Bristol Braille has created Canute, a multi-line braille eBook reader. It has 9 lines of refreshable braille. Each line has 40 cells of braille. That is an amazing 360 cells, essentially making it a full page of refreshable braille.
It is about the size of a laptop, and is designed to work as a braille version of a Kindle eBook reader. It is estimated to cost about 600 Brittish Pounds, or about $750 U.S.
If you are curious about the name, Canute is the name of an English king from the eleventh century.
From the Developer
Affordable Braille is essential for blind literacy, education and employment, yet Braille use has been declining for decades due to stagnant technology. Bristol Braille Technology is building a revolutionary and radically affordable Braille ereader for blind people called Canute, designed with and by the blind community.
The Canute is the world’s first multiple line Braille ereader — forty characters per line by nine lines — and we intend to distribute it for the price of a Perkins typewriter or iPad Pro. That’s about twenty times cheaper per cell than existing digital Braille devices.
