Seeking Community Input: Help Us Design a More Accessible Power Bank (Free Prototype for Testers)

I’ve completed the survey – thank you for involving the community early in the design process. Building accessibility in from the beginning benefits everyone, not just blind or low‑vision users. Happy to help with testing or feedback down the line.

If it has one or the other to tell battery level be OK. Long live cats.

I love the initiative and looking forward to testing the product.

Did so and send the link to a apple group list for the blind. Hope they provide input. Long live cats.

There is one that has sound and haptic to know how much the battery is charge in 25% but the price is more than $100. Long live cats.

Glad to see this could come to mainstream platforms. I'd love to test the product, unfortunately i don't live in the states and getting things shipped to my country whilest possible is a pain in the neck, so sadly had to say no to testing. However filled it out for everything else.

Looking forwar to working with you.

I am definitely interested in this and filled out the survey. Thank you for bringing this to our attention and allowing us to give our feedback.

I just filled out the survey.
It would be great to have accessible alternatives other than those energrid power banks.

i filled out the servey and opted in for testing. if in future info should change how would i submit for updates

Hatpcis would be the ideal choice if only one were made available since both blind and DeafBlind will have access to that info. Just a thought. Long live dogs too.

Agree with Scott. Is better than sound and probably cheaper? Long live cats.

What company do you work for? How will my survey data be used? How will my survey data be handled? Will it be anonymized? Will it be encrypted at rest?

Update: The survey is asking for my address. You /do not/ need this at this stage of product design. You should be asking for this if, and /only/ if, you select someone for product testing. You don't even ask for a communication method. This smells like an info-harvesting scam that preys on disabled people

I love the idea of this project. I have wanted a truly accessible power bank for a long, long time. I filled out the survey, but it didn't ask for an email address or phone number. Do you need that information?

Hatpcis would be the ideal choice if only one were made available since both blind and DeafBlind will have access to that info. Just a thought. Long live dogs too.

I think that piezo buzzers can't be beat in terms of value. They can produce very loud sound near their natural resonation frequencies, don't require almost any power (though this shouldn't be a problem for this specific product class), take virtually no space since they can be quite thin compared to traditional magnetic speakers, and only require like 3 electronic components (one transistor, one resistor, and one ceramic capacitor) to operate in analog electronics or just direct wiring to a digital signal generator. They can also be used to provide haptic feedback since they produce very strong vibrations at their natural resonating frequencies, and touching them directly when they are producing square waves feels almost like an electrocution, so assembling them in a way that would apply some force against an exterior wall of the power bank should be enough to provide the haptic sensation.

The feedback could be just a few tones, hopefully of different frequencies, to provide exactly the same kind of charge information as a few LEDs provide to the sighted, so at a minimum, if the device provides 5 LEDs for the sighted to gage the power level, it should beep up to 5 times for each LED that lights up when the user presses a button. The feedback could also include delimiter beeps of a different frequency so that the user could intuitively infer the amount of power without having to read a manual, so if the feedback lasted 1 second, the delimiter beeps would be played with that temporal space between them, with the power gage beeps played in between, meaning that a full charge would result in the whole second being filled with beeps whereas a partial charge would have a period of silence between the last power gage beep and the end delimiter.

Once our optimized prototypes are ready, we will ship them to selected testers completely free of charge for real-world feedback.

So you're saying that not all people will be selected for testing. Why are you collecting a shipping address from everyone then? You do not need that PII until you actually ship the product out. Why aren't you asking for an email address or a phone number or a social media handle? These would all be much more sensible communication methods at this stage.

I will ask again. What company do you work for and how are you handling collected data?

First off, you do realize that no matter if you selected yes or no on the question if you were available to test the prototypes, The next question where you have to provide the address was skippable entirely? Meaning, its, weather you selected yes or no; the question isn't required. So no, this was not mandatory. You should have looked at things more closely, because no, you did not have to provide your shipping address. whether you answered yes or no to that question. Second. The survey was completely anonymous. I know because I went to the link, and guess what? I was signed out of my Google account. And yes, you can still complete the survey without being signed in to your account so uh no, not a scam, imho. Of course when one doesn't read carefully or look at all the options... I can see why you'd come to that conclusion. But hey, if you’re suspicious of this you know you can skip it right? No one is forcing you to fill it, after all so, you can skip it if its what you want. Thirdly, if your that misstrustful? Put say, if you ,have it, a po box you have access to which then forwards it to your actual house or something; put the address of a mail room that's close to your house etc. If your that doubtful and you don't want to provide your actual house address because of... quote, scam risk; you have options. I'm usually not this harsh but, when I see bullshit or when things don't add up I call it out. But saying why are you collecting a shipping address from everyone then; is disingenuous. As said people didn't have to give out their address if they don't want to. Also; its logic. Say 100 people apply for testing but you only have 10 prototypes? Obviously you cannot give 100 people a prototype not when you only have 10. Doesn't mean that the other 90 people who got their address got scammed though. If this was a scam, the shipping, account name, having to be signed in to google account would've been mandotory no buts.
Here i'll just, this is from the survey itself, I coppied voiceover's output
13. Would you like to participate in our future "Chief Experience Officer" program to test new prototypes for free? description required field.
Yes checkbox checked
14. Please provide your shipping address for future prototype delivery. （ Please include Street, City, State, and Zip Code） multiline textfield
13. Would you like to participate in our future "Chief Experience Officer" program to test new prototypes for free? description required field.
no checkbox checked
14. Please provide your shipping address for future prototype delivery. （ Please include Street, City, State, and Zip Code） multiline textfield.
Now. Both have the multiline textfield except... Do you see what's missing in both cases? Required. Other questions have the, required field text next to them, like what you see in say, question 13, where you cant submit the survey without marking them. The text field in 14 though? It doesn't have a required flag as you can see. So, is that collecting everyone's address? Not even close. If it was; that would've been a required field; and its uh... Not.

