Disaboom strives to be online social community for people with disabilities

Q: What would you get if you crossed a multi-faceted web site targeting the disabled community with a focus on the coming impact of the Baby Boom” generation?

A: Well, you’d get
Disaboom.com,
Of course.

Here’s what the site’s “Overview” page says:
“Disaboom, Inc. was founded to develop the first interactive online community dedicated to constantly improving the way people with disabilities or functional limitations live their lives. It will also serve as a comprehensive online resource not only for people living with such conditions, but also their immediate families and friends, caregivers, recreation and rehabilitation providers, and employers. There are more than 100 million adults worldwide living with disabilities or functional limitations today. Founded and designed by doctors and fellow Disaboomers to meet this untapped market’s specific needs, disaboom.com will bring together content and tools ranging from specialized health information to social networking to daily living resources, in a single interactive site.”

The team behind this fresh, new site, launched just last month, seems to have done a good bit of homework in preparing the site for its debut. There are social networking aspects, similar to those found on MySpace and FaceBook, but there are other tools, which are more directly tailored to fit the needs of the direct community the site is aimed at, those with disabilities. The site offers blogs and video hosting to registered users, just like the two social networking giants, but adds some things that they don’t have.

First, there is the focused news on the disability front. Secondly, there are groups and forums with participation of medical professionals. And, finally, there is a review section that is a uniquely qualified offering for this audience. In that section, members can, not only read member reviews of the accessibility of retail businesses, hotels, and restaurants, but they can also write their own. Being that the site is directed at people with all disabilities, and not just looking at one segment of the disabled population, this offers wheelchair users and guide dog users alike a forum to share both good and bad experiences with business establishments. Hopefully, they will post good ones, as those are just as useful as tipping others off about businesses to avoid.

I’d like to share a personal comment about the web site. While I like the approach of aiming towards an audience cutting across all types of disabilities, doing so means that there is the potential to overlook some details. In that sense, I feel that that the developers have missed a step concerning the accessibility of their web site by visually impaired people who use screen readers. The site incorporates Flash animation and, it does not appear that they have taken the steps to make their Flash content accessible. As I’ve written about previously, Flash does not play nice with screen readers like JAWS, but it can be made to work. However, the developers must create their content with that aspect in mind. As the page is constructed at present, it takes some extra effort to navigate the home page due to the inaccessible Flash. To me, this is a glaring oversight when you are directing your site towards people with disabilities.

However, I am optimistic and feel that the developers at this fresh upstart will address those concerns once made aware of them.

I spent a good bit of time last night looking over the site and must say that I’m pretty excited about what this could grow into. It is a very promising venture that has a large upside. Now, I’m off to go set up my Disaboom membership to check it out in even more depth.

Yahoo continues to employ CAPTCHA without accessible alternative

If somebody says the word” CAPTCHA ,” many people do not recognize it. However, when those same people go on-line and use a web site where they submit something to the site, then are asked to verify that the user is human by typing in the distorted text in a picture, they know what that is, but don’t know what it is called.

These two things are one and the same and CAPTCHA without an accessible alternative is a curse to screen reading programs, which see the image as just another graphic on the page. The blind computer user relying on the screen reader is unable to read the text because the screen reading software sees the image as a graphic, not text, and is unable to discern any text characters from the graphic.

Some people have tagged CAPTCHA without audio, or other accessible workarounds, as a “No Blind People Allowed” sign, a statement that is true in its meaning, even though the host site may have been unintentional in denying access, because the web designer just didn’t even think about denying access when trying to screen out automated, computer generated responses. However, the end result of web inaccessibility is still the same.

It wasn’t that long ago that Google presented this same CAPTCHA problem and one man began an on-line petition to bring the innaccessability of the screening technology to Google’s attention. Google now employs an audio option for its web pages when they employ CAPTCHA.

There are a few other notable web sites which have also made their CAPTCHA accessible, but one giant and globally recognized web site has not—the search engine Yahoo!, which offers a cursory solution to the inaccessibility that many blind users claim does not work. Yahoo! Has employed a policy of “email us your phone number and a Yahoo! Rep will call you,” but the reps apparently do not follow up with their calls. I can personally attest to twice having tried this method, only to have my request ignored by whichever rep received them. I was only able to proceed in what I was doing when I sought sighted assistance, losing both time and productivity.

