Open Letter To Ryan Commerson

Ryan Commerson,

Responding to http://signcasts.com/node/258

You're complaining about TRS companies exploiting the deaf community? The fact is you all asked for it, you all let it happen.

I'm the one that discovered that the AOL's AIM service can be used for a TRS protocol.

Go look at the birth date of AOL's OCDACRelay AIM name.

May 31, 2002 at 1:26 pm at Pacific time

That's when I discovered it. That's when I started experimenting with it as relay service for the deaf people.

Did the deaf community cherish it? No They pooh poohed it saying its 'not going to work', 'a crazy idea', and a bunch of other demeaning responses. Years later AIM relay companies started popping up. Hearing people got the credit because you all let them get it. If I was allowed to get the credit, I'd use the resources and revenue to protect deaf people's ideas from exploitation by the hearing people.

You all looked the other way instead.

You all set the ground for exploitation by hearing people.

Now the exploitation you're complaining about is all from you people because you all let it happen in the first place.

Richard Roehm

Update 2/18/2011
Editors Note: The old picture was lost the following we took on a Laptop running Windows 7 and Pidgin Instant Messaging client.