I didn't fill out the survey cause I don't use a power bank but this is a great idea.

I'd go with a voice command personally, like with headphones, or maybe voice and haptic and you can choose between the two?

Haptic. Forget about sound, haptic is a must. Work for blind, those with hearing issues and also to keep it without making noise. Long live cats.

First off, you do realize that no matter if you selected yes or no on the question if you were available to test the prototypes, The next question where you have to provide the address was skippable entirely? Meaning, its, weather you selected yes or no; the question isn't required.

I never said the question was required.

yes, you can still complete the survey without being signed in to your account so uh no, not a scam

Signing in is not mandatory for a scam

you know you can skip it right? No one is forcing you to fill it, after all so, you can skip it if its what you want

You are correct. Everyone should feel free to skip it if they wish to skip it.

Also; its logic. Say 100 people apply for testing but you only have 10 prototypes? Obviously you cannot give 100 people a prototype not when you only have 10. Doesn't mean that the other 90 people who got their address got scammed though.

What's going to happen to the other 90 people who input their address? Will that data be deleted? Will it be stored indefinitely in a spreadsheet? There is no need to collect a shipping address until /after/ someone is selected for testing.

The text field in 14 though? It doesn't have a required flag as you can see

I never said it was required. Also, I, in fact, cannot see on account of my eyes not functioning.

But saying why are you collecting a shipping address from everyone then; is disingenuous.

You are correct. That was hasty wording on my part and I apologize for making that hasty generalization.

If it was; that would've been a required field; and its uh... Not.

I never said it was required. My problem is that the field exists at all in a market research survey that gives no guarantee that you will be selected for testing if you select yes.

Haptic. Forget about sound, haptic is a must. Work for blind, those with hearing issues and also to keep it without making noise. Long live cats.

I did address the haptic feedback concern as well, as you will be able to find out if you actually read my comment. Also, people with neuropathy, like my mother during her last days alive, have a disabled sense of touch, so any solution that is both cheap and effectively tackles a broader ranger of problems is always better in my opinion. Disabilities come in all forms and shapes, it's not just blindness.

first, I'm not going to say that I'm anti AI or something of the sort, because I am not. copying the text from the poster and putting it in an AI checker, shows.
63% of text is likely AI.
I see big company nowadays are using AI extensively, but I don't think they would use AI to write their statement. Yes, the result that I gave here clearly says, "likely", but after working on and off with AIs, I can definetly tell that the poster is indeed using AI without having to use the checker. and no, it doesn't matter where the company is from. if this is such a big company like say, Anker , Xiaomi, they should have an international representative that is fluent enough in English, eliminating the need for AI writing at the first place. Even though the company behind this need to be kept in secret, I think the approach should be more professional. even though it is optional to fill up the address, sharing such major personal information should at least went through a legal consent form for the participants to signed if they willing to share.
Why you're making it like it is wrong to be suspicious LOL.
well, at the end of the day, I hope my suspicion will be proven wrong. nice to see more accessible tech, that is for sure.
Best of luck.

Good that you have concerns and are curious about it. Also make sure you read the survay all the way to the end. Did finished it and when I selected yes, ask for address, if I had selected no, would not do so. Like I said you want to share your concern and we should say thanks. Long live cats.

Hello,

Thanks for replying. I am still incredibly suspect of your claims. I will go through them in order.

1. How are you going to coordinate this when the only contact method you have on file is a shipping address? I will reiterate that it would make much more sense to collect an email address, a phone number, or even a social media handle at this stage. If a participant does not provide their shipping address, then you have no way of contacting them. As far as I can tell, the address is the only potential contact method you are collecting. Personally, I would be suspicious about receiving an unsolicited package at any address, P.O box or otherwise. It might be the battery bank. It might not be. I have no way of verifying that your company has sent it.
2. I did not ask for a brand name. I asked what company you work for. There is a difference between a brand and a company. You should be able to provide at least that information, no? I have absolutely no means of verifying that you are a product manager right now. I struggle to understand what is so radical about an accessible power bank. Haptic motors and speech modules are tried, tested technologies that are present in many products and can be connected in many ways, such as I2C and SPI. I am happy to hear that there will be full transparency before the product is shipped. How will you accomplish that with no contact method, save for a shipping address?
3. Your word is not enough. If you are from a trusted brand, as you claim, you should be able to provide documented proof of that. I have yet to encounter any such proof. You have also not provided reasonable reassurance that my data will be protected and treated with care. "Trust me bro" is not reasonable reassurance. This is why we have data protection regulations such as GDPR, PDPA, and CCPA.

You are collecting information about how we use power banks and what the pain points of existing products are in order to make something that works for blind and low-vision users. This is market research according to Ideascale, Investopedia, SurveyMonkey, and Crunchbase.

You should be collecting email addresses and phone numbers so you can reach out to the people you want to test your product. If you want to build trust, then you should start by disclosing who you work for. When you do that, you can provide accountability and tracking mechanisms so that we, the target market, can make informed decisions and feel confident that we are being listened to by someone who is well-intentioned, knowledgeable, and competent.

