10 Reasons People Care About Accessibility

I don’t know why you are reading this blog, but I there are a number of reasons that people become interested in accessibility issues. Do any of the below categories sound familiar to you or maybe someone you have worked with? Presented with no authority and in no particular order:

Why do you care about accessibility?

1. Following the Crowd. My favorite A-list blogger keeps talking about accessibility and I don’t want to be left behind.
2. Curiosity Killed the Cat. Enough about alt tags already, what’s the big deal with accessibility?
3. Working for a Living. My boss cares and therefore so do I.
4. The Plaintiff will now Approach the Bench. The lawyer guy keeps telling me that I need to care about accessibility.
5. Me, Myself and I. I have a disability- I create accessible sites so that I can use them.
6. We are Family. I have a family member/friend with a disability.
7. We are the World. You know, “It’s true we’ll make a better day. Just you and me”.
8. Powerful Market Forces. Why on earth would I make my site harder for customers to use?
9. Pride cometh Before the Fall Of course my site is accessible, it also validates as XHTML Strict, I have never used a table in my life and I read W3C meeting minutes for fun.
10. I don’t. Oh, okay- fine. (there- that makes 10).

Any others you would add to the list?

As long as a web developer is motivated to create an accessible site, does it matter what their motivation is?

Open Social Network Roundup

There seems to be more and more discussion regarding the openness of social networks of late. In trying to follow the discussion, it seems that there are a number of different types of ‘openness’ being discussed. Dare Obasanjo has provided a good overview of the different considerations of what it means to be an open social network.

Regardless of what definition of openness you are using, Fred Wilson, reminds that:

…most of Facebook’s traditional users (like my two daughters) don’t care that their data is locked up in Facebook. I’ll show them my Facebook running in Netvibes when they wake up this morning and they’ll say “that’s nice dad but why would you want to do that?

Fortunately, there are a number of people interested in portable, open social networks including Marc Canter who provides us with an overview of some of the people and politics involved in the open social network discussions that are happening. Marc is working on the People Aggregator to be a stand along system and is dreaming of dreams of aggregating aggregators, aggregating conversations and aggregating groups”

Stephen Downes has also done some thinking in this area and defines three areas of need for social network portability and names some of the technologies that may get us there.

Wired recently made headlines with their critique of the walled garden approach that many vendors are using to control customer data. The article came along with a nice how to page from their wiki on how to Replace Facebook using Open Social Toos that gave some good ideas on aggregating content from your network of friends, but readily admitted the difficulty of providing the key component of social networking- relationship management tools.

Forward into the future we go- with mismatched definitions of what it means to be “open”, businesses who build market share by walling their customers in and many customers who don’t feel any need for things to change.
Hopeless?
Hardly. As common definitions emerge, businesses models are adapted and the need for social network portability is recognized then solutions will come forward, it just may be a little bit of a wait.

Other resources:

• Social Network Portability Google Group

Accessibility, Availability and Affordability

Of these three, which is the largest obstacle to the free and open flow of online information?

Consider the following:

1. A 12-year old boy in Western Africa has learned how to read Braille. He has also recently received an inexpensive laptop as part of a corporate initiative to save the world with cheap computers. Unfortunately, he is unable to access the information on his own because he was born blind and the computer did not come with any software that can read the content of web pages.
2. In rural Idaho a high school student has an inexplicable desire to “make websites”. There are no technology classes at her school, but a teacher allows her to use a school computer during the last part of lunch to practice her craft. She has found a couple of online communities that the school filter allows where she is able to find answers to many of her questions. After school she has a 50 minute bus ride to a small home at the bottom of a hill bordering a National Forest in Central Idaho. Her family does have an older computer, but they haven’t been able to find local Internet service provider.
3. A young woman in Albania constantly hears her friends talk about people that they have met online. She found a job at a local byrek stand where she earns enough money to accompany her friends to a local Internet Cafe to participate in their online activities. However, her father recently lost his job because of illness and her family expects her to contribute all of her earnings to the family pot. She occasionally gets a few minutes to check her email by tagging along with her friends, but by and large she no longer able to use the Internet.

