Re: dreams and schemes
Hi folks, As much as I think this discussion needs to happen, this list is not the place. If you still want to discuss this topic, which IMO is a good thing, plesae consider using another list to do so. My recommendation is the Blinxu list, which is for general blind linux related discussion. You can find the list info page here: https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/blinux-list I appreciate your cooperation. Thanks, Your friendly Ubuntu Accessibility list moderator. Luke -- Ubuntu-accessibility mailing list Ubuntu-accessibility@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-accessibility
Re: dreams and schemes
For some reason, I thankfully didn't see the last handful of messages in this thread. I did see that the following was stated, and I'd just like to say that I strongly disagree with such statements. "The major problem I see in the US is that too many "blind people" want everything for free, they whine about anything that doesn't go their way, and believe employers should exempt them out of every minor aspect of a job that requires them to "work hard"." I obviously can't say that there aren't some blind people who feel this way, but that's also true for some sighted people. As I said in a previous post, some blind people who feel this way were let down by a lack of positive role models as children or a rehab system that didn't set high expectations for them. Instead of looking down our noses at them we need to help them. I see plenty of whining on blindness related lists from people who think it's hopeless and don't think that any amount of legislation or rehabilitation is going to change the lot of the blind. There's just too much discrimination out there. I get frustrated with this negative attitude, but don't let the vocal minority speak for the quiet majority. I know far more blind people who are hard working or who sincerely want to be hard working than I do blind people who just want everything done for them. Note that I strongly encourage blind people to contribute to open source projects and help their fellow blind peers. I'd like to do more of this myself, but I am proud of what I am able to do. Blind people, just like their sighted counterparts, also need to get a job and think of their own employment. That will limit how much someone, even someone out of work or between projects, can contribute to projects helping the blind. I'm also not comfortable creating our own subculture. Blind people do share quite a few issues the sighted population doesn't have to Eal with, and I think we need to come together to help each other and make things better for other blind people, but I don't think we should separate ourselves from the mainstream population. I'm not saying it's easy, but we need to change the rest of the world so that it's more inclusive. We've accomplished a lot in the last few decades, and with an incredible amount of hard work, we can do more. On 11/05/2013 01:24 PM, B. Henry wrote: job is the best fix. The major problem I see in the US is that too many >"blind people" want everything for free, they whine about anything that >doesn't go their way, and believe employers should exempt them out of every >minor aspect of a job that requires them to "work hard". > > -- Christopher (CJ) chaltain at Gmail -- Ubuntu-accessibility mailing list Ubuntu-accessibility@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-accessibility
Re: dreams and schemes
Note the subjectline. Dreams and schemes implies that this is at best an untested theory, and assuming for the moment that this is something new and innovative, obviously there's no base of time prooven research and studies to build on. No barter will not pay for a cell phone network, gasoline refinery, nor expensive medical equiptment. It can on the other hand greatly reduce the need for cash, creddit cards or bit coins. One could for example trade somthing that they grow, make or do for locally produced alcohol fuel, or even a welders time to make a still so that a person or better yet a co-op could produce their own fuel. A doctor may not be able to provide MRI services free, but could certainly give consultations and in-house tests in exchange for work setting-up and maintaining an e-documents system, fresh vegies, or transportating her or his kids to swimming lessons, or the swimming lessons themselves. I believe that people who are interested in such arrangements are also more likely than the gneral population to see contributions to open source projects that benefit the society at large or under served sub-sets there of as worth "paying for" in some way. I don't think a completely cashless society is a practical efficient option, nor am I particularly interested in working towards this or most other extremes. There are any number of successful barter networks in existence today. Quite a few of these sprung up in response to the relatively high unemployment and under employment that we've seen in the last few years. (don't have the time to give any hard percentages, nor enough info to make an educated guess re this for that matter). Lastly, and most importantly I was chiming in to a conversation that had not only strayed rather far from the original topic, but gone pretty much OT for the group. I was answering a "hale Mary pass" of a solution proposed by a fellow group member. Do those kind of passes always work? Of course not, and when they do they require excellent coordiniation and timing combined with athletic ability and perhaps some luck. I for one won't be continuing this discussion here because I feel it's gone too OT for the group, and I don't have time to attempt to write more or less well crafted email that could possibly take the discussion/debate forward in useful directions. Some of the ideas I and others have mentioned are worth persuing, but as is usually the case starting with the small and doable is much more valuable than proposing grandios dreams and hoping that others will decide to follow up. One must lead by example. -- B.H. On Sun, Nov 03, 2013 at 01:33:07PM -0500, Andy B. wrote: > How does bardering with people pay the bills? Do you have time proven > research that shows industries that are making a nation-wide sweep with this > "bardering system", or is this a fruitless, wishful, and carefree dream? > Bardering will never feed family, pay the phone bill, get the credit card > collectors off my back, get me to and from the store 3 times a week, and let > me keep my internet that is required for school. For this type of problem, a > job is the best fix. The major problem I see in the US is that too many > "blind people" want everything for free, they whine about anything that > doesn't go their way, and believe employers should exempt them out of every > minor aspect of a job that requires them to "work hard". > > -Original Message- > From: B. Henry [mailto:burt1ib...@gmail.com] > Sent: Sunday, November 3, 2013 11:47 AM > To: Andy B. > Subject: Re: dreams and schemes > > My take on the suggestion is not a social club/I'm totally uninterested in > such an animal as there's not that much reason I'd have anything socially in > common with blinks more than other folks. > I was considering the type of organization where qualified folks barter > their skills for products and services with other people who are ot having > success in the cash driven society. This is being done in who knows how many > areas in the U.S. as a partial work arounnd for the unemployment crisis. > Unemployment has always been a greater problem for the disabled in general > and the bind in specific. When there's the kind of general ecoomic crisis > that so much of the world has been living over the last several years we > obviously have it even worse. > To be truly successful we'd need more than blind people involved in our > less cash society. It'd also require some truly top notch talent as well to > get the attention of others who were not onboard. > The only thing I see that might make this more than just another utopian > dream/posibe footnote in history is our interconnectivity and instant global > communication. Of course much needs to be done locally, e.g. a good driver > in India won't be of much help to a guy in Chile who needs a ride, nor > would a cook in England be able to get a good meal to a family in Canada for > a reason
Re: What happened with Firefox 25?