Let me ask you one more question. You're reaching out to get product testers? How are you going to contact them about their product experience after the evaluation period? You didn't ask for a contact method. Are you going to use snail mail for all your communication? Will you be sending an in-person representative to our houses? Explain to me the logistics of your product development strategy.

okay wow, my brain wandered way too far to the point where I just realized there is actually no way to contact participants except through their home address, if they even choose to provide it. This Google Form is not set to collect participants' email addresses automatically, try filling it up with your browser's version of incognito mode, and there is no field to enter an email address either.
oh wait. it also does not even ask for the participant's name, apparently? not sure how 10 years of experience leads to this kind of blunder...
We don't care about your name, your email, we just want your home address...

This is actually not the first time I wanted to bring up this subject here, as long before posting to this thread for the first time, I actually considered asking what exactly is there to absolutely make accessible in a power bank. Because it's not like a lightning plug will fit a USB-c port or vice-versa, and even if that could potentially happen, users unaware of the existence of accessibility information would still be none the wiser. I have two power banks, a Bluetooth speaker that can act as an additional source of power if needed, another Bluetooth speaker with lots of radio bands that can be solar powered and has its own battery, and two UPSes, with none of which ever giving me trouble figuring out which port or socket takes which plug. Getting a power reading is a mild issue in the power banks specifically, which I counter by keeping them permanently fully charged and plugged to the power grid to have as much energy as possible stored in the event of a major power outage, so the thread raised red flags for me as well without even filling in the form and therefore I wasn't even aware of what was being asked there.

My concern is that making the shipping address optional can actually be used as a strategy to lower people's guard, because most people have no concept of social engineering so to them criminals would always require mandatory filling and thus they might more easily convinced that this must be legit. Therefore I totally agree with the suspicion raised on this thread. Not being a native English speaker should never serve as an excuse to use AI, not only because the human nature of the communication is lost, but also because the messenger is missing on a good opportunity to train their English. Case in point, my native language is European Portuguese, and historically many people online just assumed that I was American for decades because I've always tried to stick to what I've always perceived to be the normative US English written dialect.

I'll admit, I filled out the form in excitement to try something new, but did start thinking about these things after the fact.
The first red flag being the lack of contact fields, then to say ten years of experience?
How can you go ten years without leaving some sort of paper trail or having any recognition?
Please explain.
The required text field could be easily missed or overlooked as well, and the average person isn't likely to pick up on that bit of nuance.

I added my email address to the address field itself, hopefully that works. I did this when submitting my response.

This post is directed toward @leahZ as well as the Applevis moderation and editorial teams.

This is from your original post:

I am a Product Manager at a specialized charging technology brand with 10 years of R&D experience.

This is from your latest post:

Really sorry for the extra click and for being a bit of a "newbie" at this! I’m learning as I go

So do you have 10 years of experience or are you a newbie? Those things are mutually exclusive. Have you, a supposed product manager, with supposed 10 years of experience, never collected information using google forms or other similar technology?

I've just added an Email field to the form. If you’ve already filled it out, could you do me a huge favor? Please jump back in real quick just to drop your email address. You don’t have to re-do the whole thing—just your name and email would be a lifesaver so I can match it up with your previous answers.

Congratulations, you just wrecked your dataset. Have fun reconstructing it.

Let's talk about the subject line of your latest post:

Important Update: Adding Email Field & Deadline Extension (My Si

What happened? Run out of characters? Not enough Claud tokens? Everything about this response is unacceptably unprofessional.

You also did not answer any of my previous questions. You have not only not built trust, you have destroyed what little trust you have left.

Where is the Applevis moderation team on this one? What research or audits have you performed on this user? Have you verified whether or not they are actually a product manager at a company that makes charging products? The continued existence of this post implies your approval of it. Personally, I would not allow a post with so many glaring holes in the narrative.

With regards to this thread, there is a possibility, slim as it may be, that the OP meant to say that their company has 10 years of experience, whereas she is new too creating surveys. Nevertheless, I never fill out surveys. It is simply way too easy for someone to present a survey, claim its for a legitimate purpose, only to use the survey to collect personally identifiable information from people. Then turn right around and sell that information to third-party marketing companies, or sell on the dark web to people Adept at stealing identities.
While I honestly hope that this is a legitimate survey, and that the OP just made a mistake, I will never just trust a survey that claims it's for a legitimate purpose, without providing verifiable proof.
Just my two cents... 🤷🏻‍♂️

OK, people applevis is responsible if there is something bad with this. Hope they checked before let the post come.Did the survay and complete it. Regarding email, well he wants it? I will sent it as an email directly to him. No will not do the servay again. Long live cats.

I personally don't follow any links to content that isn't of my own interest, it's as simple as that. It takes a lot to convince me to follow links on the Internet. If someone comes to a community with a link to fill a survey for them outside the community, that's the best way to avoid having my contribution.

Back when the blind community on reddit accepted surveys, some people would go as far as to request a video conference to answer their usually student research questions that were totally useless for us but still wasted our time. Now they post these surveys offering a small chance of winning some kind of compensation, which is not only a bad strategy as far as statistics is concerned because it skews the pool of contributions to a demographic that is more receptive to that kind of stimulation, but is also quite deceptive since the prize is not guaranteed and the roll is not even verified by an authority.

Yeah, as you know it is way too easy to post a hyperlink that, "looks", legit, but in reality is not. This is why I am grateful for the "Read URL" function of iOS, and it's counterpart on macOS, and it's equivalent on Windows.

Hi Brass,

You wrote:

Where is the Applevis moderation team on this one? What research or audits have you performed on this user? Have you verified whether or not they are actually a product manager at a company that makes charging products? The continued existence of this post implies your approval of it.

