Technology is a wonderful thing. For instance: we're communicating right now, and I've got about as much sight as you do hearing. Unfortunately, if communicating in person's going to be a thing, one of us is going to have to learn the other's language. Easier if you can read lips (I knew someone who could), and so long as I can understand what you're trying to tell me I really don't care what it sounds like, but if someone asked me if I wanted to learn sign, I'd be for it. Until I got decent at it we'd probably still likely be standing in the same room and texting each other, but hey, you do what you gotta do, no?

I remember when I was in school, before I got mainstreamed out, I was in a generalized class with blind and visually impaired kids, and deaf / hard of hearing kids. I remember my O&M instructor trying to bridge the gap with some of us and it just didn't work. We just couldn't find a viable way to communicate. This kid was a proper genius, passing college boards at 12 years of age. The only reason he didn't go off to college then is his parents prevented it. It's almost easier to communicate online because you can text and so forth, in person is harder to do.

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I remember being at summer camp when I was younger, and we had two deaf counselors. The one would play games with us sometimes in the afternoon, so I tried to ask her if she wanted to play air hockey with me and couldn't get the point across. It was kind of frustrating, because I felt like I couldn't express myself clearly. I tried miming out hitting back and forth and so on. Finally, I had to give up and get one of the other counselors to ask her for me. Also, the deaf counselors would come along and dump everything on our plates. There was some stuff I didn't like but I got it anyway lol. They couldn't really ask us if we wanted this or that and so just dumped random food on our plates without us having any idea what it was. For blind kids, that kinda sucks. I have a bit of vision, I'm still not good at identifying food visually though. None of this is their fault, nor am I trying to make out like they're bad in any way, just that communication with the deaf has always been difficult for me, and them.

I've had this same thought in the opposite direction. I know a few signs but am effectively unable to hold conversation using sign language because I cannot perceive signs (or they would need to be extremely slow and close-up, precluding other important nonverbal information).

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Would tactile signing (deafblind signing, if I have the terminology correct) be a good web/interpreter-free medium? It seems to be accessible to both populations, but I don't know enough about it. I imagine I would strive to learn tactile signing as a way to better connect if I met a deaf/hearing-impaired individual and we were striking up a friendship, if they were also interested in learning with me.

I was thinking about messaging $1 about this because they have a system where agents can type to the caller, but the caller has to request the agent type instead of talk. I also have no idea how inclusive the hiring process is.

As for in person communication, there is a $1 but is not here in the USA yet, sadly.

What about a VRS app? That's what I do sometimes, have my deaf buddy call me through the VRS app even when we are in the same room, because, I have a speech disability too, so can't use dictation when texting like so many others can so it takes forever to text if I don't have my bluetooth keyboard with me.

As for online communication, Skype has real time captioning. FB messenger is accessible to the blind, so is SMS messages, email, things of that nature.

Google hangouts is accessible too, I'm just unsure it it has live captioning?

I hope Microsoft will allow for ASL AI to interpret a skype call in the future, but for now, live captioning will have to do.

I work at a community college, and, yes, I have had a student worker who was deaf. We messaged to one another in the same room and learned a few other non-verbal tricks to get each other's attention. She went on to get a full-time office worker type job. At first, I was self-conscious about the slowness of our communication and worried that she would get frustrated with me but I soon realized that communication barriers were typical for her in everyday life.

Hey! Deafie here too. I have a blind friend as well. I wear a cochlear implant and she has a guide dog. We get along really well and find our disabilities compliment each other. I see better than the average person, and she hears better than the average person so all in all, that works perfectly for us XD. I do have trouble understanding her at time and I have to remember to voice out my actions but once we're used to it, it's all cool :)

Your a cool person for being so interested in bridging the gap between our communities, I wish more people would consider it.

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I know it's not the most ideal, and not everyone is good with a phone, but if you try to get as much said as possible at once, you could use "voice over" or "talkback" and type something with it off, then turn it back on and hand them your phone? You can set up a quick shortcut to turn these off and on (tripple click home on Iphone) or you can just get used to typing with it activated.

But is that really any better than texting? Not really... But then again I don't think I'd mind that anyway... As long as your eloquent with your words, you can get allot of personality across, particularly with all the emoji that can now be read out by screen readers.

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You could also learn grade 1 braille and buy a slate and stylus, braille eraser, and some braille paper or index cards, but it would take a while to get reasonably fast at and is basically just as hard as learning a new (non romantic) language for most people.

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But yes, as someone else already mentioned, there is a tactile form of sign language, it's just that I doubt very many people use it.

You could also try https://www.bespecular.com/ because they have a great texting component. You could text the image description to the user.

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