Egypt Revisited

As a lot of you know, last night I had a strong reaction to Apple and its decision to reject Serotek's Accessible Event app. The exact number of apps that do not make it to Apple's App Store is not documented but is estimated to range in the thousands. When our app fell into that category for a third consecutive time, I admit my reaction was a little hasty.

I understand Apple only wants the best apps to maintain a superior user experience. I applaud Apple for allowing that user experience to be so inclusive of the world's blind population. To that end, I submit my sincere apologies to Apple and to the blind and visually impaired community for having taken my frustrations as a developer to Twitter. If I may, I would like to provide an explanation for my reaction.

My sentiments are not unique among Apple's developer community. Hundreds of blog posts and Twitter feeds point to Apple's obscure approval system. There is no appeal process for rejected apps that meet the company's hardware and software specifications. Though sideloading has provided alternative access to OSX, Apple's sandboxing policy set to start on March 1 raises speculation about whether the company will simply eliminate what it deems inappropriate. Even apps that make the cut face an impending reality of not being able to interact with other apps. Some believe this is necessary to uphold a secure environment. Many others wonder if security is being used to minimize productivity.

Speaking from the position of a developer, I am worried about the direction Apple is taking. I am not alone in my feeling that what we are facing is really Apple's sandbox, and developers just happened to be allowed to play in it with an eye to the big bully who might one day decide he no longer wants some of the kids there. Yes, there are rotten apples that try to take advantage of the system and make things bad for everyone, but we should not dilute the very freedom that made Apple products cool to start.

On a more personal level, I have had time to reflect on the situation since my public blitz. There is no justification for my reaction, and yet I've been wondering about the origins of my feelings. Could it be that I am lashing out against the same oppressive environment imposed by the adaptive technology industry I have been opposing for the past ten years? The traditional players in the industry, after all, have grown comfortable telling blind people what they can or cannot access, and Apple has taken steps that open those old scars, not because they rejected a single app but because their system is being restructured in a way that is more limiting than it is liberating. But now it’s not just the blind community it’s the World. I have worked hard to encourage people to be more than just a company's list of features. I do not want us to wander down a path that excites us about everything that we might be able to do, only to hit a brick wall and discover that freedom is what a company decides it should be.

As you know, Serotek is no stranger to the Apple App Store. In January iBlink Radio was inducted into the AppleVis iOS App Hall of Fame. The app provides access to radio stations, podcasts, and reading services and has gained distinguished prominence among a global audience.

On behalf of Serotek, I apologize for the delay of another in a series of apps that will help blind people be productive in school and in the workplace. It is our desire to continue working in an open environment that empowers people to pursue personal and professional ambitions. We will be publishing instructions on how to sideload the Accessible Event app to work on your Mac.

Until then, stay vigilant. Innovation is about moving out of what previously restrained us.

Serotek Enters The Note Taker Market With The New GTO!

Minneapolis Minnesota

April 1st 2011

Serotek, the leading provider of Internet and digital information accessibility software and services, today announced its entrance in to the notetaker market with a product simply named the GTO. The GTO, originally code-named Project Doorstop, aims to resurrect previously existing technology for a second chance at life.

“So many people believe that innovation is about doing something that’s never been done before,”, said Hugh Morris, product manager for the GTO. One thing that hasn’t been done nearly enough is to take seemingly obsolete technology and combine it in new, and perhaps ludicrous ways.” That’s exactly what we’ve done with the GTO. Morris went on to say that though the cost of manufacturing the GTO is extremely low because no one else in the market has use for its parts, consumers will not benefit from this cost reduction. “We’ve spent 3 weeks in hard-core development and testing with this product. We tested it until we got tired of doing so. All that hard work costs the company money, and we’re going to pass that cost along to the consumer tenfold. We’re going to make consumers pay … and pay … and pay!” Mr. Morris then begin cackling maniacally and was unavailable for further comment.

We spoke with Rusty Mettles, lead developer for GTO, to learn more on how the product came about. “I had this closet full of stuff,”, said Mettles. “My mom was going to make me throw it out, and it was in that moment of desperation that I came up with the idea of the GTO. I love the sound of a 14.4KBPS modem connecting, and I didn’t want others to miss out on that beautiful sound. I remember composing research papers using WordPerfect 5.1, and I don’t understand why technology like this has fallen by the wayside. The GTO was my chance to bring it back.”

The GTO already works with several formats familiar to seasoned tech enthusiasts, and boasts specs on par with many previously released devices.

Specifications.

The GTO runs on RISC processors gathered from gently used Game Boy units. This will allow you to play many legacy games that may or may not be accessible.