The presence of a post on AppleVis does not imply 'endorsement' or 'approval' by the AppleVis Editorial Team.

Historically, in situations like this where questions were raised about the authenticity or intent of a post, we may have opted to remove the content out of an abundance of caution. However, based on our recent experiences handling similar posts (with the same type of concerns) and feedback from the community, we have recognized the need to evolve how we approach these decisions.

Moving forward, we are taking a more measured approach to moderation across the site. It is our longstanding practice that we do not routinely audit, verify, or substantiate the claims people make in posts; nor do we believe it would be wise or appropriate for us to do so. When there is uncertainty about a post’s authenticity, our approach going forward is generally to leave it available unless it clearly violates our guidelines as scam or spam content or in other ways.

We encourage users to evaluate posts for themselves and make the decision they feel is best.

As a suggestion, not relevant for this case but potentially useful in others, adding the domain of a linked URL in brackets after every link posted by a user could help. While VoiceOver does provide a way to read a link destination by pressing VO+Shift+U on macOS, not everybody is aware of this, so having the domain right after the link could probably help. Slashdot did that decades ago in reply to a shock site whose domain read like goat sex as well as a group whose acronym was GNAA that I won't even mention in extended form, Content from both of these domains, which was just a picture in the former case, was constantly spammed on the site, so that's the way they found to alert people for the destination of a link without censorship.

Editing to add the Shift key to the key combination above, since I posted that comment half-asleep and failed to catch the mistake in the proofread.

On the one hand, at first glance there seem to be some valid points; if one doesn't look closely. But when one does...
First. The 10 years of experience and the oh how did they forgot to put in the email field! Need I mention the multiple companies which despite their decades of experience still make mistakes which given their experience you'd think are for amatures? Boeing, for example? Decades in aviation industry and for the 737 max crashes they forgot to publish information, sufficient training, on the mcas which caused the crashes. Microsoft? Decades of experience, they pushed an update which bricked computers and harddrives. Apple? More than a decade of experience with voiceover and they still miss crusial bugs like say, the, cannot type in the password with the native keyboard other than by direct touch. I could go on, but you get the point. Even people, companies what have you with decades of experience can make amature mistakes. Decades of experience doesn't mean no mistakes. As a matter of fact it means more mistakes of this nature, amature; why? Complacency. Cutting corners. Call it what you will. Does it always happen? no, but it does happen often enough that simple, amature mistakes like these tend to be more common place despite the world telling otherwise that this is the case.
Second. The email field. If you don't want to give out your email because of again, miss trust? Yoll are aware that features like I don't know... Hide my email exist for this very thing right?
Thirdly. Missing the email field doesn't mean the data gathered was waisted. Many people like myself, likely answered without providing say, their shipping address because we're not in a position to test. Does that mean the feedback given was waisted data? Hell no; and in any case, given that only feedback was provided without wanting to be prototype testers; there shouldn't be a reason we'd need to be contacted again.
I said before, if you guys are that Mistrustful? There are solutions. Hide my email, putting in a PO Box or mail room address for your shipping address, etc. Yoll are overreacting, and badly; because there are multiple ways to still be cautious and still fill out the survey. Tools like the above exist for this very reason; use them, that's what they're meant for, for things like these.
And hell; let's be honest; yoll take far greater risks than this; we all do; on the daily. Use a physical credit / debit card for say, paying, atm withdrawal etc? Yeah there's a far greater risk of say, the card getting cloned than of, what was it again? Data mismanagement? Selling your data?
Use google? Google, and countless other companies already cell your data without telling you.
Use windows? Same thing.
Walking out in the street going someware? Yeah far greater risk of say, getting run over than the so called risks people are pointing out with this servay.
Don't take cybersecurity, online safety seriously and reuse passwords? That's a way; way bigger risk than what people are pointing out with this survey, and let's be blunt; the amount of people who either reuse passwords or use easily guessed things that say, anyone could easily find in social media? Most people do so. Me? No, but that's because I take these kinds of things seriously as one should, but seriously look at the studies as to this last one; the statistics are just, offle.
All of this to say that;, the irony here is off the charts but, hey; to each their own, the irony is just, this is a bad hill to die on, but hey. You do you.

Do you guys take more risks than this every day. You can’t just be happy that a company is trying to actually care about our needs to take Accessibility to talk to the very Community he uses it? You always have to have something to pick up when people are genuinely trying to help us to make a product better by asking the very Community who uses the Accessibility features? What is wrong with everybody? You should be happy anybody’s taking any interest in us at all. You don’t have to take the survey, but you could at least be grateful that somebody’s paying any kind of interest in you. You can at least acknowledge that even if you don’t feel like taking any surveys, I mean OK I personally don’t because I don’t use a higher bank, but that doesn’t mean that I’m not grateful for these people that want to help us. That’s all I’m going to say about this happy anybody wants to do anything at all. They don’t have to choose to. They don’t have to help us at all they choose to. There people that still care about blindness, accessibility, and vision impairment.

Hi João,

Just wanted to reply and thank you for this suggestion. We will definitely look into implementing this with our CMS--anything we can do to provide users information about external links like this etc., we want to do so.

I had absolutely no issue with filling out this survey. In fact, I was happy and excited to do so. If, for whatever reason, people don't feel comfortable participating in this opportunity, that's certainly their right, but I can't imagine what harm could possibly come out of submitting the survey. It isn't as though they're going to send a serial killer to your house or something. Personally, I hope to get an opportunity to test out a new tech toy. It's sad that there are always so many over reactions on here. I know it's an over-used statement at this point, but honestly, this is why we can't have nice things. Any time companies legitimately want to work with us, they're met with hostility of one kind or another.