Yes, this is all of course very true, and sometimes it's actually easier for a person with a stable life/employment to set asside a few hours a week to contribute to something important. In Spanish a word for will/willingness is voluntad. It takes a certain level of will, and a willingness to forgo some perhaps more pleasurable activities to do significant work on an open source accessability project; to be a volenteer! Making a commitment to give a lot of ones time aand energy to something that may not have any short to medium term payoff is not something that everyone can do, especially someone who has children to support or other first teer responsibilities. On the other hand people who are able choose to give their all to a project and make huge differences in the lives of many every day, not many people percentage wise, but examples are not hard to find when you look. In our case all we have to do is start our computers and we should be reminded of a personal hero of mine, Tony Sales. Other people with the right skill set can and do make a difference over the long haul like Luke who gives of his personal time along with his payed work on Ubuntu accessability. It's about the coming together of time/mental and emotional energy, the right skill set, and some vollenteer spirit. If one has the latter, and some of one of the first two then they are certainly part of the potential team down the line. If you have a bit of all three and are not already doing so, what are you waiting for? Find where you fit in and start working! Enough anylizing and cheerleading. It's time that I get some stuff out of the way so I can work on my skill set! -- On Sun, Nov 03, 2013 at 04:17:13PM -0600, Christopher Chaltain wrote: > I agree with this, but I do have a few caveats. First, looking for a > job, whether you're between jobs or between projects, can be a > pretty time consuming effort requiring a lot of hard work and a lot > of mental toughness. Someone in this position may not have a lot of > time to do some programming for free. Second, a programmer looking > for that next job or that next project does have to sharpen their > skills and make themselves as employable as possible. Although > working in the accessibility infrastructure and working on an open > source project like Orca or NVDA would definitely build some > marketable skills, it isn't going to do as much as contributing to > some popular open source project like OpenStack will do for > someone's employability. I'm not discouraging anyone from working on > AT or contributing to Orca; I'm just saying a blind programmer > between jobs or projects may have very legitimate reasons to spend > some of that time working on something else or in some other area. > > On 11/03/2013 11:11 AM, B. Henry wrote: > >Of course. The other part of this includes more willingness to back such > >projects financially, but the other angle to consider is that so many blind > >people are unemployed now. Even if they become pretty good programmers > >there's not likely going to be work for them all, and even less traditional > >fulltime work. While one is looking for work they could also sharpen their > >skills working on the kind of software projects we're talking about here. > >Others may be content to dedicate some window of time to this work living on > >some kind of disability paymentss, and on the more extreme edge of the > >conversation there's the alt economy model. Whether its possible to create > >a group with the critical mass of talent and deverse skillset needed to be > >sustainable is not one I'm willing to bet on; but I would certainly consider > >donating some labor to a person who has made my computer more usable above > >and beyond the very limited money I can donate to open-source projects. > >While I don't see a revolution in the making, maybe we can see a significant > >evolution in thinking and behavior where more users of FOS-access-tech > >donate to developers. While there's a long way to go, NVDA has made notable > >progress getting donations from end-users over the last few years. > >Another thing to consider is that many programmers work on a project basis, > >not a salary payed by one company. This means that even very good coders > >with contacts and good work habits are likely to have some down time between > >projects that they could dedicate to accessibility work, or they could > >choose to give a couple weeks here and there to something that interests > >them. > >Get a job with Google and use your discressionary time to improve > >g-access...lolThere's nomagic bullet, but I think many of us can organize > >our lives better on an individual basis, and we can perhaps create some > >support systems making this easier. > >-- > >B.H. > >On Sat, Nov 02, 2013 at 04:44:35PM -0500, Christopher Chaltain wrote: > >>I agree with this sentiment, but one challenge I see is that it's > >>hard to make a livin
