[blindlaw] More reply to Alcidonis' post

[McCarthy, Jim]

Hello,
Obviously, this discussion has immediate relevance to Angie, Rod and other entering law students who are trying to figure out the best ways to achieve their success in law school.  I think it is also pretty interesting from the perspective of coming to terms with what accessibility means in the computer age.  It is my understanding that Westlaw has been very out front with an interest in providing a usable product for blind lawyers and law students.  I am sure Steve Jacobson is right when he says that this discussion might confuse the Westlaw folks.  Having said that though, I have always been concerned that text only is separate and not equal, at least in the majority of cases.  I think Brendan is right to want some of the search narrowing features to be accessible.  Many people are liberated, for example, with all they can retrieve from a search engine like Google.  However, lots of us, including yours truly, really are not so good at narrowing those searches to separate the wheat from the chaff.  That, it seems to me is the mark of someone who really maximizes the usefulness of a search engine.

The point of my comments is this.  I think we who are blind can push for greater use of Westlaw features.  We can share what we learn as Angie has done, and we can negotiate to develop access to some of these more graphical features.  Westlaw has a long tradition of working with blind people and of hiring blind researchers too, or at least they use to have some blind researchers.  Most practicing attorneys I know who are blind have been generally pleased with the support they receive from Westlaw tech support and reference folks.  That certainly cannot be said of all the computer folks we know as has already been suggested.  While I am not in the trenches as many of you are, I think that we can work with Westlaw to bring about over time changes either than make the text only sight more functional or perhaps that make it less necessary.  The other way to see the text only sight is as a means to have less clutter and largely get good results as Phil suggests.  Rod, thanks for starting this thread because I really think these are the kind of discussions for which this list is so well suited, those that really are within the primary purposes of our blindlaw list.
Jim McCarthy

-----Original Message-----
From: blindlaw-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:blindlaw-bounces at nfbnet.org]On
Behalf Of Philip Sklover
Sent: Sunday, August 27, 2006 4:42 PM
To: 'NFBnet Blind Law Mailing List'
Subject: Re: [blindlaw] More reply to Alcidonis' post



	I have been an attorney for nearly four decades.  On two occasions I
managed appellate litigation for a Federal  agency.  I have used the text
version of Westlaw with considerable effectiveness and success.  This has
largely been due to the outstanding telephonic training by Westlaw
representative Kent Rinker.  While there are some features of the regular
Westlaw site which are not available to visually impaired users, there are
sufficient work-arounds to militate against any substantial deficits.  Based
on its simplicity, I have recommended the text version of Westlaw to many
sighted users on my staff.  

	I personally applaud Westlaw for its sensitivity to the needs of
visually impaired users.  I wish that Adobe with its PDF nightmare would be
as helpful.  

 




Philip B. Sklover
 
-----Original Message-----
From: blindlaw-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:blindlaw-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
Behalf Of Patrick Brendan O'Reilly
Sent: Sunday, August 27, 2006 2:34 PM
To: blindlaw at nfbnet.org
Subject: [blindlaw] More reply to Alcidonis' post

Hmm. My point is that both Westlaw and Lexis have failed to make available,
accessible and usable the same features that make computer-assisted research
fast and effective for sighted users.

To my mind and for my money as a soon-to-be practicing attorney, a text-only
version of Westlaw or Lexis that strips away the tools that make it possible
to quickly narrow my results list does me no good. When a blind person asks
Westlaw or Lexis to make a text-only version available, I think that the
blind or visually impaired person is really asking for a less-graphics
intensive version of the same product that sighted users have access to.
Taking away research tools and features, by definition, does not succeed in
offering a text-only version of the SAME product.

I further question whether it is in keeping with the spirit of the ADA to
provide an "accessible" product for the visually impaired that does not, in
fact, offer the user any of the same features that it affords to sighted
users beyond the opportunity to enter an initial search term.

In using ZoomText and Kurzweil, I found that Lexis worked a little bit
better than Westlaw.

All the same, my preference was to use the Windows accessibility tools to
increase the font sizes I saw online. In mot cases, this worked pretty well.
The only drqwback was that when I increased the font size too much, some of
the helpful tools expanded beyond the size of the frame such that I could
neither find nor use them.

I struggled with Westlaw, Lexis, and other law school related stuff through
my first year of law school. Then I had an eye surgery that has enabled me
to work with much less accommodation.

I spoke with my local Westlaw rep and spoke to one of Westlaw's corporate
vice presidents about these issues. Both were helpful in steering me to the
text-only product but neither could really do much to offer the same
features that sighted users have access to.

All the same, if you think there are any things related to your pursuance of
a law degree that you'd like to see in a disabled students bill of rights,
please email me those ideas and suggestions.

I, for one, think that a bill of rights should include a provision stating
that:

All, blind, visually impaired, dyslexic, and otherwise differently abled law
students and lawyers shall enjoy access to all the same research tools,
aids, and scope narrowing features that sighted law students and lawyers
enjoy.

Do any of you have any other ideas for positive statements of rights that
you think the ABA should adopt?

Thanks,
Brendan O'Reilly


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