Web Site Accessibility Blog

Well, I can’t say that I’m surprised about this one. Pardon the pun, but you could “see” this coming. The Blind Access Journal is rising up to ask Google to give them access. For years, blind users have been frustrated at the inability to be a part of Google’s growing services. It was a slap in the face to the Blind community when Google celebrated Louise Braille’s birthday by using a Braille logo. The Braille Google logo was simply the last straw.

The Blind Access Journal has created an online petition for users to sign and request that Google come up with an option for their CAPTCHA (Visual Turing Test) or visual word confirmation. If you aren’t aware of what the CAPTCHA is, it is the security device that makes users type in the words and letters that are in a graphic and usually jumbled up somehow. This security technique prevents automated bots from subscribing to Google services such as Gmail, Blogger and the IM service. In using a strict visual cue, this technique also prevents low-vision users, blind, dyslexic and other visually impaired users from subscribing to the services as well.

The Press release requests that the CAPTCHA be replaced with an auditory signal as an option. While I think creating the petition to request the CAPTCHA issue be accessible, I think demanding a specific action, such as an auditory cue, doesn’t help the issue. Auditory cues can also be overcome by automated bots, just as the visual word confirmations. Security is compromised by smart bots, safe from dumb ones, but people needing accessibility features are left out in the cold.

Enter Amazon.com, who is asking for volunteers for test a new system, the Mechanical Turk as a method of screening AI from humans. I, for one, am very interested to see how this program works out. The press release from The Blind Journal then goes into detail about other tech companies that have added accessibility to their Turing tests, such as AOL, Microsoft (ouch!) and PayPal.

My concern about the demand for the auditory equivalent was calmed when I realized that the auditory test was demanded in the press release, but not the petition.

Here is the Google Accessibility Petition, simple and to the point, the way I like it:

To: Google Inc.

We, the undersigned, ask Google Inc. to “do no evil” and follow their mission statement to “organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful” by promptly adding accessibility to their visual word verification scheme so that the blind and visually impaired are allowed to fully participate in all products and services offered by the company on terms of equality with our sighted peers.

Sincerely,

The Undersigned

Short, simple and to the point.

I recommend signing it.

Here is your call to action –> sign the Google Accessibility Petition at http://www.petitiononline.com/captcha/.

VisuaAid releases a Mainstream handheld for blind and low-vision users. Called Maestro, the device is a compact, palm-like handheld that offers text-to-speech technology and tactile keyboard membrane over the touch screen, eliminating the use for a stylus.

The handheld is build in the HP iPaq Pocket PC platform and VisuaAid claims it is “the most compact and affordable digital assistant to the visually impaired.” While looking impressively smooth and compact, it also offers Bluetooth and the ability to use a wireless keyboard (Braille & standard) and additional third-party applications.

These things are looking better all of the time. The interesting thing is that I’ll be this could even be marketed effectively to a non-vision impaired audience as it would be easier to use for everyone. Not relying solely on sight can be a very liberating experience, especially with not having to rely in squinting to see the tiny displays on handhelds.

I never realized diabetes was on epidemic levels until reading this article from the New York Times, here re-printed at The Amherst Times. The story focuses on the growing numbers of diabetes patients in the New York hospitals, and the different ailments and afflictions that are the results of this disease.

The estimates are as high as one in 8 adult New Yorkers have diabetes, which is about 800,000 people. Diabetes is growing in new cases and fatalities in the city, while other major diseases are in decline.

One of the major issues in Accessibility is low-vision, of which diabetes is a significant contributing factor. Dr. Daniel Lorber, an endocrinologist in Queens stated the problem succinctly:

“At a time when we are trying to shift health care out of hospitals, with diabetics you don’t have a choice,” he said. “Nursing homes are going to be crammed to the gills with amputees in rehab. Kidney dialysis centers will multiply like rabbits. We will have a tremendous amount of people not blind but with low vision. And we have lousy facilities in this country for low-vision problems. These people will not be able to function in society without significant aid.”

According to this analysis, low vision problems and accessibility issues are only going to increase as the population continues to struggle with this disease. Not an inspiring outlook.

January 4, 1809 was the birthdate of Louis Braille, and congrats to Google for celebrating the birthday of this accessibility pioneer.

Who was Louis Braille?
Louis Braille injured his eye in his father’s workshop at age three, which led to an infection that took away the site in his right eye as well. He learned a system of reading raised letters at a French school for the blind, but the system did not allow for writing, only reading. At the school, Braille met a French soldier who introduced a code system of raised dots on paper that was used in the military to transmit top-secret messages. Louis adapted this system to create the modern day Braille alphabet. Louis Braille created the Braille system by age fifteen, and extended the system to include notations for music and mathematics. Braille died at age 43, but the Braille system went unused for over 10 years until 1868, when it was used in a British publication.

I’m very pleased to see Google recognize Louis Braille. However, let’s hope that Google finds a way to remove the CAPTCHA that does not allow blind users to access the many services Google offers. That would truly be a fitting tribute.