To my fellow Blind AppleVis users:
I was really excited when I read this initial post. Here was a developer, obviously in the beta phase of a new product, trying to include individuals who are blind or low vision to get some product feedback. We always say nothing about us without us. Well, here is a company trying to be inclusive and get some real world feedback.
Then, I read the replies to the post and my heart sank. It felt like some of my fellow AppleVis users were actually attacking the original poster. Come on people, lets show a little kindness. If you have ever done any type of product development work, you will understand why the original poster did not want to include the name of the company in the original post. Its called confidentiality and it is something all companies with new products do. All the poster was asking for was for individuals who are blind to fill out a brief survey. If you aren't comfortable filling out surveys or are concerned about disclosing your personal information, then don't fill it out. But, let me ask you this. How else are companies who are developing new products with accessibility features suppose to solicit feedback from the community? This poster probably found AppleVis on Google and, after browsing the site, felt that this was a good community of actively engaged reasonable technology savvy users who are blind or have low vision. What a great resource for a company to tap into. And, they are offering to send you a free product for providing some honest real world feedback. What do some of you do? You attack this poster and accuse them of being a bot. Really? No one is forcing you to fill out a survey and disclose your information. How else do you expect companies to try and engage individuals who are blind to get product feedback. If I was the company and read some of the responses to this thread, I would think twice about trying to engage the blind community to get product feedback in the future. If you want to double check the URL of the survey, check the URL. It is a Google form. If you are not comfortable filling out a form like this, then don't fill it out. Otherwise, lets show a little kindness and appreciation for companies like this who are trying to do the right thing to get product feedback in making accessible products to help those of us who are blind. I, personally, am very excited about this new product and applaud the efforts of this company for trying to get feedback from real individuals with disabilities prior to releasing the product.
Jim

Hi,

For some reason, even though I completed the form while signed into my Google account, it's making me complete the whole thing again and to be honest, I really can't remember exactly what feedback I ended up providing.

If I do have to complete it again then that's fine, but would you mind if I contact you privately on here and gave you my email address and other details so you can match it up that way?

Alright, I get it. I was just trying to warn you all about how unprofessional this looks for a big company, that is all. Did I ever force any of you to believe me or tell you not to fill out the survey? I was simply explaining why this looks shady and how the company should have explained things better from the start.
Yes, big companies do quietly collect our data, that is kind of an open secret. But just because that happens, are you really willing to go, like, hey, here is my data, please take it, to a stranger? Sure, using a fake email or fake address helps, but not everyone is that cautious. And if you are faking your data, that already means you do not trust the survey in the first place. at least in my country, your name, phone number, email and home address can easyly be used to register on gambling sites and online loans without your consent, and the people behind those service will hunt you instead, not the one who register. To put in to perspective, I'm actually working on one of those ai trainer company, where they are not transparent regarding the detail of the company, with the same reason of confidentiality. but at least they have TOS and consent form when there is a need to collect worker's personal data.
We need to stop being so easily manipulated by this kind of thing. Not everyone who brings up accessibility is some holy angel of God with good intentions. I am speaking from experience here, not just throwing random accusations around. If I went into detail about those experiences, this would turn into a very long post, and it would not really matter anyway. The view that we are such a vulnerable idiots is still widely recognized, unfortunately. we have rights to questioned these kind of things.
Besides, this is the first time I have warned you all about something like this, because this is the first time I have seen something this unprofessional. Have I ever commented on other accessibility projects just to let them down because I am a negative person? I do not think so. Even so, if you're such a big company, and a handful negative comments enough to let you down and cancel this project, your integrity is questionable. it is just the nature of humanity, some will say positive things, some will not.
In short, I just want everyone to stay safe. At the end of the day, it is truly your choice. If this turned out to be all fine, I'm looking forward for the result.

As I said earlier I did not fill the survey, not only because like I said power banks are a mild accessibility issue for me at best, but also because I'll never understand anyone who is interested enough to want to collect data from a community but not to actually engage directly with that community. The way this comes across to me is like "here's a form, fill it out for me, and if you leve your personal data, something good might happen to you, or maybe not". Even if it's not a scam, it's still a kind of power play, and by getting along people are normalizing letting themselves be pushed around for no good reason. The message that we should be passing is: if you want our data, come talk to us on our own turf, and if that's too much for you, then the data isn't that relevant to you either.

As to what kind of bad thing might happen, I think that surveillance and impersonation enabled by personal data theft are pretty plausible scenarios, because anyone who lets a device manufactured by an anonymous entity and has not been approved by any authority into their homes, and willingly connects such a device to the data ports of their personal equipment, is unnecessarily exposing the safety of their personal data. Even if the developers don't have ill intent, they're still anonymous, so who's going to take responsibility if an unapproved power bank explodes and burns out your place or even kills someone? Even if these were totally unlikely scenarios, the consequences of their manifestation can be extremely devastating, so in my opinion it is wrong for people to just rely on their own knowledge to assess whether it's worth taking unnecessary risks, because this is a kind of reverse-gambling situation in which people put their own lives on the line for little to no reward.

Muhammad, using Hide My Email or a PO box isn’t “fake data.” It’s literally what those tools exist for. It’s a buffer. You still get the email. It still forwards to your real inbox. Nothing is “fake,” it’s just not handing strangers your direct info. If you want an example of actual fake data, that would be a temporary burner email that deletes itself in ten minutes and you never see anything from it again. That’s fake. A fake name or a street that doesn’t exist? Fake. Hide My Email is not that at all.

