I receive a few hundred Emails on most days, and there are some Emails that,
when I see that they are written by certain people, I hit the delete key. I
already know that I won't be able to understand them because of their lack
of communication skills. It's not because they don't use English as their
native language. It's because they write horribly. I, and others, used to
try to help them become more understandable, but all they did was to get
mad, and no improvements were made. It's not because they can't, but
because they! won't! They just don't care. As a result, even if I could
help them through a spot in a game, or if I could help them with a problem
with their computer, or if I could give them tips on how to barbecue, I'll
never even see their questions, because they refuse to do even minor work on
being understood. It's their loss, not mine. Sad, but true.
---
Shepherds are the best beasts, but Labs are a close second.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Thomas Ward" <thomasward1...@gmail.com>
To: "Gamers Discussion list" <gamers@audyssey.org>
Sent: Saturday, December 17, 2011 11:28 PM
Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Blind Gamers Being Taken Seriously?
Hi Chris,
All good points. I'd like to add that I'm on a number of technology
lists and forums, and I largely read and respond to e-mails based on
reputation. By reputation I mean weather the person can write clearly,
if there aren't a lot of grammar and spelling errors, and weather or
not the e-mails use proper punctuation. Is that unfair?
No. Even using a screen reader like Jaws, NVDA, or Window-Eyes things
like spelling errors, grammatical errors, and lack of punctuation make
it difficult to listen to a poorly written e-mail. Lack of punctuation
means the screen reader won't pause properly between natural sentense
breaks and it makes it difficult to listen to the message. Spelling
and grammar errors will cause the screen reader to say things
incorrectly forcing me to stop the speech and review the line word by
word to get the context of the message. If I have to do that with x
number of e-mails waiting for me to read I'm just going to throw out
and skip anything that requires extra time and effort to read. So my
point here is it isn't just a case of sighted people doing this, but
there are blind people such as myself who quickly toss out anything
that isn't immediately clear from the start as well.
Cheers!
On 12/17/11, Christopher Bartlett <themusicalbre...@gmail.com> wrote:
I have a couple of thoughts to add to this otherwise excellent post.
First of all, if anyone is feeling that all this is intensely unfair,
sighted folk use these same judgment metrics with one another. As
someone
who has taught both blind and sighted people how to write resumes and
cover
letters, I cannot stress enough to anyone doing this that the appearance
of
these documents is as important, perhaps more so, than the content. For
an
HR person glancing through a batch of 50 resumes, anything that allows
him/her to reject a resume out of hand is a Godsend, so if it's sloppily
put
together, into the circular file it goes unread and the HR person gets to
save a few minutes verifying references or scheduling an interview. Is
that
fair?
Yes it is. The care that one takes in putting together a document of
this
sort, or indeed any business communication reflects the care with which
one
structures the content. The one acts as a proxy for the other in a
surprisingly tight relationship. I can bet that if a message here or a
document is carelessly put together, then it's almost certainly not worth
my
finite time to read, no matter the subject. And that's true for sighted
people and blind.
Here on the list, we have a unique situation. This isn't quite a
business
forum, though it partakes of some of the character of such a beast. It
isn't a personal chat place, though we do that too. So it's some weird,
hybrid beastie that has a culture of its own. That being said, clarity
in
communication is still important, particularly as this appears to be a
major
hub for people to find out about adaptive gaming, including sighted
developers. That being so, it would profit us all to write clearly and
correctly to the best of our abilities, and where those abilities are
lacking, to invest time and effort to improve them.
The consequences of failing to do so here are relatively light, you will
get
ignored, and possibly mocked. The consequences of doing so out in the
world
can make the difference between succeeding in getting a job, making a
good
impression on a potential sweetie, or being an effective advocate for
accessibility in software or devices that you need or want to use.
I would suggest that the proofreading requirement be put back in the
guidelines, and let those who are offended by it go elsewhere. Goodness
knows there are plenty of places on the Internets where they will be
welcome.
Christopher Bartlett
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