Archives for “Areas of Focus”
I made my first transcription today! Tom Johnson posted his videocast interview with Brenda Huettner from the STC Summit in Dallas last week. I was provoked. I’ve argued for ages that technical communicators can lead the way in promoting transcriptions and captions (and audio descriptions, too). Here was a technical communication video on the topic [...]
This blog post is written for Blogging Against Disablism Day 2010 celebrated on May 1. Our community’s name – AccessAbility – is a play on the word accessibility. The first “i” in the correct word is replaced by an “a” to emphasize ability. Our name puts focus on the ability to access… whatever. Our community [...]
Everett Zufelt’s open letter to CTV (Canada) regarding the accessibility of CTVOlympics.ca makes me angry. I had already read Joe Clark’s article about the Vancouver Olympics websites being inaccessible to disabled people, as well as the Webaxe article. It was clear from Twitter that the sites were inaccessible. So why should Everett Zufelt’s letter make [...]
The ÆGIS project has a gift for you – 15 personas of IT users with disabilities. No more procrastination on your projects! Visit the Ægis persona page to download the PDF files for each persona. This blog post gives you a quick overview of the personas you’ll find on the Ægis site, as well as [...]
Does your business know about the need for captioning?This recent article might be a wake-up call for people in the United States: Who is Required to Close-Caption? With only a few exceptions, all programming for broadcast in the United States must be closed captioned. Fortunately, the article includes the FCC fact sheet for more closed [...]
Sutherland Shire Council in New South Wales, Australia, has a beach wheelchair available for community use at Cronulla Beach (South Cronulla). The wheelchair allows access to the beach for people who use wheelchairs or who find the beachfront difficult to negotiate. The chair is available free of charge for short term loans. The chair is [...]
I recently discovered two new logical-based captchas plugins for WordPress. 1. Logical Captcha (Version 1.0.3, Updated 2009-8-24) takes advantage of the TextCaptcha.com service, which provides logic-based textual questions instead of distorted images or audio to validate that the entity registering is a real live human being, and not a spam bot. Textual logic-based captchas mean [...]
From Space Daily, Tokyo (AFP), 26 August 2009 Robotics and medical experts in Japan on Wednesday unveiled the prototype of a new hi-tech electric wheelchair that resembles a scooter and promises greater mobility. Users ride astride the four-wheeled Rodem—rather than sitting in it, as in a conventional wheelchair—steer it with a joystick and hold onto [...]
For many of the participants, it's their first glimpse into the high-tech world and first [opportunity] to spontaneously talk to their classmates.
Update—25 July 2009: The author of the paper discussed below, Brian Kelly, thanked us for these comments and wrote that the paper is available on the repository at http://opus.bath.ac.uk/14902/ if you’d like a copy of the paper before next year. He can release a number of copies. Brian’s site is “UK Web Focus: Reflections on [...]
National Wheelchair Beautification Month was founded by Horace Knowles. According to an article by the Nashua Telegram at nashuatelegraph.com, Knowles suggests attaching a florist’s water tube near the top of a wheelchair by means of Velcro and inserting the real or artificial flower of your choice. It brightens the day not only for the wheelchair [...]
Deschamps’ Mobi-Mat provides access for wheelchairs, strollers, and pedestrians on sand, grass, or other soft and unstable surfaces. The beach access mat is a light portable polyester matting that is temporarily or permanently laid down on the ground to provide non-slip and traffic resistant access for all. Ultra-light, easy to set up and store, Mobi-Mat [...]
American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) promotes and integrates scientific research, education, and practical applications of sports medicine and exercise science to maintain and enhance physical performance, fitness, health, and quality of life. Clinical Exercise Physiology Association (CEPA) committed to advancing the profession of clinical exercise physiology. American Military University (AMU) Sports Management degrees courses [...]
The AccessAbility SIG began their fine tradition of conference accessibility guides for the STC conference to ensure that all members could attend. All members. Even those with, say, special mobility needs. As long-time SIG member, Mike Murray, declares, if it weren’t for the guide, he wouldn’t be able to attend. He must know that he [...]
Editor’s note: Here’s an anecdote from Lori Gillen, co-manager, that puts accessibility-in-the-workplace in perspective. We are not accustomed to seeing accessibility in action in the workplace, so I wanted to share a little experience that I had in which assistive technology helped people with disabilities function in the workplace. I attended a meeting at the [...]
Editor’s note: STC member Anne Gentle kindly contributed this personal account of temporarily losing vision in one eye while recovering from an injury. This story, first published on her own blog, illustrates how a simple event can have complicated consequences. Anne writes, “I’d just like to get the word out and have others learn from [...]
Sailing for people with significant physical disabilities got its start in Canada in 1989, when Sam Sullivan used a British-made Sunbird dinghy to launch the first few sails at the Jericho Sailing Centre on English Bay. Today, the Disabled Sailing Association of BC (DSA-BC) operates eight specially designed Martin 16 sailboats and hosts between 800 [...]
Working with technical communication means keeping our minds open to the diversity of our audience “out there” in the real world. This is especially the case when we spice things up with accessibility. There are many stories that expand our horizon and make us rethink our attitudes. The New York Times posted such a story [...]
For an informative article about phantom vision, which affects between 10 and 40 percent of people with low vision, read the article on Lighthouse International, “I See Purple Flowers Everywhere: The Many Visions of Charles Bonnet Syndrome” by Lylas G.Mogk,MD, and Marja Mogk, PhD; with Carol J. Sussman-Skalka,CSW, MBA. Do you ever see things you [...]
In this BBC documentary, Peter White explores the history of Braille – from its revolutionary invention to its current decline in the face of modern digital technology. For information and Web service providers, what are the design and testing implications going forward? See http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/documentaries/2008/12/081230_doc_braille.shtml?s .
The November 4th 2008 US election is considered historical, but do you know what else made history that day? New technology that can be used for captioned radio broadcasts. From the press release sent out on that occasion: While millions of U.S. citizens voted in national and local elections last week, some of the nation’s [...]
Discussions about banning the incandescent light bulb have existed for some time. The incandescent light bulb is already phased out in some countries. The concept is to save energy and the environment, which is very praiseworthy. Why is this news on a blog about accessibility and technical communication? We technical communicators who are not blind [...]
Do you find usability concepts outside your work? Oh, we who work with these topics probably run into situations concerning usability and accessibility on a regular basis. Examples are everywhere as shown by the “broken” category over at Mark Hurst’s Good Experience. But what about this ad? AccessAbility SIG member (and usability professional) Whitney Quesenbery [...]
Cats remember where their paws have been. Researchers from the Department of Physiology at the University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, report that cats can create memories of their environment without having to rely on vision. Stepping over and touching a physical obstacle with their forelegs creates a memory of the obstacle that persists for [...]
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