If a person using a screen reader wants to do something as simple as set up a Yahoo! email account or subscribe to a Yahoo! group, they have to get past this inaccessible CAPTCHA. If the Yahoo! reps are supposed to call these users after they submit their phone numbers, but don't, then the site is simply inaccessible.

Like the previous effort directed at Google, there is now an on-line petition for blind computer users to sign, which is an attempt to bring Yahoo! Into the fold of web accessibility. The web domain
BlindWebAccess.com
Has been set up as an easy to remember web site to help blind computer users get to the petition. (The petition is actually hosted on another site, but this URL will automatically redirect users to the petition.)

As Google and other web sites have demonstrated, accessible alternatives exist that still provide the security the web sites need. This doesn’t have to be expensive, either. There is one solution that is “donationware,” called
FormShield for .NET 2.0

A few years ago, in an honor society newsletter, I read something that truly applies in this case. The quote was “efficiency is doing the thing right, but effectiveness is doing the right thing.” It is time for Yahoo! To step up and do the right thing.

If you know somebody who is a blind computer user, please direct them to the web site above to sign the petition. The web is a wonderful tool and one that should be free of access barriers such as inaccessible CAPTCHA.

Options abound for making accessible web video

I just read a good recounting of available captioning options for
making web video accessible.

For the uninformed, there are captioning options available for videos using both the Microsoft Media Player and the Real Player. (I must admit that the uninformed included myself before this article was published.) Additionally, according to the above linked article, there has also been a text captioning option in Apple’s QuickTime player available for some time now.

So, if your professors insist on incorporating web videos as part of their curriculum, please know that the tools exist across the three main formats to make these accessible.

Web Accessibility: Its two, two, two posts in one

As promised, I’m back with more on web accessibility. However, I’m combining the two posts I mentioned into this one today, as the common theme is web accessibility.

Let me begin by saying up front that I readily admit that I am not a geek. While I believe I am somewhat computer savvy, I cannot wear the badge of geek. I know the difference between accessible and inaccessible web sites and software, very often, only by personal experience. I know the particular mechanics of what makes the web page accessible no better than I know what makes the mechanics of a garbage disposal operate. However, I do not have to know what makes them work to understand when they are not working for me.

However, Jeremy Keith is a web developer in Brighton, England, and I think he would fit whatever the criteria is to be a geek. (Mr. Keith, I use the term “geek” with all due reverence. Web developers know and do things I cannot even dream of.)
On his,
Adactio Journal,
Mr. Keith recently penned a very good post about
The Language of Accessibility,
Where he reflects upon a recent conference he attended in Germany.


His discussion takes us down the path of what accessibility means. In some pretty good layman’s language, he talks about things like markup language, which non-techies like myself may not know much about, but the results of which we know very well. His words in the two paragraphs below say a lot.

“Far from being something that is added to a site, accessibility is something we need to ensure isn’t removed. From that perspective, the phrase “making a site accessible” isn’t accurate.”

“Just as “progressive enhancement” sounds better than “graceful degradation”, talking about accessibility as something that needs to be added onto a website isn’t doing us any favours. Accessibility is not a plug-in. It’s not something that can be bolted onto a site after the fact.”

Mr. Keith goes on to suggest that web designers follow his new understanding: he will talk about keeping a site accessible rather than talking about making a site accessible”

That truly does sound like the language of accessibility. Thanks for sharing it with us, Mr. Keith.

I have only offered a bit of Mr. Keith's words and insight here. Do check out his post and also check out the speech made by the speaker at the conference he attended. Those words are the foundation for the piece and will ring just as true with you.

And, for today’s second feature presentation, I offer this posting from the
FinaBlog,
Titled The State of the Art of Interactive Design.

The piece starts with a simple, but fairly accurate assessment of the progression of the internet, finishing up with a projection with where it may lead. It then weaves in the need for accessibility as an essential element, stating, “Accessibility has become one of the driving forces in web design.”

Hmmm. I’m not sure that I totally agree with that statement, but it is a nice thought.

And, maybe the writer of that piece doesn’t totally agree with that thought either, because he soon follows it by saying, “Unfortunately, most websites have accessibility barriers that make it difficult or impossible for people with disabilities to use the Web.”

Then, when he begins to speak to web developers and what they can do to make web content accessible, he also begins to use the techie lingo I’m not fully fluent in, but understand what they mean to accessibility. These include the need for developers to use XHTML and CSS. He further adds further incentive for developers to use these techniques as they aid in optimizing the site for search engines. If somebody is going to create web content, it makes sense that they would want the search engines to be able to find it.