The unit supports several external storage formats including but not limited to: 3.5 and 5 ¼ inch Floppy drives, bubble memory and tape backup. The unit's internal memory is a roomy 640K, which ought to be enough for anybody. The US Robotics 14.4KBPS modem works on any existing phone line and will connect to any dial up service using the included ProComm Plus software. Telix software is available for an additional fee. Serotek continues to applaud Apple's accessibility efforts, so the Echo 2 synthesizer was the logical choice for text-to-speech on the GTO. Everything about this unit is built to offer consumer choice, so the unit will support 6 popular versions of DOS. We know many out there are tired of having to deal with messy graphics. This way we ensure that almost everything is text-based.

Input on the unit is accomplished through Morse code. Blind ham radio enthusiasts will be ecstatic about this innovation, and those who don't know Morse code should have learned it long since, and will no longer have an excuse to put off acquiring this skill.

The included car battery accessory with alligator clips allows for 20 hours of battery life.

The unit has been tested rigorously by 6 Chimpanzee-Bonobo hybrids, who received bananas and peaches in payment for their hard work. During the testing process, it was discovered that a banana-resistant surface was necessary to maintain the integrity of the unit. This is a feature not present in any other product on the market.

Though the chimps were excellent test subjects, the only intelligible quotes they provided for the press release were: "Peach good. Banana good good." For a more in-depth testimonial, we approached a human user, Ms. Anne Thrope for her thoughts on the GTO. “I despise people”, mumbled Thrope. With this technology, I can legitimately bow out of communicating with people in an effective and timely manner. It’s tremendously liberating!”

The unit is priced at a reasonable $4011, and comes with 2-hour tech support, from 11 AM to 1 PM Eastern Standard Time. We approached Izzy Smart, lead technical support

representative, for his comments on the GTO. "So basically, if they call us and tell us something's wrong, all's we gotta do is tell them to buy another one,", said Smart. "I learned how to do that pretty quick. It was like a couple of weeks, and I totally had it down, ok? And then, like, if they ask us how to do something on the thing, we're supposed to just hang up. I told my boss, I was like, man that's mean! He goes, no way, see, this way we're teaching people to learn to think for themselves. I was like, oh, right on, man! I can dig that!"

We are also proud to announce our newest addition to the Serotek stable today in support of the GTO. The SAMBBS, or System Access mobile Bulletin Board System, will let you connect with your friends and family from just about anywhere you can connect with a land line. Here are just a couple of the revolutionary things you can do on the SAMBBS.

Create documents using WordStar.

Read documentation through Borland, to relearn all that you have forgotten.

Play music files, painstakingly composed using QBasic.

Just dial in, log on and by tomorrow you will be reading email and browsing through files. Downloading files, however, is not supported at this time. This capability is slated for a future release in 2015.

To get a sneak preview of the SAMBBS, use your Telnet client of choice to connect to bbs.samobile.net

Our marketing consultants told us we should at least pretend to care about your input. With that in mind, if you can think of features we should have included in the GTO but didn't, please comment here or call the Serotalk blab line at (866) 997-2522 and we'll give your ideas the attention they deserve.

The Serotek Ultimatum

Serotek declares war on the traditional adaptive technology industry and their blind ghetto products. With this announcement we are sending out a call to arms to every blind person and every advocate for the blind to rise up and throw off the tyranny that has shaped our lives for the past two decades. It is a tyranny of good intentions – or at least what began as good intentions. But as the proverb says, “the road to hell is paved with good intentions.” And for the past two decades the technologies originally conceived to give us freedom have been our shackles. They have kept us tied down to underperforming, obscenely expensive approaches that only a small percentage of blind people can afford or master. They have shackled us to government largess and the charity of strangers to pay for what few among us could afford on our own. And we have been sheep, lead down the path, bleating from time to time, but without the vision or the resources to stand up and demand our due.
That time is past.
We stand today on the very edge of universal accessibility. Mainstream products like the iPod, iPhone, and newly announced iPad are fully accessible out of the box. And they bring with them a wealth of highly desirable accessibility applications. The cost to blind people is exactly the same as the cost to sighted people. It’s the same equipment, the same software, the same functionality, and fully accessible.
What Apple has done, others are doing as well. The adaptive technology vendor who creates hardware and software that is intended only for blind folks, and then only if they are subsidized by the government, is a dinosaur. The asteroid has hit the earth, the dust cloud is ubiquitous, the dinosaur’s days are numbered.
But dinosaurs are huge, and their extinction does not happen overnight.. Even as they die, they spawn others like them (take the Intel Reader for example). Thank you, no. Any blind person can have full accessibility to any type of information without the high-cost, blind-ghetto gear. They can get it in the same products their sighted friends are buying. But let’s face it; if we keep buying that crap and keep besieging our visual resource center to buy that crap for us, the dinosaurs of the industry are going to keep making it. Their profit margins are very good indeed. And many have invested exactly none of that profit in creating the next generation of access technology, choosing instead to perpetuate the status quo. For instance, refreshable braille technology, arguably the most expensive blindness-specific(and to many very necessary) product has not changed significantly in 30 years. Yet, the cost remains out of reach for most blind people. Where's the innovation there? Why have companies not invested in cheaper, faster, smaller, and more efficient ways to make refreshable braille? Surely the piezoelectric braille cell is not the only way? And what about PC-based OCR software? It's still around a thousand dollars per license, yet core functionality hasn't changed much; sure, we get all sorts of features not at all related to reading, along with incremental accuracy improvements, but why are these prices not dropping either, especially when you consider that comparable off-the-shelf solutions like Abby Finereader can be had for as low as $79? ? And let's not forget the screen reader itself, the core technology that all of us need to access our computers in the first place. Do we see improvements, or just an attempt to mimic innovation with the addition of features which have nothing to do with the actual reading of the screen, while maintaining the same ridiculous price point.