And yeah, I get that where you live personal info can be abused. Valid point. But if someone didn’t put their real address, didn’t put an email, didn’t put a name, then what exactly is being “misused”? There’s nothing there to misuse. At that point, the only thing they have is your survey answers. That’s feedback, not PII. You can’t weaponize information no one gave.

And the “if a company can’t handle criticism they’re questionable” thing… no. There’s constructive criticism, and then there’s what we saw here which is just, critisism; big difference. Constructive criticism gives solutions. “Here’s how to improve the form, here’s how to collect data safely.” What we actually saw was just suspicion spirals, doom scenarios, and vague accusations with zero actionable feedback, mostly. There have been a few people who have given constructive critisism but most have just criticized. Those two things are not remotely the same, and lumping them together doesn’t magically make them equal.

Now João. You keep saying they didn’t engage with the community. So I’m going to post the original message again, exactly as it was written and mind, this is one example but if you look back through the thread, op did engage with the community and tried to answer what was asked. Of course when there's just criticizing left and right instead of constructive critisism... That's likely to burn anyone out, or at least make them go, yeah no, not waisting my time with this comunity, site, whatever it is; but here goes:

Hi AppleVis Community,
I am a Product Manager at a specialized charging technology brand with 10 years of R&D experience. We recently realized that most power banks on the market—including our own—could be much more inclusive for users with visual or hearing impairments.
We believe that checking battery levels or identifying ports shouldn’t be a frustrating “guessing game.” That’s why we are launching a project to redesign our power banks with accessibility as a core feature, not an afterthought.
We need your expertise. Instead of guessing what works, we want to listen to the real-world experiences of this community. We’ve created a short survey to understand the tactile, audio, or haptic feedback that would make a charging device truly “friendly” for you.
How you can get involved:
• Share your thoughts: Click here to fill out our Accessibility Design Survey (Optimized for screen readers)
• Become a Tester: At the end of the survey, you can opt-in to our “Chief Experience Officer” program. Once our optimized prototypes are ready, we will ship them to selected testers completely free of charge for real-world feedback.
Our goal is simple: to create a product that truly works for everyone. Your input will directly shape the hardware we build.
Thank you for helping us make technology more inclusive!

Now here’s what “not talking to the community” actually looks like:

[link]

Hi, I need help filling out this survey thanks.

No context. No explanation. No purpose. No details. Nothing. That would be not engaging with the community. Not what actually happened as op did engage tried answering questions etc as I previously mentioned. The OP explained everything clearly.

On the whole “anonymous entity plugging into your equipment is dangerous” point — look, for a device to actually “expose” your data, it would have to be malicious from the start. As in: intentionally built that way. That already exists, by the way. Malicious USB cables acting as fake keyboards. Some Windows manufacturers have shipped PCs with malware preinstalled. Entire companies like NSO Group sell spyware legally, all “approved by authorities,” and innocent people get targeted. That’s real-world malicious hardware, and it didn’t come from some random person or identity, it came from companies with official paperwork.

And on the whole “if the prototype isn’t approved, it could explode and kill you” thing — that’s literally why prototypes exist. Testing. Evaluation. Real-world conditions. And even devices that ARE approved by authorities have failed catastrophically. Gun misfires. Phone batteries exploding in pockets and on planes. Aviation manufacturers cutting corners and a Boeing door blowing off midflight. All approved. Approval doesn’t magically prevent human error, manufacturing defects, or bad engineering. Acting like safety certification is a force field is not realistic.

Now the “reverse gambling / people shouldn’t rely on their own judgment to assess risk” take. If you truly believe regular people can’t judge risk, then don’t get in a car. Don’t get a job. Don’t walk to the grocery store. Don’t use a credit card. Don’t plug anything into anything. By that logic you should basically stay inside, because everything outside your front door carries risk. People evaluate risk every single day. That’s how life works. Saying people shouldn’t evaluate risk for themselves is like saying “I shouldn’t learn how to think critically because philosophers already do that,” or “I’ll never learn to walk around with a cane or guide dog because someone else will always be with me who will guide me around. It doesn’t make sense. It’s just giving up autonomy and yeah will only affect the person who has that mindset, other people? Couldn't care less.

If someone doesn’t want to participate in the survey, cool, don’t. No one is forcing anyone. But turning an optional Google form into a power struggle or worst-case-scenario disaster story is blowing everything massively out of proportion. None of the dramatic outcomes people threw around apply unless someone willingly handed over personal info — and even then there are tools to protect yourself. If someone chooses not to use those tools, that’s on them, not the survey. And oh yeah, if this was malicious? Things like the shipping address field? Would’ve been required. Mandatory, in other words. The survey could’ve only been filled out if you were signed in. Just to give a couple examples, this was not the case. this is why scammers do their utmost in getting you to sign into your stuff. Think about it. Fishing emails? A link that takes you to a site to put your login credentials so that they can be stolen. Phone calls? They do their best to make you give them your two factor authentication so that they can get access to your stuff. Granted there are things which you don’t need to do anything to get scammed or hacked? Such as, the zero day vulnerability exploited by spyware like Pegasus, etc., but that’s completely different. Regular scams? Yeah, the scammers will do the utmost to make you give them your information and its... not optional. That was not the case here.

This was a simple optional survey. It didn’t need to turn into a conspiracy session.

That would be not engaging with the community.Not what actually happened. The OP explained everything clearly.

Explaining everything clearly is not the same as engaging, which would require actually interacting with the community here, not just copying Ai-generated text to a forum post and leaving. Like I could choose to not engage with you by not replying to your comment, but I always choose to engage with everyone, both because I enjoy debating, because actually doing so helps me understand other people's perspectives more clearly, and because the only way to get better at anything is to actually do it.

