Inside the Little Plastic Castle

20th Century Audio SF

The "Mindwebs" series of 30-minute science fiction and fantasy short works brings back happy memories. Michael Hanson's voice is liquid chocolate velvet and the production values are very high (though the table-of-contents leans heavily pale male). I heard some of these live on WERN/WHA, which has a good claim to be the oldest public radio station in the USA.

It’s hosted at the Internet Archive: archive.org/details/MindWebs_201410, where I’ve had no luck using their streaming player but the downloads are fine.

Accessible Pedestrian Call Buttons

Double treat: Urban infrastructure and assistive technology! Thanks to LinusBoman, who explores the tactile and auditory interface for pedestrian signals in Sweden. Unfortunately, he provides no image descriptions to the many photos and slides in his presentation:

( stream here )

Watch on YouTube https://youtu.be/330teb6dst0

audio only "lyric video" — large captions on screen, but no explicit image descriptions

I just today realized that Boman worked on my favorite, default font, Atkinson Hyperlegible. He’s a type geek, choral singer, and designer of classy-looking books and cocktails under the brandname Calligraphuck. His home page is (of course) at TimesNewBoman.

Proximal to the 32nd anniversary of the ADA’s passage, The Verge hosted Accessibility Week, with the accurate deck: Technology promises a universally accessible world — and only sometimes manages to deliver.

The ten features run from service journalism — how to turn on your screen reader — to the barriers created by web design. One of my favorite reporters, s.e.smith, had this to say regarding online animation:

Every time I click a link, I have to ask myself if it’s going to be Bozo the clown or something delightful and captivating that I will be happy to have encountered.

All of us find the internet stimulating, but I find it extremely stimulating, specifically when it comes to animated and moving content — and not in a good way. Something about the wiring of my brain makes it difficult to process animations or repetitive movements, like the blinker you’ve left on for the last five miles, turning them into an accessibility issue: a website with animated content is difficult and sometimes impossible to use because the movement becomes all I can think about.

https://www.theverge.com/23191768/animation-accessibility-neurodivergence

I'm loving my membership in the Cloud Appreciation Society, which includes the educational "cloud a day" email newsletter. And because it's a teaching tool that highlights the distinctive elements of each cloud, the main text makes for an excellent image description. I find this approach much smoother than creating a separate image description bracketed away from the body of text.

Today's text:

Have you ever seen the state flag for Colorado, US? Well you have now, according to Kristen Erekson (Member 56,298). This formation of Cirrocumulus clouds producing an optical effect around the Sun known as a corona was spotted over Colorado by Kristen’s friend Christi Romney. It gives a pretty good impression of the flag’s design: a big red C around a yellow disc over a backdrop of white and dark blue. In Christi’s celestial tribute, the red C is formed by the iridescent colours of the corona, caused by the scattering of light by the tiny water droplets in the Cirrocumulus. The flag’s white and blue are provided by the contrast between cloud and sky, while its yellow disc comes thanks to the Sun. No need to look up what the flag looks like – you've as good as seen it already.

Today's image inside the cut.

( Read more... )

kestrell linked me to the most eloquent sheribyrnehaber’s concise dive into why disabled people’s days have a different length than non-disabled people. I noticed her newer article Are bad graphical descriptions better than no graphical descriptions to someone with vision loss?. Her answer is basically, "no."

Given that a month ago I was whining about the "Accessibility Overlay" racket, accessiBe in particular. I was very pleased to see Sheri Byrne-Haber join with 200 other folks working in accessibility on the Overlay Fact Sheet.

From "An Unquiet Mind," s.e. smith's excellent monthly column at Catapult.co which explores disability identity and its interaction with the world at large.

What If Accessibility Was Also Inclusive?

“This was fine for someone else,” someone frustrated at being asked to accommodate me says, as though I am not an expert on my own self, as though all disabled people have the same needs. Why isn’t this thing that someone who isn’t you found perfectly acceptable enough? We spent all this money on it. As though being disabled does not in itself confer a literal body of knowledge, an expertise, a skill, an awareness of precisely what I need—because I have spent a lifetime fighting for it. I have a mastery of myself, a master’s degree in myself, yet I am followed, everywhere, by reminders that myself is too much. https://catapult.co/stories/what-if-accessibility-was-also-inclusive-column-unquiet-mind-s-e-smith

I adore s.e. smith’s viewpoint and way with words! Two other essays introduced me to myself.

The small beauty of funeral sex

OMG! It’s not just me who finds death sex so highly charged.

There is a thing that happens with those adjacent to death that many people seem to be afraid to speak of, perhaps because it feels startling and shameful when it happens to them for the first time. Perhaps because no one speaks of it, they assume they are alone in this, perverse, broken. But those of us in the know are well aware that funerals—memorials, celebrations of life, transition ceremonies, Passages (always with a capital P)—are absolutely the best places for hooking up.

https://catapult.co/stories/the-small-beauty-of-funeral-sex-essay-s-e-smith

When disability is a toxic legacy

s.e. smith nails the concept of "debility," something I struggled to understand last year at the SDS conference. When impairment is the result of trauma — whether that’s state or personal violence, especially due to marginalized status — the social model of disability isn’t enough.

