“Accessibility is extremely important at Adobe,” Kirkpatrick said to me in June. “We have strived to make sure accessibility is addressed within our products as well as within the company. Adobe has a strong culture of creativity, and many features and applications come from the ideas of individuals.”

In a new interview, Kirkpatrick reiterated Adobe’s commitment to accessibility, saying it’s about “equal opportunity for all people.” He also discussed several recent announcements that coincided with the thirtieth anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act’s passing in late July. “We’re still striving to create a more inclusive world, and we are reaffirming our commitment to accessibility through several new initiatives for our customers and users,” he said.

The first is the Crip Camp Fellowship. The Fellowship was created in honor of the late Ki’Tay Davidson, an activist for and advocate of marginalized groups. Adobe’s partnership with the Camp’s Impact Campaign aims to “empower creatives and community organizers with disabilities to share their stories,” Kirkpatrick said. Selected Fellows receive a $5,000 grant to pursue what Kirkpatrick described as “passion projects” over a 7-month period, as well as receive mentorship from established creatives. Participants also get complimentary access to Creative Cloud to help propel them towards meeting their goal(s). Kirkpatrick said Adobe was inspired to collaborate with Crip Camp after the Camp’s documentary—edited, coincidentally, using Premiere Pro—screened at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. He added Fellowship participants were “thrilled” to be part of the program.

Second, Adobe is creative partner for the Easterseals Disability Film Challenge. The contest enables filmmakers, disabled or not, an opportunity to tell uniquely personal stories which highlight disability of various forms. Winners were announced August 13 at a (naturally) virtual awards ceremony.

The Best Film winner went to Jennifer Msumba for The Fish Don’t Care When It Rains, while Rachel Handler won for Best Awareness Campaign for How Much Am I Worth?. Scott Klumb took Best Editor for Autism Ability.

“This festival changed my life,” Msumba said. “Easterseals Disability Film Challenge is an amazing event.”

The final announcement is a partnership with Limbitless Solutions. Limbitless is a non-profit organization which specializes in bionic technology for children. The company uses Adobe’s Creative Cloud software to design bionic limbs. Kirkpatrick said Adobe recently awarded the non-profit a $100,000 grant to be able to continue their work of fostering accessibility and inclusivity. The money will also go towards expansion efforts, which includes FDA approval to make the technology more commercially available.

Kirkpatrick said Adobe is “proud” to support Limbitless in using technology in creative ways in order to enrich and empower lives. Likewise, Albert Manero of Limbitless said Adobe’s “corporate voice” will help “transform” the company’s work, as well as break down the stigmas associated with people with disabilities.

Lastly, Kirkpatrick reflected upon three decades of the Americans with Disabilities Act. He described the legislation as a “huge step forward” in banning discrimination, but acknowledged there’s much work still to be done. Kirkpatrick shares Rep. Tony Coelho’s thoughts regarding the ADA in today’s all-consuming digital age, insofar as the bill doesn’t regulate the internet nearly as well as it does the physical world. He told me tech companies should be “prioritizing accessibility at the onset of the development stage” in an effort to support all users. He also reemphasized Adobe’s unwavering commitment to serve the disability community through its products, citing their longstanding involvement with the W3C’s WCAG guidelines.

“We call on Congress to look for additional opportunities to clarify for accessibility: to encourage businesses and content creators to improve accessibility support, and to take action and lead a path forwarder equality for disabled people,” Kirkpatrick said.

It’s my understanding the development of the iPadOS 13 AssistiveTouch pointer feature was “handed off” internally, from the Accessibility group to the broader iOS team for more expansive integration. This is good—if anything, it shows Apple has noticed the AssisitiveTouch pointer feature has gained traction for “mainstream” users. To wit, iPad aficionados saw that you can use a mouse with an iPad and they pounced on it.

Apple loves this; they love the idea the what are ostensibly esoteric, niche features have broader relevance to everyone. But the AssistiveTouch feature, as all accessibility features, were built to accommodate a certain segment of users. The company even went on the record to me last year, when they said “this is not your traditional desktop cursor.” It is fundamentally an accessibility feature.

