If you want to work on a project that combines social impact and community building and bleeding edge technology and design challenges then Inclusive Planet might just have that experience you’re looking for!
We’re looking for part-time and full-time interns / volunteers in the following areas:
1. Engaging deeply with our 4000+ user community and nurture it through content, guided interaction and plain old solid listening; we have a performance linked stipend for both full time and part time interns. If you’re already a member of our community then that’s even better because anyone interacting with the community needs to bring the perspective of a community member;
2. Helping our team collect the right seed content, either by aggregating from other sources through partnerships or by creating our own. In case you’re wondering what seed content is – it’s the content that you put on your site to draw users in the early days where user-generated / shared content sites like ours don’t have enough user-generated/shared content to attract new users.
3. Working on a new technology and design-led project to create tools/products that could tremendously increase access to the web for the print-impaired. Here you could do research, actually help on tech creation or in the design process etc.
In case you’re interested in the work we do please write in to founders@inclusiveplanet.com. We welcome students, professionals and all else with time to spare and a curious mind to apply to some of the most interesting problems out there. Thanks!
For the technology practitioner who works in the area of getting her solutions to work well for a diverse audience, there are a few related but often ambiguous terms that float around. Accessibility, usability, design …
For those of us who are particularly concerned about ensuring that web applications fit the needs of an audience with different faculties, there are a set of standards that are laid out that presumably will tell us how to do this. The question often comes up – is it worth the effort following standards like the W3C WCAG standard? There is a profusion of articles on the web that detail how standards compliance can be achieved and there are organizations who will help you, the web asset owner, get to standards compliance. What is often not that clear is the question of – what will WCAG compliance do for my users? How will my web asset benefit from this exercise? Does WCAG compliance mean that ALL users can use my web site ‘equitably’?
Focusing on the WCAG standard as an example, the standards body has stated that the goal of defining “how to make Web content more accessible to people with disabilities”. The standards body has decided, I believe consciously, to not precisely define accessibility. Also note the comparative term “more accessible” is chosen instead of a more absolute or superlative term. There is an air of tentativeness, which again, I would think, is a conscious choice.
There are a few more factors to consider:
Standards, in its final form often represent less than the state of the art in technology due to the long life cycle of the standards process itself. This is also clear from the facts that often even as a particular standard is in the stages of approval, work on the next standards commences.
Standards bodies often need to come up with a least common denominator in its specification and in the interest of expediency, generally have to choose to ignore complicated or controversial issues.
Some of the issues related to accessibility, are so entwined in issues of usability and design, that it is difficult to make concrete standards without making assumptions about the nature of use of the system, the faculty set of the user and other environmental factors. In the continuum of accessibility-usability-design, the standards are only able to address the safe generalities than the highly variable specifics.
The points above should not be read as criticisms of standards, but merely as an observation of the facts.
Now, switching over to the practice side, take the classic cases where a web or digital asset owner takes the steps towards ensuring diversity. She is often driven by one or more of the following:
Social and values based reasons– CSR for companies, social pressure for individuals
I care about diversity, and want to make sure that there are no barriers in my organization for people with a non-standard set of faculties
I have a digital asset and want to come across to others as someone who cares about diversity
Regulatory and Legal
I need to comply to the accessibility rules/regulations/laws of my country/state/association in relation to and if I don’t there is a possible negative consequence
Commercial
I or one of my customers have or will have an audience or customers that is diverse and needs accessibility
I or one of my customers need to show some others that we are accessible so that we can get some new business
I or one of my customers deal exclusively with a segment that have a non-standard set of faculties that have accessibility implications and our offering needs to be precisely tailored for them
Consider the various cases above. While clearly not an exhaustive treatment of all possible cases, you can see 2 significant flavors:
I need to convince a certain constituency that my digital asset is accessible
I need to make my digital asset as accessible, usable and appropriate as possible to one or more specific class of users with non-standards faculties.
In both these cases, standards compliance is a requirement. For case 2 above, however, the asset owner would be ill-advised to stop at standards compliance and should consider additional steps to put forth the best possible offering – from accessibility, usability and design standpoints for the specific audience(s) in mind.