Each of the above problems might be overcome with some combination of technology, awareness or money. However, each situation does present a problem of accessibility, availability or affordability that might be generalized to include a larger number of people.

Which of these is the most significant obstacle to ubiquitous, affordable technology to allow everyone to connect to this vast collection of tubes that we call the Internet?

What other obstacles keep people from accessing the Internet?

Quick Catch Up on Links

A few links that I would like to unload off of my docket:

• Learning with a Disability PhD Program
  “…a doctoral program designed to provide a broad and comprehensive education, realistic work experiences, and opportunities for problem centered research in the area of learning with disability.”
• IBM Strives For Superhuman Speech Tech
  ” ‘At IBM, we have this superhuman speech recognition [initiative in which] the goal is to get performance comparable to humans in the next five years…’ “
• Accessibility Roundups
  • The Great Accessibility Blog Roundup
    A great list of accessibility blogs from Jared Smith at WebAIM
  • CETIS accessibility roundup
    A list of links from Shannon Perry from the CETIS-TechDis listserv
  • Welcome back and another accessibility roundup
    A few interesting links from Ron Graham

Curb Cut, Take 3

The past few years I have been working in the area of religious special education and have recently jumped back into a job where Curb Cut is relevant to my work again. A couple of feeble attempts to start posting again in the past quite awhile have led to a blistering pace of one to two posts a year. Remarkably, some people haven’t cleaned out their feed readers for awhile, so hopefully the remaining subscribers will stick around as we get things going again.

In my new gig I am working as a web developer/architect in the educational division of a large International organization and I’m anxious find a place for standards, accessibility and openness in the work that I am doing. To that end, Curb Cut lives.

We started out as Curb Cut Education and evolved into Curb Cut Design. Neither of those titles seemed quite right for the direction I’m heading, so this blog shall heretofore be known as simply ‘Curb Cut’, enjoy.

Read Speaker

A server-based product that reads the text on a website and requires no plugin. It also reads Word, RTF and PDF documents. You can try the service out by clicking on the ‘SayIt’ botton on the ReadSpeaker site. From their website:

The Mission of ReadSpeaker is to make the “miracle of the Internet” accessible for dyslexics, people with learning disabilities, low literacy level, people with English as a second language, elderly with impaired vision and others that like to listen as well as read.

I’m not quite sold on their claim that “ReadSpeaker will make your website accessible for more people than any other accessibility measurement that you put in place,” but I don’t suppose it could hurt. Fortunately they do recommend that you follow the W3C/WAI guidelines as well. I couldn’t find any pricing information, but you can contact them for a free trial and price quote

ReadSpeaker

Disability, Accessibility and Alternative Format Symbols

I’ve recently been looking for a standard set of icons to represent materials available in alternate formats. I didn’t find much, here are a couple that I came across:

• Sense, a UK Deafblind Charity has a set of symbols that they use on their site.
• The Graphics Artists Guild has created a set of twelve disability access symbols that are available to anyone to indicate the availability of accessible services. The symbols are available for download in TIFF format. If you do a search for “disability access symbols”, you’ll primarily get a bunch of lists of these icons.

Assuming that there must be more than these two resources, I started exploring disability iconography in general. A while back, Scott from Rolling Rains was was asked, “Is there an international standard that is used in the iconography depicting people with disabilities?” Scott replied:

Unfortunately, the answer is, ‘No.’

It may be arguable that the standard person in the wheelchair symbol is international in scope, but even if it is there are many good arguments that it is not a good representation of disabilities in general.

The need for better accessibility symbols is definitively laid out in a Symbolizing Accessibility article from Joe Clark wherein he critiques some of the current symbols and provides some suggestions on what is needed. In addition, Joe worked with Melanie Goux to develop an improved symbol for audio description and wrote about the process.

Is there anything better out there… anywhere? If so, please leave a note in the comments. If not, are there any ambitious graphic designers out there?