Since Apple announced iOS 13.4 and the iPad Pro’s Magic Keyboard, I’ve seen some chatter on Twitter about how 13.4 proves the AssistiveTouch functionality was bolted on and slapped together. This is flat-out wrong and shows a fundamental lack of understanding of what the feature does and who its target audience is. Furthermore, this is not the same as saying the feature cannot improve. Of course it can, and it likely will. But to imply that this feature was haphazardly put together without much thought is a lazy, privileged trope that is disrespectful to the people who really need it in order to use their devices.

Here’s the bottom line. If you are an iPad power user, the 13.4 cursor functionality is the mechanism for you. The reality is, the AssistiveTouch version never really was—and the fact this powerful new version is due out in less than 24 hours proves that point.

We noticed that you have not published to your Steven's Blog channel in three months or mode. Your channel will be deleted in one week.

A rather curt tone, but fitting for the company So…

Following in the footsteps of BuzzFeed’s John Paczkowski, here’s a take on the iPhone 11 camera(s) from my porcine pal.

The iPhone XR that I’ve used for the last year as my main phone has Portrait Mode, but it’s limited to only humans. As such, it’s been a lot of fun having a second lens on the new iPhones to capture Portrait photos of other things, including my beloved four-legged friend.

Sesame Street, of course, has been running on PBS stations for decades. PBS Kids has long been recognized as the leader in educational programming for children—but their commitment runs far deeper than that. The network cares about making accessible entertainment for all children, of all abilities.

"PBS Kids aims to reach all kids, but we have a special focus on supporting those kids that need it most," said Lesli Rotenberg, Chief Programming Executive and General Manager for Children’s Media and Education at PBS. Rotenberg oversees pretty much everything in the PBS Kids ecosystem, from content production to digital development to educational product creation. "As a public broadcaster, we’ve always felt a deep responsibility to uphold representation and inclusiveness in our content, including how that content is accessed and consumed."

PBS Kids's target demographic is children aged 2 to 8, spanning toddlerhood through early elementary school. The goal with its programming is augmenting early education. Young children's brains, particularly the toddler end of PBS's range, are highly malleable. Which is to say, their brains are exceptionally primed at this stage of development to soak up information; this retention plants the seeds of a child's worldview, which obviously becomes more complex as time passes and their cognitive abilities expand.

While there's no substitute for physical, real-world hands-on experiences for children—play-based childcare centers are best—the content PBS Kids produces surely can supplement learning in a positive way. "We aim to produce content that provides audiences with useful tools to be ever-curious and kind as they experience and grow through successful interactions at home, in the classroom and beyond," Rotenberg said. "We are committed to reducing barriers and creating flexible learning environments where all kids can succeed."

The work PBS Kids has put into accessibility and its mission to deliver accessible media began in 1972, when Boston's WGBH began showing programs with closed-captioning. Rotenberg says everything her network produces adheres to tenets of inclusive design, noting that "every PBS Kids program on-air includes closed-captioning and almost all include audio descriptions." Furthermore, the PBS Kids app—available on Android, iOS, and Windows—supports closed-captioning, as well as an information screen where parents can submit feedback and questions for the developers.

On the web, Rotenberg told me the PBS Kids site has been evaluated by the design team for accessibility. The website is optimized to work with screen readers, text-to-speech, and contrast. This is all done, she says, using the guiding principles of the Universal Design Language (UDL) framework.

Aside from streaming video, PBS Kids also has pushed for accessibility and inclusivity in its games. Rotenberg says "adaptive and personalized games have a lot of potential, as they adjust to a child’s individual learning needs and behaviors and provide on-demand supports that the child can actively seek to enhance their learning." PBS Kids's games include titles such as The Cat in the Hat Builds That and Railway Hero. The accessibility features supported in these games cover a wide variety of domains, including physical motor, blindness and low vision, and the deaf and hard-of-hearing. Screen readers, audio descriptions, and closed-captioning are just a few of the technologies designed to support disabled gamers.

The work PBS Kids has put into making content more accessible to everyone has not gone unnoticed by parents and educators. "Parents and educators alike are excited to see their [children] successfully engage with content that complies with such high standards for accessibility," Rotenberg said. Representation has been important as well, as Rotenberg notes much of the feedback garnered has centered around a child's ability to see themselves in the on-screen characters "who present a range of situational, temporary and permanent disabilities." One example of this is Julia, an autistic preschooler introduced in 2015 who, Sesame Workshop said at the time, "does things a little differently when playing with her friends.”