So here goes the stake in the ground:
We believe that standards compliance is a necessary but not sufficient condition for ensuring best possible levels of accessibility.
We do believe that current standards ensure a high degree of accessibility. However, we believe that there are additional steps that can and should be taken to allow a person with a non-standard set of faculties the best possible experience with a web site or application.
Ever wondered how a person with a visual impairment uses a computer? Surf the web? Read a book or an article? I know many people who shy away from asking these questions. The important thing is to realise that there’s no harm in asking these questions. The real harm is in not bothering to find the answers to these questions. A request to our visually impaired readers: please pass this article on to all your sighted friends. And dear sighted readers, walk with me through this simple simulation of the experience of a visually impaired person.
The most popular, specialized software program used by people with visual impairments to consume electronic content - documents, web pages and other computer programs is a type of computer software known as a screen reader. The screen reader has two major functions – Navigation and Text-to-Speech (TTS).
A screen reader aids in navigation by guiding the user in moving from one page to the other, from one paragraph to the other and so on. It aids in TTS by converting electronic text to sound – basically it reads out text. The biggest stumbling block for screen reader software are programs and content that is difficult for navigation.
A large majority of computer programs and electronic content that are used by the visually impaired, are created by sighted people – programmers, content writers, editors etc. If you happen to fall into this category of very powerful people, and if you are unfamiliar with screen readers, I would definitely encourage you to try this little experiment. Now, if you don’t, you might still want to do it – because it can open your eyes a little bit into an unfamiliar world. All you need is a computer, working eyes and an old newspaper.
Here you go:
Turn on your computer
Browse to Google news or your favorite online haunt OR open a large word document
Now get an old newspaper – take one full sheet and open it up
Make a rectangular incision 3 inches long and half inch wide at the center of the paper
With both hands, hold this newspaper against and in front of your computer display, so that you can see the screen through the rectangular hole
Now start reading through the hole. Move the paper to the right to continue reading
Try to jump to sections that you are interested in by moving the paper around
Read the whole page
Rinse and repeat with familiar and unfamiliar pages
That’s it.
Hope you enjoyed the experience .. Now we need some feedback from you:
How easy was it to find something that you are looking to read?
What would have made it easier to find what you were looking for?
Is the experience different between familiar and unfamiliar pages?
How would you change the design of your document/site/application after your experience of carrying out this experiment?
One of our member, Krissy, sent this to us. A truly amazing piece by Harold Krents.
Harold Krents, a graduate of Harvard Law School, practiced law in Washington, D.C. Blind from birth, he was a strong advocate for the rights of the handicapped. He speaks about the everyday prejudices faced by a blind person.
Darkness at Noon By Harold Krents
Blind from birth, I have never had the opportunity to see myself and have been completely dependent on the image I create in the eye of the observer. To date it has not been narcissistic. There are those who assume that since I can’t see, I obviously also cannot hear. Very often people will converse with me at the top of their lungs, enunciating each word very carefully. Conversely, people will also often whisper, assuming that since my eyes don’t work, my ears don’t either.
For example, when I go to the airport and ask the ticket agent for assistance to the plane, he or she will invariably pick up the phone, call a ground hostess, and whisper: “Hi, Jane, we’ve got a 76 here.” I have concluded that the word blind is not used, for one of two reasons: Either they fear that if the dread word is spoken, the ticket agent’s retina will immediately detach, or they are reluctant to inform me of my condition, of which I may not have been previously aware. On the other hand, others know that of course I can hear, but believe that I can’t talk. Often, therefore, when my wife and I go out to dinner, a waiter or waitress will ask Kit if “he would like a drink” to which I respond that “indeed he would.” This point was graphically driven home to me while we were in England. I had been given a year’s leave of absence from my Washington law firm to study for a diploma in law at Oxford University. During the year I became ill and was hospitalized. Immediately after admission, I was wheeled down to the X-ray room. Just at the door sat an elderly woman—elderly I would judge from the sound of her voice. “What is his name?” the woman asked the orderly who had been wheeling me. “What’s your name?” the orderly repeated to me. “Harold Krents,” I replied. “Harold Krents,” he repeated. “When was he born?” “When were you born?” “November 5, 1944,” I responded. “November 5, 1944,” the orderly intoned. This procedure continued for approximately five minutes, at which point even my saint like disposition deserted me. “Look,” I finally blurted out, “this is absolutely ridiculous. Okay, granted I can’t see, but it’s got to have become pretty clear to both of you that I don’t need an interpreter.” “He says he doesn’t need an interpreter,” the orderly reported to the woman.