Further Reading:

• Thoughts on the International Access Symbol “Yeah, even though I’m a chair user, I have a problem with the access symbol. It disenfranchises many of my friends who live with disabilities but who do not use chairs.”
• Discussion of the Wheelchair symbol from the Accessify forums “I’d be interested to know what other’s feelings are on this and open to suggestions of an alternative symbol that would deliver the same message?” (regarding the wheelchair icon)

For more information on alternate formats, see
User-Friendly Materials and Alternate Formats from the National Center for the Dissemination of Disability Research.

Mobile Education and Access for Students with Disabilities Webcast

The National Center on Disability and Access to Education is hosting a free audio Webcast titled Mobile Education and Access for Students with Disabilities on Wednesday, April 26th at 1pm Mountain Time (3:00PM Eastern). A description of the Webcast from the NCDAE website:

As technologies become smaller, sleeker and easier to carry can they be developed and used so that no child is left behind? That is the question we will address during NCDAE’s April 26, 2006 webcast entitled, “Mobile Education and Access for Students with Disabilities.” Join us at 1 PM Mountain Time (3 PM EDT) for a discussion of technologies, practices and standards related to this increasingly popular education delivery method.

The discussion will be moderated by Marty Blair and will include a panel of John Peifer, Ed Price and Paul Baker. Registration is not necessary. If you miss the Webcast then check back later at their page of archived Webcasts where you can access previous Webcasts such as:

• Student Information Systems and Individuals with Disabilities,
• Accessible Distance Education Technologies and Techniques and
• Accessible Education Policy: Points of Possible Influence.

If you haven’t visited the National Center on Disability & Access to Education website it is a great resource, with sections on Tools and Technology, Community and Partners and News and Activities.

Email eLearning- Using Email as a Course Management System

For distance education, online course mangement systems are often appropriately used to facilitate discussions and other activities associated with the instructional process. Course management systems are also often used to add an online component to face-to-face instructional experiences. Some of the oft-used features in this type of a blended/hybrid learning setting include discussion board, file sharing/storage and the sending out of announcements.

Often, a simple email discussion list could just as well provide at least the same functionality of the features mentioned above without requiring the learner to become familiar with a new a course management system. Here are some ideas on how to take full advantage of an existing technology (email) that everyone is familiar with to encourage learning, especially blended learning situations. The term discussion list is being used with the same meaning as a listserv.

1. Announcements This one is obvious, if an instructor needs to let students know about something he or she simply send out an email to the listserv and it automatically goes to everyone’s inbox. (Hopefully there isn’t anyone out there using a CMS simply for the purpose of emails other students).
2. Discussions This seems to be a common feature for instructors who desire to add an online component to their face-to-face teaching situation. Using a CMS you log in, browse to the discussion section, find whatever thread you are looking for and then read and post. Using a listserv the discussion arrives in your inbox and you click reply when you want to respond to a discussion thread- easy. Small group discussions would also be possible although it would require a second discussion list to be set up.
3. File storage and sharing As long as the nature of an assignment allows it to be shared by the group then it can be sent as an attachment where others in the group can read and comment (and grade) and the attachment is then automatically archived. Discussion list archives can be public or private.

Another advantage of using a discussion list where possible is that understanding and being able to use such lists effectively is a great way to promote future professional development in relevant discussion lists.

More Reading…

Syllabus of an entire course on Using Email in Instruction
Email games from Thiagi.com

World Usability Day

From the newly designed Accessify.com, comes a great link to the upcoming Accessibility Channel being held on November 2nd and 3rd to celebrate World Usability Day. There look to be some great sessions, including A Broader View of Web Accessibility and Usability and Accessibility: Twin Foster Children. Unfortunately (and ironically), the page states, “you will be able to see and hear these presenters on any Windows PC with a broadband connection.” Maybe they are assuming that PC users are the ones who need the most help in this area…

On a side note, I found this great list of usability demonstrations at the IDEAL Group, Inc., one of the hosts of the Accessibiltiy Channel.