As with Mr. Keith’s post, I have only presented a small portion of what the writer presents. This one is truly worth investing the time to read the full post. And, also like Mr. Keith’s post, worth sharing with your colleagues in web development.

Like I said earlier, I don’t have to understand what these web development techniques are to understand their impact. Describing inaccessible web content for me is much like that one judge said about pornography, I may not be able to tell you exactly what it is, but I know it when I see it. Being I’m totally blind, maybe the more accurate way of wording that phrase would be to say, “I know it when I don’t see it.”

Web access: Head's up on time-consuming project and GAID initiative

I will be meeting with a colleague and the head of his university’s web site portal in the coming days. In preparation for this meeting, I will be examining the university’s web content. This will include examining the least prefered design route the university has taken, offering text-only pages, which were recently offered as an accessible alternative to meet the letter of the law in Section 508 compliance...Grrr. Additionally, I will also be looking at web sites being offered by other school’s in the same university system.

My reason for telling you this is to give you a head’s up that posting may be a little on the light side here at Access Ability for the next few days, due to the time commitment I will need to review the large amount of web pages.

I’m not one to leave you hanging high and dry, though. Below is a recent news item related to this very subject of accessibility to web content for people with disabilities who use assistive technology. I will also follow up this with a couple more posts related to this subject before knuckling down on the research for my pending project.

An interesting article in
EContentMag
Reports on the latest efforts of the United Nations’
Global alliance working to bridge the information divide.

This article informs readers about the goals of the Global Alliance for Information and Communication Technologies and Development (GAID),which has global players from academia, governments, the private sector, and civil society. A strong demonstration of the commitment from the technological industry can be sensed just by noting that the current GAID chairman is Craig Barrett, the chairman of Intel.

GAID’s primary objectives span a wide spectrum, but two areas of the groups interest are discussed in the article; gaining more saturated broadband penetration in Africa and developing better technology solutions to assist people with disabilities in information access.

Explaining the group’s methodology, Sarbuland Khan, GAID's executive coordinator, said, "The goal is not that we, the UN, do it, but we try to get the partners to do it themselves and show that the UN can catalyze. We don't have the resources or the expertise, but we can convene the right people around the right table to work on these issues.”


Another source cited in the article is Daniel Aghion, executive director and co-founder of the Wireless Internet Institute (W2i), which has been working with GAID since its days as the UN’s ICT Task Force, the predecessor to GAID. In December, 2006, the United Nations adopted a convention protecting the rights of people with disabilities to education, health, labor, and other needs. The UN has encouraged all 192 of its member states to ratify this convention, because, according to Aghion, approximately ten percent of the global population has some impairment keeping them from accessing information technology.

As for the United States, Aghion says, "In the U.S., some policies have been set to address that community and are embedded in the Americans with Disabilities Act, but—as far as information technology is concerned—they have not been very actively enforced."

This goes back to the adage about laws only being as good as their enforcement. If things work as planned, the proposals GAID has set out offer some teeth for accountability towards the end of enforcement.

Again, as I’ve posted previously, the United States has yet to sign this UN convention. Please take an active role and contact the White House and your legislators, encouraging our country to sign off on this potential powerful tool for accessibility.

PDF Equalizer makes Google Books accessible

You’ve got to hand it to the folks at
Premiere Assistive Technology
as they’ve made inroads for accessibility once again.

According to a press release for PDF Equalizer, it is easy to understand the powerful functionality of this latest offering from Premiere Assistive Technology.


From the press release:
“PDF Equalizer is a tool that can open and read aloud PDF Files in their original format without any required file conversion. It is designed so that individuals who use electronic documents can have the true "equal access" to those who use the printed version, plus a few extras. PDF Equalizer allows individuals to select and control what is being read aloud as simply as using your mouse to select the text to be read. If listening to audio of the text is beneficial to you, PDF Equalizer can also turn a PDF Document into MP3 files that individuals can listen to on their MP3/MP4 players. PDF Equalizer can convert each PDF page into a separate MP3 file so it is easy to navigate or create a playlist of the pages you want to hear.”