The toughest misconception of all is the view that because I can’t see, I can’t work. I was turned down by over forty law firms because of my blindness, even though my qualifications included a cum laude3 degree from Harvard College and a good ranking in my Harvard Law School class. The attempt to find employment, the continuous frustration of being told that it was impossible for a blind person to practice law, the rejection letters, based not on my lack of ability but rather on my disability, will always remain one of the most disillusioning experiences of my life. Fortunately, this view of limitation and exclusion is beginning to change. On April 16, [1978] the Department of Labour issued regulations that mandate equal-employment opportunities for the handicapped.
By and large, the business community’s response to offering employment to the disabled has been enthusiastic. I therefore look forward to the day, with the expectation that it is certain to come, when employers will view their handicapped workers as a little child did me years ago when my family still lived in Scarsdale. I was playing basketball with my father in our back yard according to procedures we had developed. My father would stand beneath the hoop, shout, and I would shoot over his head at the basket attached to our garage. Our next-door neighbour, aged five, wandered over into our yard with a playmate. “He’s blind,” our neighbour whispered to her friend in a voice that could be heard distinctly by Dad and me. Dad shot and missed; I did the same. Dad hit the rim; I missed entirely; Dad shot and missed the garage entirely. “Which one is blind?” whispered back the little friend.
I would hope that in the near future, when a plant manager is touring the factory with the foreman and comes upon a handicapped and a non-handicapped person working together, his comment after watching them work will be, “Which one is disabled?”
We received a lot of feedback from our members and well wishers that some parts of our site were not inclusive! Last week, we made some changes. Now you can check out our new login page, an improved navigation bar, and the use of colours to aid people with low vision.
This is the first step that we have taken towards redesign. In the coming weeks you will see a lot more changes to help people with low vision navigate the site with ease. We would like to thank Srini for his insights on low vision design.
As the site grows by leaps and bounds, as more content and connections are made and shared, we feel that we need to prepare for a much more exciting future. Of course, we understand the recent changes may have caused some pain as familiar landmarks have disappeared. However, some changes could not be avoided as we have tried to consolidate and add more consistency to our design and structure. Of course, we are always on standby to assist if you are having any trouble.
The site will go through some more changes in the coming months as we put into practice what we have been dreaming about, a more approachable and customized experience. Veteran users may not notice these changes, but we want to make the site easier for new users to join and improve the Inclusive Planet experience.
Check out the new design if you have not done so already. And give us your feedback, the good the bad and the ugly.
It seems that everyone has an opinion on twitter… they love it, hate it, don’t mind it, find it useful, or think it’s a waste of time. But they still have an opinion on it. While I was doing my research I found some very interesting articles like Top 5 ways Smart people use Twitter, why twitter will endure etc. I also found Why I don’t use twitter. You can read all these and make up your mind for yourself. Better yet, sign up and try it out!
But whatever you do, don’t dismiss it out of hand. There is value that twitter provides, if you know how to tap it effectively.
We started actively tweeting from @inclusiveplanet recently and the response has been phenomenal! I don’t want to measure the results based on the number of followers or lists etc. What I will base it on is the solutions that we have discovered, and similar minded people & organizations that we have managed to connect with!
Now coming to the point of the blog post – You can now tweet from Inclusive Planet!
Of course we didn’t debate over the potential use of twitter. Our decision was easy to make – Our planeteers asked for it! J
Many of our members pointed out that they would like to tweet from Inclusive Planet – what they are doing on Inclusive Planet, share with other people something that they saw or read on Inclusive Planet.