At a macro level, the work Rotenberg and her team at PBS Kids is both laudable and necessary. Disability representation on television and other media has been pitiful forever, so to see PBS go to the lengths they do to provide better representation for children is not an insignificant development. It puts disability—and by extension, accessibility—at the forefront of the shows and of the overall user experience; this is also why Apple's forthcoming series See, starring Alfre Woodward and Jason Momoa, is so intriguing. The whole premise surrounds a post-apocalyptic world in which humanity is blind—this is a stark contrast to the usual role disability plays as a plot device: one of moribundity and adversity.

PBS Kids has taken the right approach, putting all children on a level playing field. "There is a major gap in accessibility in media, [and] children and families are finding that PBS Kids is leading the industry in making this space open to kids from all backgrounds," Rotenberg said. PBS Kids can be an invaluable resource to not only families, but to special educators and others in special education classrooms.

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]]> Site News Steven Aquino Wed, 26 Sep 2018 16:34:45 +0000 https://feedpress.me/link/9647/13016158/tech-products-making-life-easier-for-disabled-people 54ab25c5e4b00fb49e26f54e:54ac7d98e4b085f495d7584f:5babb415f4e1fc5a4875df6c Yesterday, I joined Cheddar anchors Hope King and Tim Stenovec to do a segment on how voice assistants help and hinder accessibility. This was my first-ever television appearance and I think it went really well.

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]]> Site News Steven Aquino Sat, 15 Sep 2018 20:45:22 +0000 https://feedpress.me/link/9647/13016159/what-apple-watch-series-4-means-accessibility 54ab25c5e4b00fb49e26f54e:54ac7d98e4b085f495d7584f:5b9d6f62758d46cdbe6e4da0 In my latest piece for iMore, I discuss what Apple’s redesigned Watch means for accessibility. Its marquee new features—a larger display, haptic-enabled Digital Crown, and fall detection—all have enormous implications for disabled people.

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]]> Podcasts Steven Aquino Fri, 07 Sep 2018 23:24:43 +0000 https://feedpress.me/link/9647/13016160/008 54ab25c5e4b00fb49e26f54e:54ac7d98e4b085f495d7584f:5b9308bbc2241b077904c8cc Steven and Timothy discuss Steven’s trip to Oregon, what they expect from Apple’s September 12 media event, and Timothy explains how he configured his AirPort Express to use AirPlay 2.

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]]> Podcasts Steven Aquino Mon, 20 Aug 2018 16:23:46 +0000 https://feedpress.me/link/9647/13016161/007 54ab25c5e4b00fb49e26f54e:54ac7d98e4b085f495d7584f:5b7aeb12562fa7c4f8ed3515 Steven and Timothy are joined by special guest Shelly Brisbin. Topics include Shelly’s career in tech journalism and podcasting, the portrayal of accessibility coverage in the mainstream tech press, why accessibility talk on podcasts is important, our favorite iOS 12 features, and more

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]]> Podcasts Steven Aquino Thu, 09 Aug 2018 21:23:19 +0000 https://feedpress.me/link/9647/13016162/parallel 54ab25c5e4b00fb49e26f54e:54ac7d98e4b085f495d7584f:5b6cb0c71ae6cf891d346c6c Shelly Brisbin’s show, now simply called Parallel, is now a member of the Relay FM network. I’ve known Shelly for a while—she does great work, and it’s great to see accessibility represented on a popular network like Relay. (I was on episode #11 in January 2017.)

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]]> Podcasts Steven Aquino Tue, 07 Aug 2018 02:36:33 +0000 https://feedpress.me/link/9647/13016163/006 54ab25c5e4b00fb49e26f54e:54ac7d98e4b085f495d7584f:5b6905a5352f53ab4a546e87 Steven and Timothy talk about their impressions so far of the iOS 12 beta, Steven's new Kindle Paperwhite, the accessible packaging of Microsoft's upcoming adaptive Xbox controller, and how to attract disabled people to beta-test accessibility features in apps.