On the whole “anonymous entity plugging into your equipment is dangerous” point — look, for a device to actually “expose” your data, it would have to be malicious from the start. As in: intentionally built that way. That already exists, by the way. Malicious USB cables acting as fake keyboards. Some Windows manufacturers have shipped PCs with malware preinstalled. Entire companies like NSO Group sell spyware legally, all “approved by authorities,” and innocent people get targeted. That’s real-world malicious hardware, and it didn’t come from some random person or identity, it came from companies with official paperwork.

That's a completely moot point, since you aren't going out of your way to actually get infected with malware in the case of Pegasus and the likes, and none of the companies selling USB cables are anonymous, meaning that there's always someone liable for faulty or malicious products on the market, with that liability ending up acting as a deterrent, so even though there's always a risk, you can at least be sure that someone will be responsible for damaging your property or exfiltrating your data if that happens. This case is a lot more like people getting lured to engage in dangerous behaviors like attaching USB devices found in random places to their personal computers, which isn't likely to reward them with anything of value but their curiosity makes them take completely unnecessary risks, and the reason for this is because for all intents and purposes this is an anonymous entity, so if something goes wrong, their asses are fully covered.

Now the “reverse gambling / people shouldn’t rely on their own judgment to assess risk” take. If you truly believe regular people can’t judge risk, then don’t get in a car. Don’t get a job. Don’t walk to the grocery store. Don’t use a credit card. Don’t plug anything into anything. By that logic you should basically stay inside, because everything outside your front door carries risk. People evaluate risk every single day. That’s how life works. Saying people shouldn’t evaluate risk for themselves is like saying “I shouldn’t learn how to think critically because philosophers already do that,” or “I’ll never learn to walk around with a cane or guide dog because someone else will always be with me who will guide me around. It doesn’t make sense. It’s just giving up autonomy and yeah will only affect the person who has that mindset, other people? Couldn't care less.

The thing is that ignorance is never a good advisor, so just because you don't understand the risk of taking certain actions doesn't mean they are safe, so in situations like this the only reasonable option is to not participate, or at least not submit your personal data if you do participate, because in these situations the reward is little to none so it really is not worth any kind of risk. Now compared to your example of not going outside, while there are obvious risks from doing so like getting run over or attacked by a stray animal, there may also be significant benefits that may make it worth taking that risk, so again you are completely missing the point.

If someone doesn’t want to participate in the survey, cool, don’t. No one is forcing anyone. But turning an optional Google form into a power struggle or worst-case-scenario disaster story is blowing everything massively out of proportion.

I did none of that, only alerted people to the potential problems that they can be getting into for not following basic security practices. As a matter of fact you are sprinkling your own narrative with a lot more rhetoric than I ever did on this thread.

None of the dramatic outcomes people threw around apply unless someone willingly handed over personal info — and even then there are tools to protect yourself. If someone chooses not to use those tools, that’s on them, not the survey.

I completely agree here, which is precisely why all I did was point out potential red flags so that people can make more informed decisions. I never actually even implied that this was a scam, but in the face of overconfidence, I decided to step in and share my advice.

And oh yeah, if this was malicious? Things like the shipping address field? Would’ve been required.

Why exactly would that be? That's the kind of overconfidence that I'm trying to advise against. If someone is looking to steal someone else's identity, all it takes is just one person being compromised for the perpetrators to succeed, so it doesn't really matter if they send a billion E-mails luring people to fill an optional form in order to maybe get the chance of winning a prize, because even if only 100 people actually submit their personal data, the scammer is already getting rewarded for their effort 100 times, and the people who submitted their personal data exposed their personal lives for absolutely nothing. Therefore just because you don't understand the risk doesn't mean there's no risk, so instead of judging the risk, people should actually judge the reward, because they can only protect themselves against what they already know.

I think that you seriously need to educate yourself on social engineering.

João, again, you’re incorrect. Since you keep shifting the goalposts, here goes.

First. Engagement. Engagement doesn’t magically mean sticking around arguing in the comments for three days. Engagement means coming in, explaining the project, explaining the goals, asking for feedback, and giving the community the context they need and yes, answering questions when they come up which, op did. examples?
First? Regarding the "Chief Experience Officer" program: once our accessible prototypes are ready, we will be reaching out via the email addresses provided to arrange the free shipping of the testing units.
second? 1. Why do we ask for a shipping address (Optional)? Our primary goal is to minimize future interruptions to your time. If you are selected for our prototype testing, we want to be able to ship the device to you immediately without back-and-forth emails. However, this field is completely optional. You are more than welcome to skip it now and only provide it later if you are selected and feel comfortable doing so.

2. Why haven't we disclosed the brand name yet? This project is currently in a confidential R&D stage. We are exploring radical new hardware designs that haven't been released to the market yet. We chose to remain "brand-neutral" during this initial survey to ensure the feedback we receive is purely about the user experience, not brand bias. Rest assured, all selected testers will receive full brand and company transparency before any hardware is shipped.

3. Data Security & Intent: We are a professional charging brand with a decade of experience. We promise that your information will never be shared, sold, or used for marketing. Our sole intent is to listen to this community to build a power bank that actually works for you.

The number of testers will be determined based on the total participation, and we are committed to making this a meaningful collaboration. Thank you for your skepticism—it keeps us accountable—and thank you for your trust as we try to build something better.

I can go on but the point is; That is engagement. Pretending otherwise is just you redefining the word to suit your argument.