This is a pretty exciting move for us. It allows all our members to let the rest of the world know what you they’re upto! Or as one of planeteers, Tomi puts it – “my vocational school blocks Twitter now Inclusive Planet to the rescue! #1P”
I suggest you join in on the fun… and don’t forget to use #1P – the official Inclusive Planet hash tag.
Our friends in Canada are fighting for better online accessibility in Canada. Donna Jodhan and her friends are calling upon the Government of Canada to ensure that all information and services offered through Federal Government websites be made to comply with WCAG 2.0 guidelines by December 31, 2010. Please copy and paste the <links> below into your internet browser.
Take action today by signing our online petition at:
<http://www.PetitionOnline.com/GCWAP/petition.html>
Please share this with your friends, colleagues, and supporters of
e-accessibility. Accessible websites mean stronger communities and
healthier economies!
_______________
Quick Facts:
+ Over 800,000 Canadians have seeing limitations that require accommodations.
+ If a website is not accessible, then to a blind person, it does not exist.
+ Government of Canada websites fail simple accessibility compliance tests.
+ Offenders include many major Federal departments, including Canada’s
largest employer, the Public Service Commission
Help us Support in her Charter challenge against the
Attorney General of Canada, scheduled for May 19-21, 2010!
If you are reading this, it probably means that you have crossed the digital divide and are independent enough to take in the sea of content, that we call the internet. But in Madagascar, out of 600,000 persons with visual impairment, less than 10 have access to computers!
Three young social entrepreneurs have decided to bring about change! Holiniaina, Martin and Karin are just like you and me… the only difference is that they acted! They created The Madagascar Education and Resource Centre for the visually Impaired (MERCI) with the vision to offer support and services for visually impaired people in and around Antananarivo, the capital of Madagascar.
MERCI needs your help!
MERCI has decided to maximize the power of collaboration by using the Inclusive Ideasplatform. Here’s how you can help.
The team at MERCI has designed a computer training curriculum, but before finalising it, they wanted everybody’s views is to ensure that students of MERCI get access to the best possible curriculum. Click here to review MERCI’s computer training curriculum. Moreover, if you already have some material which can be used for developing this curriculum, then feel free to share it.
To achieve their vision, they need funds to run MERCI. You may not be able to help 600,000 people overnight… but what you can do, in your own small way, is contribute to this cause, and pass the word on to people in your network. If you are interested in funding their venture or helping them in any other way, then do write to us on contact at inclusiveplanet dot com
Join hands with Holiniaina, Martin, Karin & Inclusive Planet to give this gift to the visually impaired people of Madagascar! Armed with the knowledge of computers, the opportunities are innumerable. They can start a business, write stories, create music, join groups, campaign for causes, try online dating, make friends around the world and be on Inclusive Planet. A gift that they can use throughout their lives… a gift that will enrich their life!
I had attended the Techshare Conference in February, and had met some wonderful people and got an opportunity to learn about some fantastic innovations. This post is dedicated to a wonderful innovation called the Tactile Explorer.
What is the Tactile Explorer(TE)?
The TE is a comprehensive PC reading and navigating system driven by an adapted computer mouse that provides the first real opportunity for full PC accessibility for blind and visually impaired individuals. The basic idea behind the product is that the users only need two tactile pads to experience the whole computer screen as the cursor can be moved across the screen in a way similar to a regular computer mouse.
How does it look?
It looks like a slight larger version of a regular mouse. The two buttons of a regular mouse is replaced by 2 Tactile Pads of 4 by 4 Braille Cells.So a person holds this just like a regular mouse and now has 16 dots under the two fingers.
How does it work?
The hardware, is a unique design for a computer mouse incorporating two pads of 4X4 pins on the top of the mouse, that rise and fall under the user’s fingertips when the mouse is moved, translating the data on the screen (shapes, textures, letters, Braille, paths, and objects) to tactile sensations and to speech. For the sighted readers of this blog, you can check out this demo on the their site http://www.tactile-world.com/Demo1/. For those who are blind, I guess the only way to experience the product is to feel it.
What are its USP’s?
The Tactile Explorer is a complete system, including a refreshable Braille display, screen reader, navigator, games console and uniquely a graphics reader. Its core functionalities include:
Ability to feel graphics – NONE of the existing peripherals’ has this feature.
