What happens in Vegas may stay in Vegas, but not when it comes to the Consumer Electronics Show. The latest tech gadgets were unveiled but were overshadowed by the biggest product of all - one that wasn't even in the show. Not that Apple has to worry about it being kept under wraps: It clearly wanted to let the world know about its revolutionary new product called the iPhone.

Naturally, the media has been all over this new addition to the mobile handset market, but lost in the clamor is whether this is a useful device for those of us who are deaf or hard of hearing.

The iPhone combines several features of the iPod (which still has no captioning), digital camera, smart phones and even portable computing in one device. It's smaller and lighter than most smartphones and uses a new technology called multi-touch - you can touch the screen in multiple places at once, like pinching fingers to zoom in. It uses both Wi-Fi and EDGE (similar to the data connection in a Sidekick) to automatically connect to the Internet. Apple's website has good visual demonstrations of many iPhone's features, including the keyboard (see the "SMS" demo).

The main issue with the iPhone is not the fancy user interface, touch screen or iPod capability, but the fact that it can use Wi-Fi when near an accessible network. This means there's enough bandwidth to do two-way video chat. Unfortunately, the camera is on the back of the device, so a VRS or a video chat would be rather difficult.

What may be possible with the iPhone, however, is the ability to conduct VCO calls. First, some background: pretty much all phones have cell phone radios that only support voice or data; they can't support both simultaneously. This is the major limiting factor to getting VCO on a mobile phone. Some of the new high speed 3G networks being rolled out can do this, but they're few and far between. Likewise, high speed 3G networks are generally comparable to broadband network connections, so voice-over Internet protocol (VOIP) could theoretically be used for the voice instead of relying on the cell phone's voice capability. Cell phone carriers are not inclined to support VOIP, however, since they make money off the use of voice minutes. The iPhone is not a 3G phone, but it does appear to support simultaneous use of cellular voice and Wi-Fi data. This means data connections at the same time as the cell connections are possible, thus making VCO a possibility.

How much those of us with hearing loss can get out of the iPhone is uncertain because very few people have a distinct picture of what the iPhone can support. It does support web sites that have javascript, but Apple has been vague on whether it supports Flash. Apple CEO Steve Jobs has outright said it will not support Java. These web technology restrictions could be problematic for web-based Internet Relay services. If this is the case, hopefully someone will work with Apple to provide native relay software.

Of course, an IM client would render all this moot, since IM could be used for the text. The phone doesn't seem to have an IM client. One would hope that Apple is working with AOL to provide one, especially given the working relationship it has with AOL on iChat. It does provide an iChat-like interface for SMS or perhaps this is strictly a negotiations issue. Apple has already stated that more applications will become available for the device.

The iPhone will support Quicktime, but whether users will be able to go to a random site and open a Quicktime video is unclear. Given the reported clarity of the screen, it may be a great platform for viewing VRS "voicemail" clips.

The limiting factor for the high speed data and simultaneous voice and data is that users would need to be near an accessible Wi-Fi network. If you spend all your time at work and home, this may not be an issue. If your town has municipal Wi-Fi, then you're in luck. Or you could get a subscription to a hotspot network that serves many of the places you go to (e.g. T-Mobile at Starbucks).

And finally, what may be of paramount concern to many of us: the keyboard. Few external reviewers have had a chance to use it, since the iPhone won't be released until June. David Pogue from the New York Times did, however, and says that typing is difficult and the "virtual" keys make it slower than a Blackberry. The letter keys are just pictures on the glass screen, so there's no tactile feedback, he says. I'm going to withhold judgment on this one, because I personally type better and faster when the keys aren't as raised. Unless there's a delay when pressing keys on a touch-screen, I would think it'd be easier to use.

Pogue says that software helps a lot. "You can afford to make a lot of typos as you muddle through a word, because the software analyzes what keys you 'might' have meant and figures out the word you wanted," he writes. "Its best guess appears just under what you've typed; if it's correct, you tap the space bar to accept it and continue. I typed a couple of email messages with lots of typos but eventually 100 percent accuracy, thanks to this auto-correct feature."

A Chicago Sun-Times reviewer who also got a chance to try the iPhone actually says the keyboard is a huge improvement over the mechanical thumbpads found on other smart phones. He liked the size of the significantly larger buttons. You don't have to hit them dead-center.

So, the verdict is that while the iPhone looks cool, Universal Design wasn't exactly applied when it was created. We can only hope that Apple makes up for this by working to incorporate certain features to make it more accessible for us. Then it would truly be an innovative all-in-one device, and we wouldn't be iLeftOutAgain.

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