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"Visually impaired customers of American Express say they can no longer read their credit card statements online. In December Amex changed its format for UK statements from HTML to Portable Document Format or PDF. However, it failed to encode the new PDF documents so they could be read by "screen readers," special software used by blind or partially sighted people. "

"Deaf children have been testing software that enables them to see a visual representation of sound waves. Called Lumisonic the software translates sound waves into circles that radiate on a display. It creates a real time representation of sound and is designed to elicit responses quickly in the human brain. "

"Kuniholm is a biomechanics researcher at Duke University who lost his arm in an explosion while serving in Iraq. His efforts at Guitar Hero are more than just fun and games. He is trying out a system developed by Jacob Vogelstein and Robert Armiger of the Applied Physics lab at Johns Hopkins University who hope to use games like Guitar Hero to train people to use prosthetic limbs."

"Jason Perkins, 34, talked to blind people in Cardiff to develop a handset that tells users which way to turn by vibrating their index or ring finger. Owners hold the GPS device in the same hand as their guide dog's lead. "

"Trials are under way of a UK service allowing people to contact emergency services by text message. The system is aimed at people who cannot make normal voice calls to the 999 service due to disability"

"A device that allows blind people to attach and read audio labels on everyday objects has gone on show. The PenFriend uses minute barcodes which - when scanned by a digital pen - trigger MP3 files recorded on the unit."

""There aren't enough therapists available for the number of children who have movement difficulties in the UK," said Professor Mon-Williams. "So increasingly we need to move towards assisted technologies to fill the gap." He said that in the past it had been assumed that children like Tom would 'grow out' of their dyspraxia, but this has turned out not to be the case."

"Vint Cerf, vice president at Google, is widely recognised as a founding father of the internet. He is also hard of hearing and has worn a hearing aid since the age of 13. "One of the big challenges of the video medium is whether it can be made accessible to everyone," he told news agency AFP. "