Ability to easily navigate their way around PC programs and the internet.
Is an “attractive” and effective teaching tool for blind and visually impaired children and youth – eliminating any future obstacles to employment due to lack of computer familiarity and skills.
Portability – It is light and small and you can plug the TE into any laptop or PC, load the software and go!
What’s the price?
The unit cost is priced at less than $695. Whilst its price is cheaper compared to a lot of assistive aids I have come across. I still feel its a tad highly priced for a lot of developing markets, and I hope that with larger volumes, they will be able to bring down the price and let a larger population benefit from this wonderful innovation
What I really liked about the demonstration at Techshare was that it was completely managed by two volunteers from India. Manish and Pranav, who have regular corporate jobs took time out of their busy schedules and volunteered to demonstrate this wonderful product. Both of them are amazing presenters, with a great sense of humour. Manish in fact gave a demonstration of how to play a game using the TE, and Pranav showed the audience how a blind person can experience the map of India! The officials from the company, Mandi the project manager, and Dr.Igor the inventor, both stayed in the background and let the product do the talking!
I have no doubts in my mind about the utility of this product especially as a teaching aid in a lot of blind schools across the world. The company has currently completed Alpha testing, and are looking for a round of funding. By the second half of the year, they should be ready to roll out the products.
We are very lucky to have in our midst an extremely talented and friendly member called Dave Uhlman. I am sure that some of you must have already heard his show “Hear and there” and interacted with him on Inclusive Planet.
Hear & There is an adventure program that is centered on detailed descriptions. Dave gives his unique perspective on museums, nature walks, art shows or just about anyplace he can visit. Dave can put words to the visual so the listener can see and enjoy the experience. Many of the places they go are accessible for people with disabilities.
Personally, I love the show! I was also lucky enough to spend some time speaking with him about how he started doing the show, and what he loves most about doing it.
I was volunteering in a local museum and they had never had somebody with a visual impairment that volunteered for them. The museum was really not accessible and I saw the problems that I was having and I decided to make a change with and I started learning about accessible museum exhibit design and I became a consultant just through my own education for museums on how to become accessible and communicate their exhibits and messages to people with disabilities. I stumbled across radio reading service in the United States; there are networks of radio stations that read newspapers etc. for the blind community. I did a couple of shows and I realised that it would be a good vehicle to get the word out there about accessible museums. I started going to museums and interviewing them about their exhibits and their accessibility that’s how the show started out – to get people with disabilities to go to museums and see the exhibits. My early shows are about that. I started doing the show on a regular basis and doing hikes and finding ways to describe things that perhaps a blind person has never seen or done. I wanted to make it a fun, new experience for people and also to highlight the places that are accessible and talk about those.
One of the main complaints I got from museums is that “we make changes for people and accommodations, but they don’t use them!” what I found is that most museums don’t have a disability /accessibility outreach program. They don’t know where the organizations or the people with disabilities are and how to bring them into the museum or the venue. So I started “Hear and There” as a way to bridge that gap and get the word out, and get people going for these events.
I started doing the show with a little hand held digital recorder and then editing the programs on my computer. I taught myself the ropes of doing interview. In the first ones, I said ahh and umms a lot, but I learned how to edit them on the computer later!
How has the show changed over time?
I have changed the that way I describe things for my shows because when I started out I was talking to an audience to Cincinnati , Ohio and so I would give directions and descriptions of things for people from Ohio. But now having been on the internet and seeing that people from all over the world are listening in, I need to change the way I describe things to suit a world audience instead of a local audience.
I started out doing the show for the blind but it really is for everybody. When people listen to the radio, isn’t everybody who listens to the radio blind at that time? They can’t see what you’re talking about. The better the descriptions the better is the image that is brought to their minds. So what I am really trying to do is capture an image in people’s minds and take them someplace maybe that they have never been before, and that works for everybody. So I have changed the way that I look at the show in terms of just a blind audience into a universal audience.