This maintaining of the status quo will, inevitably, face an enormous crash, worse than the transition from DOS to Windows based accessibility. You can expect a technology crash that will put users of the most expensive accessibility gear out of business.
Why? I won’t bore you with all the technical details, but the basic story is that some of these products have been kept current with patches and fixes and partial rewrites and other tricks we IT types use when we haven’t got the budget to do it right, but we need to make the product work with the latest operating system. That process of patching and fixing creates an enormous legacy barrier that makes it impossible to rewrite without abandoning all who came before. But you can only keep a kluge working for so long before it will crumble under its own weight. That, my friends, is exactly where some of the leading adaptive technology vendors find themselves today.
There are exceptions. Serotek is an exception because we have completely recreated our product base every three years. GW Micro is an exception because they built their product in a highly modular fashion and can update modules without destroying the whole. KNFB is an exception because they take advantage of off-the-shelf technologies, which translate ultimately into price drops and increased functionality.

But even we who have done it right are on a path to obsolescence. The fundamental need for accessibility software is rapidly beginning to vanish. The universal accessibility principles we see Apple, Microsoft, Olympus, and others putting in place are going to eliminate the need for these specialty products in a matter of just a very few years.
Stop and think. Why do you need accessibility tools? To read text? E-book devices are eliminating that need. None of them are perfect yet, but we are really only in the first generation. By Gen2 they will all be fully accessible. To find your way? GPS on your iPhone or your Android based phone will do that for you. To take notes? Easy on any laptop, netbook, or iPad. Heck, you can record it live and play it back at your convenience. Just what isn’t accessible? You can play your music, catch a described video, scan a spreadsheet, take in a PowerPoint presentation – all using conventional, off-the-shelf systems and/or software that is free of charge.
There are still some legacy situations where you need to create an accessibility path. Some corporations still have internal applications that do not lend themselves to modern devices. There will certainly be situations where a specialized product will better solve an accessibility problem than a mainstream one, especially in the short term. We don't advocate throwing the baby out with the bathwater, but we do advocate that we begin to hasten the inevitable change by using accessible mainstream solutions wherever possible. Even now, the leading edge companies are reinventing their internal systems with accessibility as a design criteria, so the situations that require specialized products will certainly become fewer as time goes on.
If our current Assistive technology guard's reign is coming to an end, why the war? Why not just let it die its own, natural, inevitable death? Because nothing dies more slowly than an obsolete technology. Punch cards hung on for twenty or thirty years after they were completely obsolete. The same is true for magnetic tape. Old stuff represents a comparatively large investment, and people hate to throw away something they paid a lot of money for even if it’s currently worthless. But that legacy stuff obscures the capabilities of the present. It gets used in situations where other solutions are cheaper and more practical. The legacy stuff clogs the vocational rehab channel, eating up the lion’s share of the resources but serving a tiny portion of the need. It gets grandfathered into contracts. It gets specified when there is no earthly reason why the application requires it. The legacy stuff slows down the dawning of a fully accessible world.
It hurts you and it hurts me.
To be sure, I make my living creating and selling products that make our world accessible. But first and foremost, I am a blind person. I am one of you. And every day I face the same accessibility challenges you face. I have dedicated my life and my company to making the world more accessible for all of us, but I can’t do it alone. This is a challenge that every blind person needs to take up. We need to shout from the rooftops: “Enough!”
We need to commit ourselves in each and every situation to finding and using the most accessible off the shelf tool and/or the least-cost, highest function accessibility tool available. With our dollars and our commitment to making known that our needs and the needs of sighted people are 99% the same, we can reshape this marketplace. We can drive the dinosaurs into the tar pits and nurture those cute fuzzy little varmints that are ancestors to the next generation. We can be part of the solution rather than part of the problem.
And all it takes is getting the best possible solution for your specific need. Once you have found the solution to fill that need, let the company know you appreciate their work towards better accessibility. Let your friends (sighted and blind) know about these accessibility features; they probably don't know that such features exist.
Make your needs known to the vocational rehab people you are working with, and don’t allow them to make recommendations for a specific technology for no other reason than that it’s been in the contract for years. Make sure your schools and your workplace understand the need to push technology in to the accessible space. Show them the low-cost alternatives. In this economy some, the intelligent ones, will get it and the tide will begin to turn.
And then in short order the tsunami of good sense will wash away the old, and give us the space to build a more accessible world for all of us. Let the demand ring out loud and clear and the market will follow.
If this message rings true to you, don’t just shake your fist in agreement and leave it at that. let your voice be heard! Arm yourself with the vision of a future where there are no social, conceptual, or economic barriers to accessibility, and let your words and your actions demonstrate that you will not rest until that vision is realized. Take out your wallet and let your consumer power shine! You do mater as a market people! You have kept this company alive with your money for 8 years this month! I believe that if we all get together and do our part, we will finally say “NO more!” same old same old! Join the revolution! Together we can change the world!

