A descriptive rich visual perspective of the Moon

For audio direct from the surface of Mars check out: https://mars.nasa.gov/mars2020/multimedia/audio/

linkhttps://www.buzzsprout.com/1136756/8216732-episode-44-the-moon.mp3?blob_id=37160958

With the first of four monthly SuperMoons set to rise this weekend, we’re turning our attention to Earth’s little buddy. If you’ve ever wondered about the look of the moon, its phases, craters, or size, this is the episode for you! Plus, Christine poses questions asked by listeners about the Apollo moon landing, and of course, the famous Moonwalk by astronaut Michael “Buzz” Jackson. Wait, that doesn’t sound quite right…

And for Visual Descriptions from the Chandra X-Ray Observatory, visit:https://chandra.harvard.edu/resources/podcasts/description_audio.html

https://groups.io/g/office-accessibility/topic/99025717

Getting back to Outlook Classic User Interface if you’re in the Inaccessible New Outlook User Interface (AKA Outlook Preview or Outlook PRE)
To change back to the Outlook Classic user interface from the New Outlook user interface:

Note:  The New Outlook interface is NOT accessible and most of the keyboard shortcuts you are accustomed to are not available.

1. Hit F6 until you hear, “Ribbon Region, Tab Control, Home Tab Selected, one of three.”  (Or something very similar.)

2. Hit Tab once, and you should land on the control for toggling out of New Outlook.  NVDA Announces the following when you land on the toggle, “Try the New Outlook, Toggle Switch, On. Press Enter to go back to the classic Outlook for Windows.”  There is a bit more verbiage after this, but once you hear you’re on that toggle switch, activate it with Enter.

In the case of going back to Classic from New, prior to Outlook doing so you will be presented with a Feedback form that I’d encourage you to fill out, and blast Microsoft about the appalling lack of accessibility in this UI.  If you choose to fill out the survey, at the end there are two buttons:  Submit (active if and only if you have filled out the survey) and Skip Feedback.  Whether you’ve filled out the survey or not, hit tab, slowly (this dialog is sluggish and it’s easy to circle around if you’re not patient between each hit of tab and listen for what you’ve landed on) until you land on the button that’s appropriate to what you’re doing, and activate it.  If you happen to circle back to the close button for the survey dialog, just activate it.

In order to achieve the change of User Interface, Outlook must close and start up again to complete that transition.

After you’ve dealt with that dialog in whatever way you saw fit, that’s when Outlook will close and restart, and when it does you are back in Outlook classic.  Be aware that if you are in the Classic view, ALT + T will activate the toggle that takes you back to New View.

—
Brian – Virginia, USA – Windows 11 Pro, 64-Bit, Version 22H2, Build 22621; Office 2016, (Version 2304, Build 16.0.16327.20200) 32-bit; Android 13 (MIUI 14)

There are many people who can only make themselves feel better about themselves by making themselves feel better than others.

    ~ Commenter Looking_in on the Washington Post, 7/10/2014

Behind Apple’s new voice cloning feature ↦

Fast Company’s Harry McCracken talked to some of the team behind Apple’s new Personal Voice accessibility feature about its development as well as some more fine details:

When it came to enabling third-party apps to speak via Personal Voice, Apple put privacy measures in place similar to those it imposes for photos, location, and other bits of personal data in its care. Such apps can only hook into Personal Voice with the user’s permission, must be running in the foreground, and receive only enough access to read text in the voice, not to get at the data used to generate it.

I’ve been thinking a lot about the privacy implications, but the implementation of this feature certainly seems that it will be harder to abuse than something like ElevenLabs’s voice cloning tech. For example, just having to spend fifteen minutes training the model with a random set of words is going to make it a lot harder to create a model of someone else’s voice without their knowledge, even if it does give me shades of training the ViaVoice dictation software circa 2000 by reading Treasure Island to it.

—Linked by Dan Moren

Behind Apple’s new voice cloning feature

https://www.charitycomms.org.uk/social-media-etiquette-for-accessibility

Social media etiquette for accessibility
Liking someone’s Instagram post from 2017? Posting TV spoilers? Backseat gaming? All big no-no’s when it comes to social media etiquette, but what about not making your posts accessible in the first place?

Online accessibility means that everyone can join in the discourse, the memes, and much more. It’s a love note that says ‘we want you here, this is for you too’. Here’s our guide to accessible social media etiquette.

Use image descriptions correctly

The intended purpose for image descriptions is to make images accessible for blind and partially sighted people. They’re a written description of an image – not for extending your copy, adding photo credits, or solely for boosting Search Engine Optimisation (SEO).

Check out these examples of good alt text on the Accessible Social website.

Add image descriptions to memes and gifs

When it comes to alt text, memes and gifs can often be forgotten. Add image descriptions to your memes and gifs in the same way you would with images. If you don’t, screen readers will simply read the filename; BeyonceHair.gif for example, which doesn’t describe what is happening in the gif.

