This post presents the research on a technology to improve accessibility in indoor spaces by providing accurate directions when a user approaches pre-installed beacons. Currently, many routes lack this type of information. Inadequate navigation information limits autonomy and complicates decision-making. This leads to indecision for individuals who are navigating a space for the first [...]
ELIA is a breakthrough new language for the blind that can be mastered in a matter of hours, not months. Almost 200 years ago, a blind, 20-year-old French student demonstrated a dot-based reading-and-writing system at the 1834 Paris Industrial Exposition that would go on to become the single, universal standard for the visually impaired. [...]
This post was originally published on The Atlantic. Legally blind since age 18, my father missed out on the first digital revolution. "Is it ‘electra?’” my father asks, leaning in close to the Amazon Echo my mother has just installed. Leaning in close is his trademark maneuver: Dad has been legally blind since age [...]
This post was originally published on Fast Company. Kat Holmes shares the biggest misconceptions with inclusive design–and what companies need to do to get it right. Inclusivity. It’s one of the biggest buzzwords inside corporations right now. But the person who brought the practice of inclusive design to Microsoft–Kat Holmes–isn’t so sure that [...]
A thought experiment: Imagine that your only device is a smartphone. No computer, no tablet, no Amazon Dot or Google Home. Just a phone. From the lack of broadband access to the reliance on mobile, under-resourced families don’t always have the opportunity to adopt new technology. While there have been some improvements, the digital [...]
Its creators pose a challenge to machine vision researchers: use the information to make assistive technology better. by Emerging Technology from the arXiv February 27, 2018 One of the hardest tasks for computers is “visual question answering”—that is, answering a question about an image. And this is no theoretical brain-teaser: such skills could be [...]
WASHINGTON, March 21, 2018 /PRNewswire-USNewswire This week Cisco is in San Diego for one of the biggest events in the accessibility world, the annual CSUN Assistive Technology Conference. It's amazing to see so much technology innovation happening in this space. And I'm grateful to work for a company that is developing solutions to enable [...]
A few small accessibility changes can unlock a whole new playerbase. https://www.youtube.com/embed/k2EfkzStDNc?start=0&wmode=transparent SAN FRANCISCO — Blind people might not seem like a natural audience for most video games since they can’t experience the “video” part that’s a definitional piece of the experience. At a fascinating Game Developers Conference Presentation this week, though, EA [...]