A History Making Day For The Blind

This week, Serotek’s iBlink Radio app for the iPhone and iPod Touch is in the “Featured apps” section of the iTunes Store. On the surface, this may appear to be a nice feather in Serotek’s cap, but the implications go far beyond company recognition. This listing recognizes the blind community as a worthy market as well as putting Serotek on display as a contributor of high quality software and content. This is a first. The first time ever an application for blind people has been offered to the world at large, by a major marketing organization, without qualification or apology. It’s just there as part of the best of the best applications Apple has highlighted for its iPhone and iPod users.

We created this application and placed it on the iTunes store, free of charge, for a number of reasons. First and foremost it is great content – a complete array of entertainment and information, all created by and for the blind and low vision community. This is everything a blind person needs to know in one place, quick and easy, accessible anywhere. This is my personal app of choice.

Second, this is a valuable resource for sighted people if they or someone in their family is losing their sight. It’s a time when it feels as if the whole world is ending. But this one application can be salvation. With it the person can have access to everything they need to know. It used to be considered a tragedy to lose your sight. But today, it is just an inconvenience. With the power of full accessibility any one can live a rich and rewarding independent life even as their eyesight fades to black. iBlink leads a newly blind person to all the information he or she needs and puts them in touch with what they need to know to survive and thrive.

Third, the blind community is full of people with an astounding and diverse array of talents and skills. These abilities are worthy of being noticed and appreciated by everyone. There are a lot of cool dudes out there who happen to be blind and who create some amazing information and entertainment. iBlink brings together the best of the best. A sighted person who wants to experience the world from a blind perspective, can do it on iBlink.

For as long as I remember, our community has been viewed as separate, different, and less capable by the businesses that produce high tech products. A few producers and marketers have seen us as perhaps worthy of separate but equal access to the things that everyone else takes for granted. Even fewer have been willing to provide full accessibility, but only if providing that accessibility doesn’t inconvenience anyone else. Unfortunately large parts of society, including many within the blind community, believe the blind population needs to depend on the kindness and generosity of the government and our sighted counterparts to accomplish the most basic of tasks. They just assume that social networking, the Internet and all the latest hi-tech gadgets are and always will be beyond our grasp. But Apple, and a growing number of followers, recognized that blind people are part of the market. They recognized that including us within their market scope is good business and builds their bottom line.

Apple has opened a whole new take on accessibility with products like the Mac, iPhone, iPod, and soon the iPad; each product is completely accessible out of the box and with all the same functionality our sighted counterparts enjoy. We owe it to ourselves to exploit these mainstream platforms and show the world just how smart Apple is. This week, our community, with its diverse array of talents, ideas and skills, is being showcased right alongside the talents, ideas and skills of the world at large. And you know what? It feels right. This is what accessibility is all about. This is what Serotek has been campaigning for since the company was founded. Blind and low vision folks being treated like ordinary people. It doesn’t get better than that.

The Serotek Story Documentary A Must For your Audio Archive

I don’t usually post things from the Serotalk Podcast here, but, The Serotek Story Documentary is so compelling that I figured I would post it. Of course I’m biased!

If you haven’t put the Serotalk Podcast on your RSS, shame on you! LOL! Really though, it is a great resource for information on what’s happening in the World of technology according to a few blind and rather disturbed geeks! So, if you’d like a few laughs and some pretty good information head over to the Serotalk Podcast! And hey, you might not even be sorry you did!

Happy New Year!

What I think About the Intel Reader

Yesterday marked the release of a product which, according to Intel, would revolutionize the way the blind and others with reading disabilities accessed printed materials. During those few fleeting moments between hearing of the announcement and reading the actual press release, I had high hopes that a mainstream company would demonstrate its dedication to accessibility and innovation at an affordable price. And with backing from companies and organizations such as Humanware, Lighthouse International and the Council for Exceptional Children, I felt certain that the device I was going to read about would be very impressive indeed.