Talking about how environmental disparities can contribute to disability becomes complicated as a disabled person who is proud and confident in my identity.

https://catapult.co/stories/when-disability-is-a-toxic-legacy-se-smith

I met s.e. smith through FWD: Feminists With Disabilities, an excellent group blog that’s further proof that longevity is not equal to value. Later I had the good fortune to meet s.e. in person. I’ve always admired smith’s ways with words, and I was delighted but not surprised to learn that three of smith’s monthly columns at Catapult won a 2020 US National Magazine Award.

Explore s.e. smith’s stuff at https://www.realsesmith.com/

Comedy Wildlife Photo Contest

Thanks to NPR, this project absolutely delivers on its concept. I guarantee that browsing four years of 40-item finalist galleries will provide a brain vacation.

NPR’s own caption provides an elegant example of image description:

This squirrel in Sweden better have some wishes in mind — and fast — with the wind blowing those dandelion seeds like that.
Geert Weggen/Comedy Wildlife Photo Awards 2019

( you’ll be glad you clicked )

Sadly, the other 100+ images aren’t described at the Comedy Wildlife site.

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Best Plum Weirdness with Bonus Wheelchair

I was happy to read this revision of William Carlos William’s irresistibly remixable poem, "This is Just To Say,"

This is just to say

I have built
a massive wheelchair
in my lab
that can climb stairs

And which
You were probably
hoping
could be affordable or fit on a bus

Forgive me
the likes from abled people were delicious
so sweet
and so cold
Who rt'ed in here? (taylewd) August 31, 2019

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Liz Jackson and the "Disability Dongle"

The Girl with the Purple Cane Liz Jackson elizejackson writes about design and disability with clear insight and an acid tongue which make me happy.

A Disability Dongle is a well intended elegant, yet useless solution to a problem we never knew we had. Disability Dongles are most often conceived of and created in design schools and at IDEO.

#disabilitydongle on Twitter generated lots of responses collated on Medium.

sesmith uses the disability dongle concept to critique the wrong-headed focus on cutting-edge assistive tech:

It’s not just impractical and unsafe. It’s also wildly expensive. Breakthrough technology can cost more than a midrange car and most insurers do not cover it. Insurers, including private companies and Medicare/Medicaid, make durable medical equipment (DME) coverage determinations on the basis of demonstrated need, and they are notoriously choosy.

Disabled people don’t need so many fancy new gadgets. We just need more ramps.

There’s many more megabytes of Liz Jackson worth perusing

( blog posts, podcasts, captioned video )

I learned a lot from the presenters at the conference—I hope to post about that real soon now.

In the meantime, here’s what the experience was like.

The high point was volunteering.

( I like registration )

Access: physical and intellectual success & failure

( the good )

( the frustrating )

( I guess I belong here )

ljwrites does a much better job explaining this!

https://lj-writes.dreamwidth.org/2019/03/02/alt-text.html

lightgetsin relies on image descriptions, and her thoughts are crucial

https://lightgetsin.dreamwidth.org/308442.html

For sighted people, images can communicate a lot in a short time. On the web, tho, images come with a cost: bandwidth. Folks who don’t or can’t view your image can still get your message when you use image descriptions. "alt text" is the HTML tool to hold your image descriptions.

Web Accessibility In Mind — WebAIM — is an outstanding resource for ensuring that all users can appreciate your web content.

Spend twenty minutes at WebAIM to gain a confidence in applying the principles of alt texts. Their tl;dr about the content of alt texts: ( open me )

During WisCon I couldn’t enter a favorite restaurant–someone had removed the exterior handle on the accessible door. A dinner companion went in and opened the door from the inside. I asked to speak to the manager; he was very understanding, said that it wasn’t the first time someone had mentioned this, and that his manager had removed the handle even though he and many customers said this was a bad idea. He happily gave me his manager’s email address when I asked.

( how and where I complained )

I was delighted when Mr Glendinning replied within 62 minutes:

Hello,

Thank you for reaching out about this. We will have the situation resolved ASAP.
Kevin Glendinning
Regional Director of Operations - Midwest

My constant downtown diva, laceblade, reported that the handle is back!

( official response )

I was hopeful this very various anthology would spark some new ideas, as its mission statement is at the intersection of design-as-theory and design-as-practice.

If you have university access, you can read it online http://www.tandfebooks.com/doi/view/10.4324/9781315560076

For Interlibrary loan: Print and ebook

Three chapters made this jumbled collection worth reading; here's how you can almost read them if you don't have university access: ( essentially the same articles available on the web )