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Chris Cooke

Chris Cooke

Mayor of Middlesbrough

Oct 20, 2026

36:44
How is the operating experience on this compared to the previous Fire tablet you've tried?
36:51
Yeah.
36:51
So the biggest difference I would say is the home screen layout.
36:55
There are a lot of widgets on the top, say weather and search and camera search, image, Google search, different kinds of search options, weather, you know, as I said.
37:04
So there are a lot of widgets that occupy the top of the screen.
37:08
And then on the bottom, maybe third or even less are the actual apps.
37:13
And you can customize that home screen.
42:11
Yeah, let's talk about that because that, of course, is the key thing here, right? Is that you've got this assistant, this more powerful assistant, more conversational assistant.
4:55
And, and what was the process? How did you, h- how did you end up in Britain?
5:00
So I was lucky enough to have a British passport.
5:02
Um, and I kind of did my studies in Cape Town, um, and had a few games for the, for the Western Province side then.
5:11
Um, so I was on their radar.
5:12
Um, but obviously there are only six teams in South Africa, um, and there's, you know, as we know, quite a lot of politics.
5:18
So I, you know, I made the decision to, to come over, um, and put my British passport to use.
5:24
So I came over in 2009, um, and I played in the Birmingham League with a view to trialing at a few counties that year.

15 MINS LATER

20:48
Are there sort of, are there people that you think have been pivotal to you over the years that you, that you'd like to thank? Well, who are the people that have, uh, little cornerstones all the way through, all the way through your career?
5:15
Am I doing an all right job with it?
5:16
You're doing a good job.
5:17
You're doing a good job so far.
5:20
It's, it's actually, it, you know, it's a hybrid of two words.
5:22
It's portmanteau of ethica- uh, ethical and ikigai.
5:26
Ethical is, you know, my Myers-Briggs, um, kinda says I'm kinda very morally and values driven.
5:33
I like things to be ethical, and so it kind of speaks for itself.

6 MINS LATER

11:50
[laughs]
2:42
Perfect.
2:42
So I am a, well, it's a long title, um, vocational rehabilitation specialist, and what I do is I teach adult learners with vision loss how to gain the skills they need for employment.
2:57
And we, um, love serving our students.
3:01
They come from all over our state.
3:03
We have a training center, and we offer lots of classes, and it's just really a great opportunity to give people their skills.
3:10
So, um, I happen to be a person who is blind.
3:12
I've been blind since birth, and I have some light and shadow perception, but nothing that anyone else would consider u- you know, usable or useful.
5:17
... you're trying to meld that together for the, the two, basically the two, if you will, audiences.

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