The Intel Reader, a device about the size of a paperback and weighing approximately 1 pound, is equipped with a camera and text-to-speech allowing print documents such as newspapers, menus, and signs to be converted in to a readable form by the blind and others with print disabilities. With the addition of a capturing station, sold separately, the device can be used to scan and convert more lengthy materials such as textbooks and novels. It can also read existing etexts in Daisy format as well as play standard MP3 and Wav files. This feature set reads quite a bit like other mainstream and custom-built solutions on the market. In fact, the only jaw-dropping aspect of this product is its price. The device itself can be had for a mere $1499, and you’ll pay an extra $399 for the privilege of using the capturing station.

After the initial shock, I and many others in the blind community began looking more closely at the information available about the device, just to ensure that we hadn’t overlooked anything truly awe-inspiring. After all, for its price, there had to be something which set the device apart from existing solutions such as the KNFB Reader for performing OCR on documents on the go, the forthcoming free e-reader from Kurzweil to read existing Daisy documents, off-the-shelf solutions like a PC, scanner, and ABBYY FineReader for more involved projects like scanning textbooks, or even the $259 Amazon Kindle, which isn’t currently accessible but could be made so with a little effort and encouragement from the community.

As we learned more about the Intel Reader, there was plenty to make this device unique. First, while most portable scanning solutions like the KNFB reader for mobile phones or a scanner/Netbook combo are equipped with wi-fi access, the Intel Reader can’t make that claim. In this article from VentureBeat it is stated that wi-fi is absent from the product because web-connected devices aren’t allowed in some classrooms. Far be it from us to suggest including wi-fi and leaving it up to school IT professionals to handle whether or not to grant wi-fi access, as they must do for all other wi-fi-equipped mainstream devices.

In addition to having no wi-fi capabilities, the device is also unable to handle HTML content natively. Rather, a user must first convert the HtML document to plain text before it can be read. This doesn’t bode well for a device whose major goal is purportedly to take the hassle out of reading for the blind and print-disabled.

Given that this device appears to boast no significant features setting it apart in a positive way from existing solutions, we must ask why the device was created in the first place. Ben Foss, the Intel representative spear-heading the project, has a lot to say on this. Foss states in a press conference: “A metaphor for this are the ramps that make buildings wheelchair accessible. This reader is like a ramp.” Unfortunately, this particular metaphor is far from apt. While wheelchair ramps are an example of smart universal design principles in action because they’re just as useful to a walking mother with a stroller as they are to a person in a wheelchair, the Intel reader has been manufactured and marketed exclusively for the blind and print-disabled without a thought for universal design. Foss goes on to acknowledge that the price is not cheap, but guess what, folks? It’s ok. You see, the device contains several custom components. Never mind that the essential components are a 5-megapixel camera, flash memory, and Intel’s own low-cost Atom processor which can all be had for under $250 as parts. Are you questioning the price yet? No, don’t do that. Intel can explain. Braille reading devices can cost upwards of $10000, so $1500 is really easy to swallow in comparison to that, isn’t it? Never mind that comparing Braille displays and text-to-speech readers makes little sense.

In essence, Intel is unapologetically asking us to accept this device’s hefty price tag for no other reason than that it was designed specifically for the blind. Are we going to accept being blatantly charged a premium because of our blindness, especially by a company who claims to have a philanthropic bent? Remember Intel’s Classmate PC, whose aim was to provide a low-cost and rugged netbook to students, especially those in developing countries? How can we take initiatives like that seriously when with this device Intel clearly shows it isn’t interested in providing low-cost solutions to the blind students in its own back yard?

Still, Intel didn’t create this device in a vacuum. “Intel has done its homework on the device,”, says Dorrie Rush, who serves as the marketing director for Lighthouse International. This signifies that Intel received input from blind and print-disabled individuals as it designed the product. So why is it that no one from these groups questioned Intel’s decision to reinvent the wheel, and in a completely lackluster way at that. Why did no one from these groups encourage Intel to combine existing components to create an innovative and affordable product that could be beneficial to all?

No matter how stunning a product Intel created, it still needed the backing of influential groups within the blind community in order to be taken seriously. For Humanware, who is among the companies distributing the product, partnering with one of the most lucrative and well-known mainstream companies was a huge accomplishment. Did Humanware leverage this relationship to educate Intel so that at least one mainstream company would design its products with accessibility in mind from the ground up? No! It did not! Humanware thanked Intel for producing yet another overpriced, sub par blind ghetto product, and jumped on the chance to convince millions of blind and print-disabled people that they need look no further than this bulky and expensive device to further their independence. When a mainstream company like Intel employs such tactics it is shameful. But from Humanware, a company who should by all rights have the interests of blind consumers at heart, these actions are nothing less than despicable.