“PDF Equalizer is a "must have" tool for those who take distant learning classes. The superior note taking capability in PDF Equalizer is unmatched. Notes are automatically synchronized with the PDF page to help keep them organized. At any time, the user can extract all notes into a single Microsoft Word document. If you have too much to read and need to condense the amount of material, use the powerful built-in "content summarization" feature. You can summarize a single topic or an entire book. If you can't find a publication in your native language, don't worry, the translation feature built into PDF Equalizer can translate text on the fly. You can also imbed hyperlinks for direct access to the Internet and there is an integrated dictionary that allows you to immediately lookup definitions.”


This useful piece of assistive technology does more than just make access to pdf documents easy. It also makes
Google Books
Accessible. This feature alone makes the PDF Equalizer's functionality stand out alone in the field of assistive technology. No other pdf reader on the market that I am aware of does this.

If you’re not already familiar with it, check out Google Books and see what a powerful research tool it can be for students.

Google Books has been around for a little while, letting users read passages of print books on their computers, yet also protecting the publisher’s copyrights by not allowing the screen to be printed. In the past, however, it has been completely inaccessible to those who could not read the picture of the text displayed on the screen.

Now, with PDF Equalizer, all those who have been previously excluded from this rich resource can now read the print material via the web…without having to purchase the whole book.

And, like so many other titles from Premiere Assistive, PDF Equalizer is available for free as a fully functional demo so you can try it out. I’m guessing that if you try it, you’ll make that purchase. The price, like so many others from Premiere Assistive, is also reasonable—only $89.95.

If you want more information on this product, check out the official
PDF Equalizer page
On Premiere Assistive’s web site.

Finally, also from that press release, I gleaned an interesting statistic from
the National Institute for Literacy--
nearly 42 million Americans struggle with literacy.

I’m just curious how many of these people are going to college and have a diagnosis of some type of disability. My guess would be a good number of them. Even if just one percent of these were college students, that is still more than 400,000 people. And, this is yet one more tool to help provide access to material which has been previously inaccessible.

Updated: Attitudes towards people with disabilities-- Like We're Not Even Here

There is an interesting article in the
Government Technology magazine,
titled
Like We’re Not Even Here.
In it, the writer discusses the attitude of some people towards others who have visible disabilities—they talk about us like “we’re not even here.”

I think the article speaks clearly about a particular group of people, unfortunately found too often in the service industry such as cab drivers, wait staff at restaurants or hotel desk clerks. This aggravating and disrespectful attitude is displayed when the service person does not speak to the person with a disability, instead talking to the person who happens to be with him or her.

People in service professions still routinely ask the accompanying person questions such as, What would he like to drink?” or “Will she need anything special for her guide dog?” It is the unspoken attitude that the person with a disability is not capable of speaking for himself.

Whether the attitude is intentional or if it is being subconsciously voiced doesn’t really matter. It still exists.

The heart of the matter is to recognize that it exists. Only then can we change attitudes.

As a footnote to this post, when I attempted to leave a comment on the publication’s web site regarding the attitude expressed in the article, I was unable to do so. The site, like many others employs a screening technology called Captcha to filter spam from reader replies. Captcha uses a graphical image to show letters and numbers that the reader must enter into an edit field to demonstrate it is an actual person, not a spam bot, that is posting to the site. Unfortunately, screen readers, such as JAWS, do not decipher any letters or numbers. Screen readers only see a graphical image—a picture – instead of text.

Isn’t it ironic that a magazine targeted towards government technology workers, who one would think would be fully cognizant of the requirements of Section 508, has a web site that does not allow access to blind readers?

Like we're not even here.

UPDATE: 04/19/07

I emailed Gina Scott, the writer of that article and received a prompt and professional response later that same day. She acknowledged the accessibility concerns and was clear that she did not want to come across as hypocritical. It was her hope that, despite the accessibility concerns, by raising the issue, she would get the word out to "those in government who were not even aware of the issues"

No problem, Ms. Scott. I don't believe you came across as hypocritical in any manner. Enlightenment is a wonderful thing.

She was also forwarding my concerns and suggested solutions to her IT department for consideration as they are in the process of updating their web site. Here's hoping that the IT folks follow up!

I thank Ms. Scott for her time, concern, and insight.

Lastly, I received a comment that the link to the story does not work, so here is the URL to read that story:
www.govtech.net/news/news.php?id=104996

(I Have tried to correct the link, but am still unable to make it work, but provide the complete URL so that readers can read Ms. Scott's meaningful article. Copy the address and paste it into your web browser. The article will then load correctly.)

