STEP OUT OF SILENCE - DEAF FRIENDLY TOURISM is the first application in Croatian tourism adapted for deaf persons. The mobile app contains a travel guide for people with hearing impairment, the "GO social" platform - as well as important information and contacts.
The base of the app is an interactive map with points of interests which have adjusted their content to the needs of deaf and hard of hearing people. By clicking on the point of interest the new screen is opened to the user with relevant information, such as the contact information of the tourist service provider, the visual content he or she has made accessible and the comments of other users. The user can evaluate each point of interest (from 1 to 5) and add their own review to it.
The "GO social" part of the app is intended, with the usual functionality, as a chat and social platform, as a platform for organizing meetups of deaf persons who are at the same time in the same location by means of the "check in" function.
In the second phase of the project, the app will be upgraded with a software that converts text to speech, and vice versa. Out of our desire to position ourselves as a socially conscious company, we began to think about how we could contribute to the integration of marginalized social groups in the area of providing our services.
In 2014 we started with the realization of the innovative project "A Step Out of Silence", by which we wish to draw attention to distinctive features of the population of deaf and hard of hearing persons considering their specific communication system. It is about adapting tourist attractions to deaf people via the DF mobile application which enables them to get information on tourist facilities offered in their vicinity in sign language.
Deaf and hard of hearing persons use sign language in communication. Each country has its own national sign language, but there is also an international sign language used by most deaf and hard of hearing persons at international meetings, conferences and the like. The existing tourist facilities and offers in Croatia are not adapted for them, so they lack the information available to other guests. The realization of the DF project will contribute to increasing the accessibility of tourist facilities to deaf and hard of hearing people from Croatia and abroad. It is also a kind of pilot project which aims to promote the development of socially sensitive tourism in the Republic of Croatia.
According to the report of the European Federation of Hard of Hearing People (EFHOH), there are over 50,000,000 people with hearing impairment in Europe. The realization of the DF project will also contribute to the strengthening of competitiveness and reputation of Croatian tourism and increasing the total number of guests.
The town of Novigrad - Cittanova supports this project from its very beginning and it is the City in which this pilot project begins. At the time of writing this text, the Tourist Board of Novigrad - Cittanova has been adapting tourist information boards to place on them the QR Code of this mobile app.