Because of Intel’s status and high visibility, its new product rated mentions in mainstream publications as well as those which are more blindness-oriented. In this somewhat flippant article from Engadget, the authors posit that a device like the Intel reader could be created for under $500, and I suspect they’re right. But the interesting reading isn’t so much the article itself, but the comments. One post says in part: “Sure, you could build something that did something similar for less money, but would you then be able to give it to a nearly blind person to use all day, everyday? Completely implausible for $500.” This same poster goes on to say: “besides, the target audience for this device is disabled -- it should be paid for by 3rd parties because it meets the requirements to be classed as an aide for the disabled.”

And there you have it -- everything that we despise about this product’s existence all wrapped up in a smug, condescending little package and tied with a bow. Essentially, this poster believes that nothing which wasn’t created specifically for the blind could possibly work well in a day-to-day situation. Not only that, but there are apparently an abundance of tax dollars to go around for purchasing overpriced devices. And luckily, the blind person need not ever make a decision as a consumer since there’s a benevolent 3rd-party agency to take care of such things, rendering the process of making choices for oneself unnecessary.

So, are we, as a community, going to let this stand? Are we going to throw our support behind Intel, who spent countless hours and research funds to offer us a third-rate product which is priced out of our reach? Are we going to put our hard-earned money in the pockets of Humanware, who squandered their one chance to truly shape the direction of accessibility in mainstream technology in favor of making a quick profit? Do we want to continue accepting the pronouncement that blind ghetto products are not only necessary, but worthy of our everlasting gratitude? Or are we going to tear down those ghetto walls and demand our rightful place as the smart and savvy consumers that we are!

And before you say that you’re only one consumer, that your voice will never be heard, I will tell you that you’re wrong. You can make a choice to be educated about what you buy before you make a decision. And once you embrace the power to choose, you’ll want to share that power., and you won’t want to stop with just one person. You’ll tell every blind person you know to stop and think before choosing a product which has no claim to fame other than being designed for the blind. You’ll tell the blindness agencies and school systems who already struggle with tight budgets to stop and investigate before accepting the party line and purchasing something which does half as much at twice the price. And to those companies who are banking on your willingness to accept anything less than the best just because it’s been given the stamp of accessibility, the sound of your wallet slamming shut an the realization that you are actually “a consumer” with a functional brain and an opinion will convey your point quite eloquently indeed!

Access to iTunes 9.0 is here!

This past Wednesday, Apple held a media event to showcase new products. With a musical theme, Apple announced many exciting developments, particularly of interest to people who are blind. With the introduction of the Voiceover screen reader for the iPod Touch and an updated Voiceover interface for the iPod Nano, as well as accessibility updates to the iPhone OS utilized on both the iPhone and iPod Touch, Apple clearly demonstrated its commitment to universal access across its product line. In an ironic twist, in fact, the blind community got much of what we have been asking for in terms of access to these devices, while the larger sighted world did not get what they most expected--a camera for the iPod Touch. To my knowledge, this has never happened before.

It isn't all roses and candy, though. Apple also released iTunes version 9.0, which, while introducing many desirable features, such as the ability to share tracks from several computers in the same household and an expansion of the genius playlist options, also broke accessibility to the iTunes store. Access to the iTunes store has become more difficult and cumbersome on the Mac platform, and it has become all but unusable under Windows.

I have personally been a mac user for a while. (I got a Mac when Tiger first came out with Voiceover, then had some time away, then returned with my current MacBook in 2007.)  I in particular, and Serotek in general, have been very excited by Apple's commitment to universal access across their entire product line. Those of you who follow our blogs and podcasts know that we are thrilled that access for the blind has reached nearly every Apple product. We aren't talking about just token access either, but real access that allows blind Mac, iPhone, and iPod users to be very productive with these very high profile and very mainstream devices.

That said, accessibility has taken a back seat in this release of iTunes. To say the least, we are disappointed that iTunes has taken an accessibility hit, especially on the Windows side, and especially in light of Apple's otherwise excellent commitment to universal accessibility.

Just like Apple, Serotek believes that the blind community deserves access to the modern digital lifestyle. We have, over the course of our existence, steadily broken down the walls of our blind ghetto and championed the cause of universal access to mainstream digital products and services. With such a similar philosophy, it's easy to see why Serotek has been beating the Apple drum since the release of the 4th Generation iPod Nano.

Our slogan, "Accessibility anywhere", isn't just a great tag line. It's something that we at Serotek believe passionately, and it's what gets us up in the morning. We use this stuff ourselves every day. We understand that our computers and music players aren't just used for work anymore. The digital lifestyle is more and more pervasive, and if we are to truly be a part of the larger community and finish breaking down those walls, it is imperative that we have the ability to participate fully in our modern digital world. As a company passionate about our right to accessibility of the digital lifestyle, we believe that access to the market leader in the digital music player space is essential. It's even more essential because Apple's accessibility philosophy so closely parallels ours.