Often times on the show I like to have a blind person with me. I am visually impaired myself but I can see a little bit but I like to have a totally blind person there because it totally changes the conversations with the people that I am interviewing. If just I am there the people that I am interviewing think that I am a sighted person so if they hold up a vase and they say,” this is an Egyptian vase”, that’s how they describe it. But if I have a blind person is there, their mind goes to describing for that blind person and then they’ll say that it’s a vase with a large base on it and a large rim and they’ll start to describe it for the blind person so it makes it easier for the people on the show to know the audience and it gets in their mind on how to do descriptions.
Was it difficult to start doing the shows, describing everything in detail? Especially keeping in mind audience who are visually impaired?
It is difficult to describe things because for the first time that you see something, you have to figure out what its elements are and what are the most important elements but how you describe it, so that there is an image in the mind of your listener. Everybody has different interpretations, they listen to different things. One of the exercises that I go through on my presentations is that I have a relic of a short man who is squatted; it is an American Indian relic and I have a replica of it. I have my listeners close their eyes and have them describe it and then I have them open their eyes and then look at it, and ask them – was it what you thought it was? How well could you describe it? And 10 people in the audience have 10 different interpretations. You have to realise that there are certain things that help people imagine things and especially for blind people, one of the techniques is that when I describe things I put it in terms of the size of their hands or the size from their elbow to their hands instead of saying a foot (an American measurement) because it gives a much better idea of the size of things. There are a lot of little tricks to describing things that I have picked up and developed. Because when I am doing the show often times it’s the first time that I am seeing things – a lot of times I don’t record trying to describe it with the people that I am participating with me because it takes up 2-3 times to find the words for the best description. That’s the interesting and challenging part of doing the show. On my website I have a hand-out under the cool resources where I put together a sheet for people who would lead a group of blind people on a bird watching or listening tour. The local rangers have never led a group of blind people and this helps them think about how to describe birds and bird calls and the forest to people on a hike. Most bird watchers are pretty list fanatic. They keep a list of all the birds they’ve seen and when they are out look looking at birds they have a field guide that has a picture of the bird and they look for certain colours on the birds feathers, certain patterns on the tails and that’s what a bird watcher is really concerned with – to identify the bird that they are looking at.
But all this is not helpful for a blind person. Here’s Dave describing what he suggests as a solution for visually impaired people…
The show is heard 70 times a month on the various stations that I am on, via the internet and various reading stations and that is one of my main accomplishments! For 5 years I did the show and it was just heard in the Cincinnati area and once I got on the internet and explored the different venues, a lot changed. I put up the website and then I found out about ACB radio and some internet stations, and I got my show broadcast on there. From that people around the world started hearing my show and then I got a twitter account, and that’s really brought a lot of exposure towards people finding out about “Hear and there”.
I have only been on the internet for a year and exploring it and it’s been very interesting!
My website gets a lot of hits and it gives me a nice sense of accomplishment but there is a lot more to do!
The great thing about doing the show is that I show the museum docents, rangers and many others the positive aspects of accessibility. They see the people and how the people that they have never reached before – people with disabilities or the blind people experience their museum or their venue or their hike. And what rangers and docents see them having a positive experience, they feel great!
“Hear and there” shows that I have done have showed them this positive aspect!
When I started doing the show it was called here and there, but when I got on to the internet I realised that most clubs and organizations have newsletters called here and there. And so to try and make a differentiation, I decided to change it hear. And then I realised that since blind people use screen readers so they don’t hear the difference so I make sure I
And like Dave always says, Hear what we’re talking about and you’ll feel like you’re there!
Dave Uhlman is an Accessibility Consultant for Museum Exhibits and outdoor recreation parks. You can learn more about his adventures on his website http://hearandthere.net/default.aspx
If you would like to subscribe to the Hear and There Podcast, use this link in your podcatcher or add it to your Favourites feed list.http://duhlman.podbean.com/feed
Inclusive Planet crosses 10,000 members! A huge thank you to all our wonderful members, supporters and volunteers for making this possible! 9 months ago
RT @AvantiFellows: "Two Indian entrepreneurs who provide opportunities to bright but economically disadvantaged students manage to... ht ... 9 months ago
.. Now we need some feedback from you:
Inclusive Planet to the rescue! 
#1P”