Second. Your “malicious hardware must have liability behind it” point is just wrong. There are entire Amazon storefronts filled with counterfeit junk. Drives advertised as Toshiba turning out to be knockoff western digitals. Counterfeit USB cables with embedded keyloggers. Fuses rated for x amount of current but when examined by professionals it turns out that the amount of current they can handle is way way lower than advertised which yeah can cause a fire, easily, and yeah from no name brands. No liability. No accountability. They still exist. They still end up in people’s homes. And accountability? Again; wrong. Countless no name brands selling on amazon. Guess what happens when, if they get found out? Simple. Make a new account, essentially start over, keep celling false or dangerous products. That's, not accountability, because they don't care about liability in the first place, hense, the oh liability equals accountability falls flat. So the idea that “malicious hardware is only a threat when someone official signs off on it” is just false. Threats exist regardless of paperwork. And again, this is irrelevant anyway, because nobody was plugging anything in. You’re treating a Google Form like a rogue USB stick someone found in a parking lot.

Third. The “educate yourself on social engineering” line is projection. Pure and simple. Social engineering relies on people acting without thinking. Fear, urgency, pressure, confusion. Phishing relies on people a, clicking the wrong link followed by b, inputting identifiable information that attackers can steel i.e, login details, but its not just by clicking on the link that someone gets compromised; especially because most modern browsers have security features like not automatically exsecuting say, java script or code. Not loading remote content automatically; that's emails but, same point, plus browsers warn you if a site looks suspicious etc before you even enter, hell even an expired certificate will trigger said warning. Also things like Password reuse, weak passwords etc can give scammers access to sensative identity stuff which they can use for ill intent and this one is way, way bigger as far as risks go than the multiple overblown scenarios you outlined above; by a mile. As far as overconfidense? This is not that; this is me using logic. Now. I have confidence in said logic sure, but again; not overconfidence, as your accusing me of beeing; big difference between beeing overconfident and beeing highly logical and analytical. And for the record; ironically, some of the people most likely to fall for it are the ones who assume they’re too smart to fall for it, i.e, studies have shown that when it comes to scams people with phds are way more likely to fall for said scams, but again; big difference between that, and using logic and beeing analytical. I actually take cybersecurity seriously. Strong passwords. Keychain. 2FA. Phishing awareness. Basic common sense. You’re acting like filling out a survey is equivalent to handing over a 2FA code to a fake bank rep. It isn’t.

Fourth. Reward versus risk. Your entire framework collapses on contact. For a massive portion of people here, there is zero reward and zero risk. Example: anyone who didn’t volunteer to test a prototype. If you didn’t enter a shipping address or email, then what “risk” are you talking about? The idea they’ll somehow identify someone off writing style and survey choices? That’s not how anything works. You’re applying a threat model that does not fit the situation even slightly.

Fifth. Paranoia and blowing things way out of proportion. You’re saying things like identity theft, surveillance, impersonation, malicious devices, unapproved hardware “exploding,” and data exfiltration from plugging in rogue accessories, you were catastrofising and taking this way into into worst-case-scenario territory. That is paranoia by definition. You took a simple optional survey and stretched it into a cyber-horror movie script when all evidence says the opposite.

Sixth. “Only one person needs to be compromised.” Compromised with what? The original form didn’t ask for name. Didn’t ask for email. Didn’t require login. Didn’t require shipping address. So what data is being “compromised”? And how does one person’s shipping address, assuming someone willingly gave it, compromise anyone else? It doesn’t. And no, “your network IP” doesn’t magically give someone your exact location — especially not with dynamic IPs or VPNs. That’s not how that works.

Seventh. Your point about scammers not needing required fields is wrong. Scammers pressure you. They create fake urgency, fake deadlines, fake logins, fake authority. They force information out of you. They do not leave the critical data optional. If this was a scam, the shipping address would have been required. The form would have forced a login. It would have required an email. It would have used urgency and fear. That’s how actual social engineering works.
Case in point? This? Is what a scam on google forms looks like. Per this article. Notice any differences between this and the servay? Because I do; no trying to get sensative credentials, no providing login info etc. But here, so you can see it yourself,
A recent (and relatively sophisticated) iteration of this scam targeted higher education, including students, faculty, and staff at 15 institutions in the U.S. A post on Google's blog from February 2025 outlines a campaign in which attackers sent links to Google Forms that mimicked legitimate university communications, complete with the school names, color schemes, and logos or mascots displayed in the headers. The forms were designed to trick recipients into providing university account credentials and, in some cases, financial institution logins under the pretense of maintaining an existing account or distributing aid.

Scammers sent forms out around important dates on the academic calendar, such as financial aid deadlines, when recipients have lots of administrative tasks to complete and are less likely to notice potential red flags.

While Google notes that all of the malicious forms identified were eventually removed, Stanford University's Information Security Office issued an alert on April 23 warning of a similar phishing scheme meant to steal passwords and Duo passcodes for university network accounts.
Huge, huge difference, which leads me to,

You’re projecting, as I said before. Every accusation you threw at me about “misunderstanding social engineering, overconfidence, ignorance, are actually gaps in your own argument. You’re describing scenarios that don’t match the reality of what happened.

In short, this was an optional survey. People who didn’t want to share data didn’t share anything. Acting like this was some high-stakes infiltration attempt is blowing a simple situation way out of proportion. You can be cautious without spiraling into worst-case fiction. This wasn’t that deep. As I said; this is not hubris; its logic and competence, yes there is hubris, overconfidence and ignorance on display; your not wrong about that; but they're not mine to deal with.