Consider alternative formats for lots of text

There are character limits for alt text. So, those wordy graphics simply won’t fit into the box, no matter how hard you try. That’s why it’s crucial to provide the information in alternative ways. For example, link to the information on your website, or split the wordy graphic into two or three less wordy graphics to help split the alt text character counts.

Audio-led and audio described video

Audio-led videos are when the intended message is shared, both audibly and visually. Audio described videos include a narration of what’s happening in the video, giving details of the visual elements. You should always aim for audio-led, or audio described content. Videos with funky music and cool visuals might look good, but they’re not accessible.

Add open or closed captions

Always caption your videos. It’s not only people who are deaf or hard of hearing that benefit from captions – lots of people find captions useful. Closed captions can be turned on and off if the viewer chooses and can be resized. Open captions, on the other hand, are always visible and cannot be turned off by a viewer. Whether you’re using open or closed captions, there are lots of tools out there to help you. Take a look at this article on CharityComms by RNID on how to caption social media content and why you should.

Use inclusive language

Everyone has language preferences. It’s important to know how disabled people refer to themselves and their disabilities. For example, are we using the social model of disability, or using person-first/disability-first language? Take time to connect with your audience, as this will help you to gain a deeper understanding of them.

Don’t use fancy fonts

Fancy fonts on social media might make your posts stand out, but they’ll stand out for a lack of accessibility too. Not only can they be difficult to read, they’re also not accessible for screen reader users. Screen readers will either say “bold” or “italic” before each letter or skip the text altogether. This means that blind and partially sighted people will miss out on what you’re trying to say.

Use #CamelCase for hashtags

Camel Case, sometimes called Pascal Case, refers to capitalising the first letter of each word within hashtags. This ensures that they’re read out correctly by screen readers. It also makes them easier to read for everyone. For example, #SusanAlbumParty, and not #susanalbumparty… if you know, you know.

Don’t overuse emojis

Everyone loves an emoji, but screen readers will read out the name of every single emoji you include in your posts. So, it’s best to limit yourself to one or two per post.

Be mindful of emoji names. What you might think of as the ‘crying laughing emoji’, a screen reader will call the ‘face with tears of joy emoji’. Don’t rely on emojis to get your intended message across. If in doubt, check the emoji descriptions on EmojiPedia.

Ensure what you’re linking to is accessible

If you’re linking to external information or resources, take a moment to recognise whether they’re accessible or not. If you aren’t sure, let your followers know. Be honest and transparent.

Don’t get defensive if someone points out your post isn’t accessible

Rather than kicking yourself for missing the mark, take it as an opportunity to learn and improve.

Aim for progress, not perfection

If you aim for perfection, you’ll never make progress, but if you do your best and aim for progress, you’ll get a lot further.

Demand change

The best way to get lots of people to do anything is to make it easy and valuable. If it was easier to make social media posts accessible, more people would do it and see the value in it. If a social media platform doesn’t allow you to easily make your posts accessible, let the platform know! Change doesn’t happen unless enough people demand change. Disabled people shouldn’t need to demand change alone. We all must play our part.

Further reading:

Accessible Communication resource
Accessible communications doesn’t have to be complicated
Top tips for accessible communications
Making your social media accessible
Core principles for accessible design in print
Banner Image: Mariia Shalabaieva on Unsplash

https://www.accessible-social.com/images-and-visuals/good-alt-text

https://www.charitycomms.org.uk/how-to-caption-your-social-media-content-and-why-you-should

https://emojipedia.org/

Accessible communications: A starting point for fostering more inclusive comms

https://www.charitycomms.org.uk/accessible-communications-doesnt-have-to-be-complicated

https://www.charitycomms.org.uk/top-tips-for-accessible-communications

https://www.charitycomms.org.uk/making-your-social-media-accessible

https://www.charitycomms.org.uk/core-principles-for-accessible-design-in-print

Envision Glasses – Envision glasses guides and tutorials

Envision Glasses related articles.
— Read on support.letsenvision.com/hc/en-us/categories/4408122042513-Envision-Glasses

The Surprising Role of Blind Women in India’s Health Care System

With their heightened sense of touch, visually impaired women can detect breast cancer with a higher rate of success than doctors who can see.
— Read on reasonstobecheerful.world/blind-women-detect-breast-cancer-india/

The most realistic and versatile AI speech software, ever. Eleven brings the most compelling, rich and lifelike voices to creators and publishers seeking the ultimate tools for storytelling.