We wanted access to iTunes under Windows, just as we had before version 9.0 was rolled out, and we wanted it as soon as possible. So, rather than waiting for Apple to fix the problem, we fixed it ourselves. We have done this by providing the accessibility framework for the iTunes store. Beginning now, any blind person has the ability to access the iTunes store using the latest version of Apple's media management software, with complete access to its entire interface. The ability to use the iTunes store under iTunes version 9.0 is available to any user of System Access or System Access To Go. So, whether you own our stand-alone product or use our free, Internet-based solution, you can take full advantage of all that iTunes has to offer. We therefore invite and encourage all blind people to use our services to access the iTunes store. And with www.satogo.com, you can even use it free--just like any sighted person can.

As exciting as this is on its own, our work hasn't stopped there. The work we've done for iTunes actually goes far beyond solving the iTunes problem. It has the potential to be much more far-reaching.

The new version of the iTunes store is built with Webkit, the engine that runs Apple's Safari browser. As you may be aware, Webkit (and, consequently, any Webkit-based browser, such as Google Chrome or Apple's Safari) has been conspicuously inaccessible on Windows. In adding accessibility for iTunes, we have put the pieces together to make Webkit accessible. We will furthermore be contributing this accessibility code to the Webkit community. This means that Webkit- based browsers for Windows have the very real potential to be accessible to us with only a minimum of effort by browser developers. This means more choices for us all, and more choices are never a bad thing.

We at Serotek are happy that the walls between our community and our specialized products, and the sighted world at large, are tumbling down. It's an exciting time to be blind, and we see real, radical, and wonderful changes in what accessibility means. We are excited to be at the forefront of these changes, and we are enthusiastically tearing down the walls that divide us from our sighted brothers and sisters.

Who Says? You Can't Build It and They Will Come

Knowbility blogger Desiree at Universally Designed gives us a wonderful tutorial in Webinars in her September 2nd posting along with an introduction to Serotek’s Accessible Event, which makes this phenomenally useful tool completely accessible to the blind, deaf, and deaf-blind. Desiree gives our AE team a lot of well-deserved pats on the back. That’s the way it should be because our people are out there changing the world, one demonstration at a time. Once again Serotek has blasted the barriers and brings the latest in social networking technology to everyone.
I call Accessible Event a social networking tool because online meetings are really a dimension of social networking. The one-on-one stuff is great and we make that available in many different ways, but some information is best provided to a group, all at the same time. That includes corporate meetings, webinars, university classes, sermons and presentations of many kinds – really any time one person or a group of people play show and tell to a larger group in real time. Thanks to the Internet and tools like GoToMeetinghttps://www1.gotomeeting.com/?Portal=www.gotomeeting.com and WebEx virtual meetings or webinars have been with us for a while now. But, as Desiree pointed out, the blind were not invited to be full participants. And neither were the deaf and deaf-blind.
Serotek changed that. We did it in a way that is very low cost and absolutely easy to use. We brought in the deaf and deaf-blind with closed caption capability and Braille interface. There is really no excuse now for any organization to offer a Webinar or even a presentation in an auditorium and not include full participation for the blind, deaf, and deaf-blind.
In case you haven’t noticed, this is what we do best. Make the world accessible with little or no hassle. We provide the accessibility tools people need to fully participate in today’s society. We make them easy to use and easy to own. We don’t wrap people up in expensive maintenance agreements or force them to own only our software in order to take advantage of the accessibility. AE, for example, works with any screen reader. And, of course, you don’t even need to purchase a screen reader for online use. System Access To Go is available free of charge to anyone.
When ADA was enacted there was always the built-in excuse that it was too costly or difficult to make certain activities accessible. Unfortunately, before we came on the scene, the Adaptive Technology Industry seemed to be doing its best to prove the ADA backsliders’ point. Serotek’s mission is to eliminate that excuse and with Accessible Event we’ve virtually eliminated it from presentations, online meetings and forums.
So speak up. If you are attending classes, webinars, going to meetings, or otherwise involved in presentations that are not fully accessible to you, it’s time to demand your rights. Any organization or individual can use AE at very little cost. The tools are available to tear down the barriers to accessibility, but only you can demand the people you deal with use those tools. Accessibility really begins with you demanding your right to it.

Out of the Ghetto and in to the Digital Lifestyle

A ghetto is a portion of a city in which members of a minority group are coerced to live through social, cultural, legal, and/or economic pressure. Ghettos are often separated from the city at large by a wall or other natural barrier. But the real barrier is fear: fear of outsiders by those within the ghetto and fear of ghetto-dwellers by those outside the ghetto.

