Kestrell

WebAIM: The crisis is real: Where are the web accessibility professionals?
Like everyone in the web accessibility field, WebAIM has a vested interest in a sufficiently-sized community comprised of skilled professionals. The shortage of qualified talent is felt by all of us. But from where will these individuals come, and how can we accelerate their availability?
https://webaim.org/blog/web-accessibility-professionals/

The Case For Describing Race In Alternative Text Attributes
This is an excellent article by Tolu Adegbite on why we need to get more descriptive in some alternative text descriptions
https://ux.shopify.com/the-case-for-describing-race-in-alternative-text-attributes-a093380634f2

Hitting The Books: The Decades-Long Fight To Bring Live Television To Deaf Audiences
Engadget has a write up on a new book by Harry G. Lang on the history of closed captioning in the United States
https://www.engadget.com/hitting-the-books-turn-on-the-words-harry-lang-gallaudet-university-press-163045001.html

A Blind Tech Consultant Finds His Calling
Legally blind from birth, Julian Vargas's old cell phone led him to a new career in training other blind people how to use technology
https://www.pcmag.com/news/a-blind-tech-consultant-finds-his-calling

These links were culled from this week's Top Tech Tidbits newsletter. You can view the entire newsletter, search the archive, or subscribe on the website
https://www.toptechtidbits.com/

At the beginning of the podcast I mention below, there is a brief ad, and I wanted to confirm what it said was still true, which it is:

Deque University Scholarships for People with Disabilities
If you have a disability, you qualify for a scholarship to access to Deque's in-depth web accessibility curriculum for a full year (normally $315) at no cost.
https://dequeuniversity.com/scholarships#:~:text=If%20you%20have%20a%20disability,normally%20%24315)%20at%20no%20cost

Will VR be Accessible?
13 Letters podcast April 16, 2020

Will Butler from Be My Eyes interviews Larry Goldberg, head of accessibility at Verizon Media. Larry spent twenty years at WGBH in Boston developing the National Center for Accessible Media (NCAM), and in this interview he discusses much of the history of innovations such as close captioning and audio description.
https://www.bemyeyes.com/podcasts/will-vr-be-accessible
Listen through Spotify
https://open.spotify.com/episode/0VsGfjRZEsw3Gf8FSrdcDV

Note: VR isn't really discussed until about 67% of the way through the podcast, but Larry has many fascinating stories about the history and people involved in the history of accessible technologies.

Inside the Verizon Accessibility Lab
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grK0ihVi-FA

This Q&A with Larry Goldberg contains links to many of the resources he mentions in the podcast
https://equalentry.com/qa-with-larrygoldberg-headofaccessibility-verizonmedia/#:~:text=Larry%20Goldberg%20leads%20Accessibility%20at,and%20audio%20description%20production%20unit.

xr access initiative -A community committed to making virtual, augmented, and mixed reality (XR) accessible to people with disabilities
https://xraccess.org/#content

This article
https://www.howtogeek.com/662339/how-to-join-a-zoom-meeting/

lists multiple ways to join a Zoom meeting.

However, I've found that using my PC involves tweaking way too many settings, so instead have whoever sets up the meeting send me a text with the OneTap link in it.
Troubleshooting I have had to figure out so far:
1. Sometimes if the person sending the text includes other text, aside from the link, in the text, it makes it difficult for me to click on the link.
2. Sometimes when I get into the meeting, Voiceover says that I am muted and it doesn't matter how many times I use the unmute command of *6, I just get repeatedly muted, and at some point my onscreen keyboard gets dimmed and I can't get it undimmed to unmute.
I haven't found a way to tweak the keyboard dimming setting, so every few minutes I flip my phone up and then back down to the horizontal position, which refreshes the keyboard.
There has to be a better way to accomplish this but, since I am using Voiceover, it changes many of the default commands, so it's difficult to find troubleshooting fixes that also work with Voiceover.
Many users who are more confident using an iPhone turn Voiceover off while using other apps, but I'm not at that level yet.

Finally, let me once more plug the national Braille Press nbp.org for providing a pile of technology guides for blind and low-vision users. Anna Dresner's books, in particular, are both detailed and clearly written, and you will definitely get your money's worth from any of her guides.
Note that, although it is called the "Braille" Press, you can get these guides in all sort of accessible formats, including Daisy, and that you can buy these books already loaded ona thumb drive so that you just plug them into whatever device you use to read your books.

Kes: I really liked The world is big. It’s a long flight."

https://twitter.com/#!/blindgadget

Kes: This Boston Globe article
http://www.boston.com/ae/movies/articles/2010/10/18/a_reel_deal_for_blind_deaf/#
talks about why there will soon be a lot more movie theatres showing accessible films with descriptive narration for blind and deaf moviegoers. My own experience with these films is mixed, as when the earphones work, it's great, but two out of three times the earphones don't work. I think there might be specific spots where you are supposed to sit to receive the transmission, but the theatre staff is consistently clueless about being able to give any suggestions.
Also, I sitll like to tell the story of my very first experience with descriptive video. I went to see Spiderman and it began with the narrative description: "A woman in a toga holds a torch high..." and I was thinking, "Toga? I don't recall there being togas in..." which is about when I heard "the Columbia Pictures logo." Alexx still starts all film descriptions by describing the studio logos.

Posted to the NCAM announcement list

The Carl and Ruth Shapiro Family National Center for Accessible Media at WGBH (NCAM) has written guidelines for content providers who would like to create accessible iTunes U media via captions, subtitles and audio descriptions. This guidelines document provides step-by-step documentation on creating fully accessible media, including:

- Closed captions and audio descriptions that the user can turn on or off as needed.
- Open subtitles and descriptions that are available to everyone watching or listening.
- Closed subtitles for adding multiple language tracks to video files.
- Accessible PDFs.

Also included with the guidelines are links to eight video and audio clips that illustrate the various forms of accessible media discussed in the document. Using these guidelines, iTunes U content providers can create content that all people can learn from including people with vision and
hearing loss.

To access the Creating Accessible iTunes U Content guidelines document and related media, see Creating Accessible iTunes U Content on Apple's iTunes site,
<http://deimos3.apple.com/webobjects/core.woa/browse/wgbh.org.2010579900>.

About NCAM and WGBH
The Carl and Ruth Shapiro Family National Center for Accessible Media at WGBH is a research, development and advocacy entity that works to make existing and emerging technologies accessible to all audiences. NCAM is part of the Media Access Group at WGBH, which also includes The Caption Center (est. 1972), and Descriptive Video Service® (est. 1990). For more
information, visit http://access.wgbh.org.

WGBH Boston is America's preeminent public broadcasting producer, the source of fully one-third of PBS's prime-time lineup, along with some of public television's best-known lifestyle shows and children's programs and many public radio favorites. For more information, visit http://www.wgbh.org.