Sorry to only be replying now. To Claude, and others -- great that you have this knowledge about making sites accessible. But the problem is that this knowledge is NOT being applied. There is plenty of knowledge on how to make sites accessible for people using assistive technologies or people with limited physical abilities -- you've shown a lot of it here. But can I know from all of the people posting to the Digital Divide Network: how many of you apply these accessibility principles? How many of you that supposedly address digital divide issues address accessibility issues at all for people with disabilities?
Sorry to keep harping on this issue, but it seems to be the "forgotten" part of the Digital Divide Network. >(sorry, I sent that from the wrong address) > > >---------- Forwarded message ---------- >From: Claude Almansi <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Date: Wed, Jul 2, 2008 at 9:40 PM >Subject: Re: [DDN] Web 2.0 leaves out people with disabilities >To: The Digital Divide Network discussion group ><digitaldivide@digitaldivide.net> > > >Hi Jayne > >Thanks for the Washington Post article >(<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/06/18/AR2008061803080.html>. >Re the part about captioning: > >... >> Captions are difficult to post with online videos because there is no >> common standard for how they are decoded and displayed, said Larry >> Goldberg, director of media access at WGBH, a public broadcasting >> station in Boston. The station is coordinating a coalition called the >> Internet Captioning Forum, formed last year by AOL, Google, Microsoft >> and Yahoo, which is working to draw up captioning standards for content >> providers and Web sites. >> >> The proposed bill would not extend to the homemade clips posted on >> YouTube and other video sharing sites but would require major TV networks >> and movie studios to include captions with Web-bound content. >> >> "The problem is every video player -- RealPlayer, Windows Media >> Player, QuickTime -- works differently," Goldberg said. >> >> Although made-for-TV content is required to have captions, they are not >> always easily repurposed for the Web. For example, if a half-hour show >> is broken up into smaller clips for the Web site, the prerecorded >> captions "can be garbled or destroyed." > >Mmm. That would not happen with SMIL (see ><http://www.w3.org/AudioVideo/>), where the captions are on a separate >.txt file with time codes, which gets coordinated to the video by the >.smil file. And this does also work with streaming flash, as used on >many amateur video platforms. So if you were to present just an >extract of a video, it would be enough to modify accordingly the .txt >file of the captions, renumbering the timecodes. > >Example: take the captioned "Missing in Pakistan" video in ><http://www.webmultimediale.org/almansi/2007/11/missing_in_pakistan_sottotitol.html>. >Say I wanted to show an extract starting with Amina Mahsood's story. >I'd cut the first 00:03:30.24 part of the video, and do the same with >my .txt captioning file, starting at > >"[00:03:30.25] > >Journalist > >But behind the pictures exist real human stories" > >and substracting 00:03:30.25 from the present timecodes. > >Actually, the same would probably work also with DotSub.com, where you >can export the captioning file: you could modify it in the same way >to fit a new shorter version of the video. It doesn't take a geek to >do that - just someone rather meticulous in order not to skip a >timecode ;-) > >Re: > >> >> Some companies have created programs that cater to deaf and blind >> people. FeedRoom, a New York company, has created a video player that >> can display captions. Audiopoint, based in Rockville, has a >> text-to-speech program that reads e-mail and news alerts over the phone >> in a robotic voice. >> >> But the software can cost hundreds of dollars, and compatible devices >> can cost in the thousands, said Karen Peltz Strauss, who helped form the > > Coalition of Organizations for Accessible Technology. > >A blind friend is presently experimenting with NVDA ><http://www.nvda-project.org/> a FOSS screenreader that works on >Windows. He says that "considering how recent its development is, it >works quite well". He is now exploring screen reader solutions that >work on Ubuntu Linux. > >But as to captioning, the real issue is the time it takes to >transcribe the audio of a video - and hence the manpower cost involved >if you want to do it systematically > >With a powerful computer, a tool like MAGpie (see ><http://ncam.wgbh.org/webaccess/magpie/>), which has a player and a >part where you write captions and timecode them using the player, can >be of help. On an average computer, though, it only works with fairly >short videos. Of course, you can rip the audio and transcribe it in >the labels of Audacity <http://audacity.sourceforge.net/> . It's the >easiest way I found so far but still takes time, though (1): I'm not >sure how a broadcasting corporation could afford to have it done >systematically. > >Sure, some "Amazon Mechanical Turks" are ready to do transcriptions >for a pittance (see the part about CastingWords.com in "I make $1.45 >a week and I love it" ><http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2006/07/24/turks/index1.html>), but >I hope a broadcasting corporation would have qualms about using such a >service, even though some podcasters (Tim O'Reilly for instance: see >the podcasts listed in ><http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/feed/69?format=rss2>) don't. > >Best > >Claude Almansi >www.noimedia.org > >(1) also because when you export Audacity labels as a .txt file, the >time codes are expressed in seconds, whereas they have to be expressed >in hh:mm:ss for SMIL captioning. So you either systematically divide >them by 60 (and again by 60 for really long stuff) - or you replace >them by hand using a video editing software that's precise enough. >_______________________________________________ >DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list >DIGITALDIVIDE@digitaldivide.net >http://digitaldivide.net/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide >To unsubscribe, send a message to >[EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word UNSUBSCRIBE in >the body of the message. -- <><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><> Ms. Jayne Cravens MSc Bonn, Germany http://www.coyotecommunications.com Volunteer Coordinator http://www.aidworkers.net www.ivisit.com id: jcravens.4947 <><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><> _______________________________________________ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list DIGITALDIVIDE@digitaldivide.net http://digitaldivide.net/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message.