What are your opinions and views on voice cloning. Do you believe voice cloning could pose a security risk?Voice cloning and Ethical AI https://beta.elevenlabs.io/

How for blind people, the iPhone significantly changed the world of cell phones even more than for the sighted

Source page

In 1990 I had a conversation with my friend Aaron Levinthal about phones and we thought it would be cool if we could just take our phone put it on our belts and go out into public. Neither of us had seen a cell phone at that point yet. On a college trip the assistant choir professor Jonathan Øverby had a cell phone, and used it once or twice. They began to be more prevalent as time passed, though I’d never held one until I got one. Well, a working cell anyway; my parents showed me an old cell from the early 1990s that was no longer in service. The retired phone was from one of their friends, was about the size of a brick, and seriously weighed in like one too , at least two or three pounds.

In 1997, my Dad was in the hospital, and I had been invited to American Players Theater for some Shakespeare. I decided to get a phone so i wasn’t forced to stay at home for a call, and could still be reachable when away; cell plans were cheap then. The phone was cool, but not accessible at all. All I could do with it was answer calls and call people from memory. I heard about how people were beginning to text, but there was no way to make the phone talk.

In December 2002 Mike Calvo introduced the blind community through Main Menu to talks, a screen reader on the Nokia 9290 communicator. That, for sure, was one of the most exciting podcasts (before there were podcasts) I had ever heard. I even took it to work the next day, so I could listen to it during my lunch; I just had to have one. Luckily, about two weeks later, between Christmas and new years, my friend Ted found one on eBay. The owner had received it for Christmas, but thought it was too complicated; so it was bran new, and at a good price. The communicator only supported GSM, and I was on Verizon, which at that time only had CDMA, so I only used the PDA features on it until summer. In July 2003 I changed to T-Mobile, and never looked back.

I had the 9290 for two years and then Nokia came out with its successor, the 9500. It had Bluetooth and Wifi, the 9290 only had infrared (IR) for transferring data. Over the next four years I had several more Nokia, and a few windows phones too. Things slowly got more accessible, more apps were available, but the big problem was still third party screen reader prices. From 2002-2009, blind people who wanted a talking cell phone had to first buy the phone, and then buy the screen reader. There were two major programs at that time. Talks came out first followed by Mobile Speak. The programs had a one week trial, and then after that they would force a reboot every ten minutes or so, thus, the user would want to buy a license and get it installed as soon as possible. They needed a windows computer for that. The two screen readers cost between $300 and $400, if you changed phones, you could move your license over for $50. Mobile Speak was $80 if you had AT&T, but I didn’t know that at the time. Back then, AT&T on the cell phone side was known as Singular Wireless. The additional cost of a screen reader  made the phone about twice as expensive for a blind person, of whom many were on a lower or fixed income. I was working full time during that period, and I even found it annoying.

January 7, 2007 was a huge day for technology, Steve Jobs announced the iPhone, and everyone was ecstatic, except the blind community. The iPhone was basically a slab of glass, nobody in the blind world had an idea how that would ever be accessible, but I knew that was the future. In 2009, BlackBerry came out with a screen reader for their phones, it cost $500, I’m glad it never had to matter. Steve Jobs announced that VoiceOver, which was Apple’s screen reader for the mac, first announced with macOS Tiger, would be coming to iPhone OS 3 at WWDC 2009. This would change the world for blind cell phone users forever. Never again, would people have to buy an additional screen reader, unless they needed a Windows phone while they were still viable. I went to the Apple store less than a month after VoiceOver was announced, and bought a new shiny iPhone 3GS. Phones and operating systems came out in the summer back then. It took me weeks before I could type text messages on the touch screen, I still suck at it, but Apple added support for Bluetooth keyboards the next year. They then added Braille screen input several years later, and many blind people find that very efficient.

Android was announced late in 2008, and after VoiceOver came out on the iPhone, Google had to follow suit. TalkBack is Google’s offering, and together they pretty much assure that a blind person wanting a talking smartphone today can pay the same price as any sighted person, and get their phone of choice talking immediately out of the box. Now, a blind potential buyer can go to a store and look at their phone of choice and see how the screen reader behaves before actually buying it. That was not possible before 2009. Also, the models that talked with third party screen readers in the past seemed not popular here in North America, none of my sighted friends or family had them. Now, blind people can use the most popular phones, and if they don’t know how to do something, they can just Google it, or ask someone they know how to do it. Although Apple and Google changed the world of cell phones forever, unknown to many sighted people, the change was definitely, and significantly even more of a life changer for those who have low vision, or who are blind.

https://accessibility-insights.com/2023/05/16/how-for-blind-people-the-iphone-significantly-changed-the-world-of-cell-phones-even-more-than-for-the-sighted/

‘Find My iPhone’ app glitch sends angry strangers to man’s home

Scott Schuster says he’s had nearly a dozen people come to his door, falsely accusing him of stealing their Apple devices based on data from their “Find My iPhone” app.
— Read on nypost.com/2023/04/06/find-my-iphone-app-glitch-sends-strangers-to-mans-home/

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