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]]> Tech Steven Aquino Thu, 26 Jul 2018 18:40:41 +0000 https://feedpress.me/link/9647/9865611/kindle-paperwhite-first-impressions 54ab25c5e4b00fb49e26f54e:54ac7d98e4b085f495d7584f:5b5a1576562fa7a725f23285 I know I’m extremely late to the Kindle party, but I finally made it.

On Prime Day last week, I saw that Amazon was selling the Paperwhite for $80 and decided I would grab one. I’ve had it for about a week now, but haven’t had much time with it due to other things going on at home recently. I took it with me on BART yesterday on a trip across the bay to visit family, and so far I am very impressed by the device. It’s pretty great.

The book I’m reading is John Carreyrou’s Bad Blood, which chronicles the rise and fall of Theranos and its founder, Elizabeth Holmes. I’d seen nothing but rave reviews for the book, so I figured it would be a good first book. As I write this, I’m three chapters in and loving it so far.

Here are some assorted thoughts on the Paperwhite thus far.

Size & Weight. The Paperwhite is much smaller and lighter than I expected, but I like it. It’s easy to hold and throw into my backpack. I got the black model, which is nice looking and well made, but the bezels make it look old. I have no insight into Amazon’s industrial design process, but I would love a Paperwhite with no bezels at all, kind of like how Apple got rid of the “forehead and chin” of the iPhone X.

The E-ink Display. The Paperwhite’s screen is great—text is sharp and easy to see at maximum brightness. As someone with low vision, I was curious to see how my eyes would acclimate to a different screen technology. In my brief time with my Paperwhite, I’ve had no issues with glare or eye fatigue.

The User Interface. I’ve found the Paperwhite’s touchscreen to be surprisingly responsive; I haven’t noticed any significant lag when tapping. The controls are thoughtfully laid out too. I like Amazon’s font choices and the slider for adjusting screen brightness and text size. As for page-turning, I don’t mind tapping the screen to go back and forth. I like the feeling of touching the screen and it does something; it’s natural.

Accessibility. Amazon has a slew of accessibility features for its products, including a screen reader, magnifier, text options, and more. For the Paperwhite, their VoiceView screen reader is supported, as are text options like font size and line spacing. If I discover more functionality, I will report back.

Overall, I’m enjoying the Paperwhite very much. I now see why Kindles are so popular. The Paperwhite is, in Alton Brown parlance, a unitasker—but the one thing it does, it excels at. There is a serenity about the device that is appealing; I don’t feel distracted or tempted to reach for my iPhone. I can focus on the reading experience in a way that’s more difficult on my iPad. Different devices for different things, but still. I’m happy I decided to finally take the plunge into Kindleland.

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]]> Podcasts Steven Aquino Fri, 13 Jul 2018 06:14:21 +0000 https://feedpress.me/link/9647/13016165/005 54ab25c5e4b00fb49e26f54e:54ac7d98e4b085f495d7584f:5b48433d1ae6cf8d84dc4b92 Steven and Timothy are joined by special guest Aleen Simms. Topics include diversity in tech and the disabled, the representation/discussion of diversity and accessibility on tech podcasts and in the tech media, the importance of accessible design in software, and more.

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]]> Tech Steven Aquino Tue, 10 Jul 2018 19:23:05 +0000 https://feedpress.me/link/9647/13016166/apple-combines-machine-learning-and-siri-teams-under-giannandrea 54ab25c5e4b00fb49e26f54e:54ac7d98e4b085f495d7584f:5b45068388251bb1113ff9f7 Matthew Panzarino, reporting for TechCrunch:

Apple is creating a new AI/ML team that brings together its Core ML and Siri teams under one leader in John Giannandrea.

Apple confirmed this morning that the combined Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning team, which houses Siri, will be led by the recent hire, who came to Apple this year after an eight-year stint at Google, where he led the Machine Intelligence, Research and Search teams. Before that he founded Metaweb Technologies and Tellme.

The internal structures of the Siri and Core ML teams will remain the same, but they will now answer to Giannandrea. Apple’s internal structure means that the teams will likely remain integrated across the org as they’re wedded to various projects, including developer tools, mapping, Core OS and more. ML is everywhere, basically.