Library site aware of need to address accessible web content

On a blog named
Library Stories,
Which is targeted towards library professionals, there was a recent post about
Web content and meeting the needs of students with disabilities,
particularly pointing out the need for compliance to Section 508.

The author of that post had the insight to point out that students needing consideration in web content are not only blind, but that list includes students whose disabilities are:

• Blindness / low vision
• Dyslexia
• Deaf / hard of hearing
• Limited Mobility
• Epilepsy
• Cognitive impairments

Whatever trends develop over the course of the coming years, one constant will remain-- students with disabilities will continue to go to college and need accommodations at their school’s library. Accessible texts and web sites are two of the primary concerns that will continue to need to be addressed.

IBM develops Accessibility Browser

To further enhance accessibility for people who are visually impaired, IBM will soon release
The Accessibility Browser.

The multimedia browser, also called the “A-Browser,” is set on giving people with visual impairments the same control over their browser’s content as their sighted counterparts, and will do so without interfering with the functionality of talking screen readers. There is a specific concentration on content compatible with the Real player and Windows Media Player.

Information from the BBC news article linked above states:
“By using the A-Browser, the visually-impaired person can control media content by using preset shortcut keys instead of having to seek the control buttons using a mouse. The browser also allows the users to slow down or increase the speed of the video. The volume controls let user adjust the sound of various sources in parallel. Frances West, director of IBM’s Human Ability and Accessibility Centre said.”

“IBM says it should be available later this year and hopes that it will be free.”

The A-Browser’s developer, Dr. Chieko Asakawa,is a blind employee of IBM who designed the browser in response to the growing amount of web content she was unable to access.

Now, if somebody would only do something similar with that darn, embedded Flash content.

Flash animation and assistive technology

Is it just me, or has there been a recent explosion by web designers to incorporate Flash plug ins on their websites?

Perhaps Macromedia, the makers of the Flash animation product, have put on a full court press to promote a broader use of their application.

Whatever the reason, Flash seems to be flourishing on the web in the past several weeks. On top of that, in most cases, the controls for the Flash features are just the generic buttons with no description to what their functions are, leaving blind users of screen readers wondering what in the heck those buttons do. So, not only is Flash spreading like wildfire, the ignorance about accessibility is being incorporated in the fold as it does so.

I don’t think that most web designers have any idea that Flash is a difficult speedbump for users of screen readers. It is so much of a problem that Freedom Scientific’s JAWS screen reader includes a function to disable Flash animation when using the web browser.

Speaking purely anecdotally, I have noticed a large number of websites in just the past month that have begun embedding Flash animation as a means to spiff up their sites. I notice it because it makes it difficult for me to read their site’s content. On one newspaper’s site, if I had not been reading the site for the years that I have, I would have not known how the site was laid out and, as a result, when they employed Flash animation about three weeks ago, I would not have been able to read the news without taking a slow and time-consuming method of reading one line at a time with the down arrow. Even then, I don’t know how well the Flash animation would have interfered with JAWS.

Don’t misunderstand my complaint. I’m not a new JAWS user who might be unfamiliar with the program’s operation. I’ve been using this product for more than 10 years and am using the latest version. Also, I’m not a rookie in understanding how to maximize the efficiency of JAWS. I have often been called upon by friends who are also JAWS users for technical assistance.

I’m just noticing a glut of embedded Flash animation that is making my life difficult. I can’t speak for users of other assistive technology software such as screen magnifiers or other brands of screen readers, but I would think that this is affecting their access to web sites as well.

I just read an interesting post related to this subject on a new blog called ,
Aspirants.
It is only the second post on the blog, but seems well written and offers good insight to understanding web design.

Hopefully, future web designers will initiate some insight and think about the users of their products as somebody besides the typical, sighted consumer. Universal design would make their web pages readable by a broader audience. Isn’t more traffic what most creators of web content want? There are methods for creating accessible Flash animation. I’ve posted about some training on this specific subject here on previous occasions.

Finally, so you don’t think this post is purely a personal vent, look at your school’s web pages. Are they employing Flash as part of their effort to have the latest in whiz-bang technology? Is it accessible? Does it meet Section 508 standards?

Pardon any self indulgence on this subject, but it is a concern that I see as a growing trend and not dissipating in the near future.

My hope is that the understanding that Flash can be used successfully and also be accessible will begin to spread as fast as the use of Flash has been on the web.