramp outside a building over the accessibility work nobody can photograph.
Along the way: Earshot, the VoiceOver-first podcast app from Michael Babcock, gets a thumbs up, Steven confesses to buying a tiny 3D printed VibeKeys keypad for vibe coding, and floats two future projects, a watch that tells you the time without a rooster, and Wi-Fi presence sensing to find the dog. The episode closes with Apple event predictions, recorded hours before the keynote.
Chapters
0:00 – Welcome to Double Tap
0:48 – The broken desk and Amazon's odd fix
10:12 – Falling out of love with the Meta glasses
12:19 – The microphone fix for the Meta Adventurer
17:48 – Walking directions, spatial audio and a splintering lineup
19:36 – Earshot, app overload and the VibeKeys keypad
24:30 – A talking watch and Wi-Fi presence sensing
27:02 – Richard on TalkBack, Meta app connections and walking navigation
32:03 – Learning a screen reader and the promise of agentic AI
39:06 – Gavin on privacy, the LED and Scottish inventors
44:45 – Would you stop wearing camera glasses?
47:12 – Meta's PR and the ramp outside the building
52:53 – Apple event predictions
Have the Meta glasses worked for you, or has the privacy conversation changed how you wear them? Send a voice note or an email and it could feature on the show. Subscribe wherever you listen, and hit like on YouTube to help more blind and low vision listeners find us.
Relevant Links
Meta AI Glasses: https://www.meta.com/ai-glasses/
OOrion: https://www.oorion.fr/en
Aira: https://aira.io/
Be My Eyes: https://www.bemyeyes.com/
Earshot Podcasts: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/earshot-podcasts/id6770760602
VibeKeys: https://vibekeys.dev/
Zero Project: https://zeroproject.org/

----
Follow on:
YouTube: https://www.doubletaponair.com/youtube
X (formerly Twitter): https://www.doubletaponair.com/x
Instagram: https://www.doubletaponair.com/instagram
TikTok: https://www.doubletaponair.com/tiktok
Threads: https://www.doubletaponair.com/threads
Facebook: https://www.doubletaponair.com/facebook
LinkedIn: https://www.doubletaponair.com/linkedin
Subscribe to the Podcast:
Apple: https://www.doubletaponair.com/apple
Spotify: https://www.doubletaponair.com/spotify
RSS: https://www.doubletaponair.com/podcast
iHeadRadio: https://www.doubletaponair.com/iheart
About Double Tap
Hosted by the insightful duo, Steven Scott and Shaun Preece, Double Tap is a treasure trove of information for anyone who's blind or partially sighted and has a passion for tech. Steven and Shaun not only demystify tech, but they also regularly feature interviews and welcome guests from the community, fostering an interactive and engaging environment. Tune in every day of the week, and you'll discover how technology can seamlessly integrate into your life, enhancing daily tasks and experiences, even if your sight is limited.
"Double Tap" is a registered trademark of Double Tap Productions Inc.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.