As Panzarino notes, this move makes a ton of sense for many reasons.

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]]> Miscellaneous Steven Aquino Sat, 07 Jul 2018 01:01:32 +0000 https://feedpress.me/link/9647/13016167/declaration-of-independence-science 54ab25c5e4b00fb49e26f54e:54ac7d98e4b085f495d7584f:5b4010ec8a922de7209f466c Joe Pappalardo, writing for Popular Mechanics:

The official declaration of America’s independence from Britain may be dated July 4, 1776, but the story of the Thomas Jefferson's hallowed document really begins two weeks later. On July 19, the Continental Congress ordered a scribe, Pennsylvania State House clerk Timothy Matlack, to write the words on a piece of parchment big enough for everyone to read—and with room for signatures.

Since then, the Declaration of Independence has had a fairly rough time. A forensic analysis of the document shows some rough handling, damaging displays, and even a mysterious handprint. Understanding why it looks the way that it does — much more faded and battered than the U.S. Constitution or The Bill of Rights — is a romp through the history of printing, preservation, and patriotism.

This was a fascinating read; it’s astounding how old documents like this survive.

(via The Loop)

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]]> Tech Steven Aquino Fri, 06 Jul 2018 19:33:39 +0000 https://feedpress.me/link/9647/13016168/the-democratization-of-communication-cfa81eb2dd17 54ab25c5e4b00fb49e26f54e:54ac7d98e4b085f495d7584f:5b3fc1f288251b6ef0d5b9ed AssistiveWare founder and CEO David Niemeijer wrote a terrific piece on Medium on how the App Store has revolutionized access for AAC devices. He writes, in part:

We saw an opportunity to democratize access to AAC. Our aim was to deliver AAC on a consumer device at a price within reach of those who did not have access to funding. In April 2009, we released Proloquo2Go, the first full-featured symbol-based AAC app on iOS. Combined with an iPod touch and a speaker case, total cost was below US$ 500.

We were a small company based in Amsterdam, Netherlands. We did not have a network of sales reps or a department to help with funding requests. The App Store provided us with access to a worldwide market. Within a year, we reached 40 countries and sold over 4,000 licenses, of which the vast majority were in the US.

This article ties in perfectly with yesterday's press release from Apple.

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]]> Tech Steven Aquino Thu, 05 Jul 2018 18:22:41 +0000 https://feedpress.me/link/9647/13016169/app-store-turns-10 54ab25c5e4b00fb49e26f54e:54ac7d98e4b085f495d7584f:5b3e60b0aa4a9940863ce4fa Apple today posted a great retrospective on its Newsroom page marking the App Store's 10th birthday, which is next week. As I tweeted, given the App Store's reach, the fact Apple included accessibility in this feature isn't a trivial detail. Among the developers quoted were Marco Arment and AssistiveWare founder and CEO David Niemeijer.

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]]> Sports Steven Aquino Wed, 04 Jul 2018 18:35:18 +0000 https://feedpress.me/link/9647/13016170/when-is-a-sport-not-a-sport-when-its-on-espn-and-youre-rooting-for-vomit 54ab25c5e4b00fb49e26f54e:54ac7d98e4b085f495d7584f:5b3d11a78a922db5a540d426 Great 2012 piece by Michele Catalano for the now-defunct American McCarver:

When did eating your weight in nitrates and meat-by products become a sport?

[...]

What does bother me about the whole IFOCE (yes, competitive eaters have their own federation) is that the people who partake in this stuff take themselves so seriously as to refer to themselves as athletes. Eating is not a sport. A competition, sure, but it’s not a sport, in much the same way that high school dance squads are not a sport. Yet ESPN wants you to believe they are, just so they can fill their programming slots with something besides paid advertisements from companies wanting to sell you souvenir coins imprinted with the number of your favorite NASCAR driver. Pounding back food, whether it be hot dogs or burgers or burritos or ice cream, is not a sport. Yes, it takes training and determination and discipline, but so does being a car bomber, and no one considers that a competitive sport.

Relevant today because Joey Chestnut won another Nathan's hot dog-eating contest.

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