If you’ve read this article in AFB Accessworld, you’ll know I have firsthand experience with a ghetto. When my parents came to Miami from Cuba looking for new opportunities, they joined a community of other Cubans who were here for the same reasons. Our community was a place where we proudly celebrated our Cuban heritage and where the Cuban culture remained alive and well. But it was also a place that trapped us in poverty; a place where expectations were low; and ultimately a place which isolated us from the rest of society. It was a type of ghetto.

Did we prefer being poor, stereotyped, isolated and hopeless? Of course not! But there was an unspoken sentiment that leaving the ghetto would also mean leaving an important part of yourself behind, and that you would sacrifice the culture that made you who you were if you tried to blend seamlessly with mainstream society.

Over time, I came to realize that my cultural differences didn’t need to isolate me from those outside my community. In fact, those differences are a part of what make me interesting. I learned that there was a whole world full of people who had their own interesting differences to celebrate, and that despite all our differences, we were exactly the same in many ways.

This is a truth I had to learn not only as a Cuban American, but as a blind person as well. I spent much of my life listening to the stereotypes about blind people. We were socially inept. We were unemployable. We were to be pitied. We had to be provided with basic necessities to make our insular world habitable, but we were too different from the rest of society to ever be a part of it in any meaningful way.

I knew that I didn’t fit any of these stereotypes. I was sociable, I had talents, and I certainly didn’t want any pity. I didn’t need anyone to take the liberty of creating a world for me which contained only the things they thought I might need. I was perfectly capable of thinking for myself, and I wanted the freedom to choose what I would and would not do. I needed to bridge the gap between the blind ghetto the world thought I should live in and the place I really wanted to be.

Early on I understood that technology would play a huge role in bridging that gap, not just for me, but for the millions of other blind people like me. It isn’t just about bridging the gap to employment, which is certainly important. It’s about providing a way for blind people to have fun, to be entertained, and to communicate with the rest of the world without any geographical, social or economic barriers.

Over the years, I have watched mainstream technology evolve from something available to only an elite few to something completely ubiquitous. I have seen technology emerge from complex, bulky gadgetry comprehensible only to geeka to user-friendly, pocket-sized and smaller devices which can be enjoyed easily by those who have no tech savvy whatsoever. And during this time the price of mainstream technology has plummeted so that even the most budget-conscious consumer can pick up a state-of-the-art computer for $400 or less.

But has this trend carried over in to the assistive technology arena? Is there a push to provide compelling access to off-the-shelf products? Are AT companies designing easy and affordable products that don’t require hours of training to operate? The answer is a resounding no!


But why not? Is it because blind people are content to remain in the blind ghetto? Are we content to continue paying thousands of dollars for access to proprietary products which provide only a fraction of the functionality of mainstream products? Is it because we are content to remain a niche market rather than insisting on being seen as viable consumers who share the interests of our sighted counterparts? Is it because blind people simply don’t want access to entertainment or social networking? The answer to these questions is also a resounding no!

Ghettos, you see, not only keep insiders in, they keep outsiders out. The blind ghetto discourages mainstream technology companies from making their products accessible. A select group controls the sales to the ghetto and like it that way. The ghetto barriers protect their market share even though those walls can deny their customers access to the riches available to everyone outside the walls. It takes gutsy companies to build and market products that tear down the walls and it is these "disruptive" technologies that excite me.

Finally, in the past couple of years we have begun to see products that break down the ghetto walls. And each time a “ghetto-busting” product is introduced, its success enriches us all. Look at some of these products: Packmate from Freedom Scientific, runs on the Windows Mobile platform, and allows users to install their own software rather than depending on a specific group of preinstalled proprietary applications—exactly like mainstream PDAs.. Mobilespeak from Codefactory, puts blind cell phone users on a par with their sighted friends; and maybe the most fun “ghetto-buster” is the exciting Apple 4th generation Nano which, for the first time, gave blind folks the same accessibility to their “tunes” that every sighted teenager has enjoyed for years..

My company, Serotek, is a big participant in “ghetto-busting.” Today, Serotek introduced the Socializer, an application which provides access to instant messaging services such as MSN and AIM, as well as easy access to social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter. The response has been overwhelming and runs the gamut from tech savvy users clamoring for MySpace to be added to the application, to technical neophytes who have no idea what Facebook and Twitter are, but are anxious to find out. In a world that is becoming ever smaller with instant and ubiquitous one to one communications, Serotek tore down the ghetto wall and invited blind folks everywhere to be full twittering members.

The response shows clearly that blind people do want to live the accessible digital lifestyle. We do want to share photos on Facebook and Flicker and keep in touch through Twitter and MSN. We do want to chat with friends and family about how cool the iPod is, instead of waiting for an AT company to produce something half as good for twice the price. So let’s be loud about it! Let’s make our voices heard. Whether you create a petition, write an email, twitter to your new social network, create a group on Facebook, or just pick up the phone, let it be known that you want to tear down the walls to the blind ghetto and proudly live the accessible digital lifestyle.