[gui-talk] schools shun Kindle

[Mike Freeman]

Dream on!

Mike

----- Original Message -----
From: James Pepper <b75205 at gmail.com>
To: NFBnet GUI Talk Mailing List <gui-talk at nfbnet.org>
Date: Saturday, Nov 14, 2009 15:47:31
Subject: Re: [gui-talk] schools shun Kindle

>
>
> The problems of tagging content for accessibility is a long and tedious
> process requiring experts in the field who usually get it wrong.
> 
> We have built in features in software for accessibility but they are not
> comprehensive.  For instance we have the "Save as Daisy" feature in
> Microsoft Word, but if you do not lay out the content correctly before you
> press that button, content will be missed or not placed in the proper order
> and the only way to notice this is if you actually read the document; all of
> it.
> 
> In any of these procedures, content is usually missing and it is extremely
> rare to get all of the content to be accessible; unless it is a short
> document.  Hence in order to fix this situation we must rebuild the process
> of making content from the start and then fix it so that content is
> inherently accessible to the blind, the illiterate, etc.
> 
> And of course for dynamic content things really get complicated!
> 
> It is important to make this a procedure where the author is not aware that
> they are making their content accessible, that it is built into the system.
> If we do this, then the average person can make accessible content without
> any expertise!
> 
> There is a misconception out there about accessibility.  Right now people
> are trying to make their content legally accessible to the blind, following
> the Section 508 law and ADA regs, but if you lay out content to that
> specification there is no guarantee that it will be actually accessible to
> the blind. Actually, most content made to the legal standard is useless.
> 
> Take for instance buttons.  Many web design programs provide alt text as
> placeholder text in the alt text field.  Just having any content, even if it
> says "Button 1" will pass the test for accessibilty using the standard
> testing programs that test for section 508 compliance.  But you and I both
> know that a page that says "Button 1" all the time will not do!  That it is
> completely inaccessible.
> 
> So the definition of accessibility needs to be changed to a functional
> accessibility which can be tested using free screen readers so that people
> who make the content can test it and judges can read the document
> immediately in court without any assistance. That the accessibility is
> obvious and that you do not need a special program to read the content.
> 
> Kindle suffers from the same coding problems that other PDF based formats
> have and so there is an inherent inaccessibility which can be overcome, but
> not with the current solutions available to the public.  To fix the current
> problems using conventional technology is a very editorial intensive
> process, not practical in the current business environment. Hence we need a
> new solution.
> 
> Also there seems to be a bias towards making content accessible to the
> latest version of JAWS which is unavailable to the majority of the blind and
> disabled because it costs so much!  Backwards compatibility is needed and
> making content accessible to the simplest text to speech engines is
> necessary if we are truly going to be accessible to the blind. This can be
> done.
> 
> When I look at the content on the page and then I see what the blind have
> access, I have to say that the state of accessibility at this point is just
> not good enough.  The blind must insist on a standard of all of the content
> must be accessible, not just parts of it.  There must be a "meeting of the
> minds," otherwise every document made partially accessible should be
> declared null and void because both parties are not communicating.  Is it a
> legal contract if only one party has access to the content?
> 
> Is it a legal document if the content provided to the blind is different,
> even a completely different content than what is presented on the printed
> page.  It is perfectly possible to create an accessible document that is
> completely different than the content provided on the page.  What asurances
> do we have that what we hear in a screen reader is the terms of a contract?
> 
> 
> And lastly, we need to make this content accessible in every language in the
> world.
> 
> This can be done.
> 
> James Pepper
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