disabilities

Barack Obama's administration has announced plans to ensure people with disabilities get better access to retails and hospitality focused websites, in addition to ensuring better access to physical premises such as cinemas.

Most of the proposals are aimed primarily at improved access for the those with visual and hearing impairments.

The Justice Department will soon be seeking comment on four proposed rules to establish accessibility requirements for websites, movies, equipment and furniture,
and 911 call-taking technologies, Attorney General
Eric Holder said Wednesday at an event commemorating the 15th anniversary of the American Association of People with Disabilities.

Holder spoke as part of the Justice Department’s week honoring the 20th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act, known as the ADA. He pledged
“aggressive and appropriate” enforcement of the landmark disabilities law — both in communities and the department itself.

“More important than the right to speech is the right to speak.” The world renowned British theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking knows this exactly to be true. Having been robbed of his ability to speak to a motor neuron disease, Stephen Hawking had to struggle with crude communication systems just to be able to tell his wants and needs…until he discovered VOCAs.

If it had not been for VOCAs, Stephen Hawking’s insights into the nature of space and time would not have been known. This assistive technology has allowed him to communicate, write and publish his works, and give lectures to live audiences around the world in spite of losing his ability to speak.

In this post we will explore what VOCAs are and how these instruments give people an ability that most of us take for granted.

AMMAN - People with disabilities (PWD) will have an easier time voting in November's parliamentary elections as several polling stations will be specially
equipped to accommodate them, the government said on Monday.

“Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Interior Nayef Qadi has instructed all governors to take necessary measures to provide some polling centres with
special equipment needed to facilitate accessibility for PWD in the forthcoming elections,” Director of Elections at the Interior Ministry Saad Shihab,
told The Jordan Times yesterday.

Tied up with an invisible chain -- you’d probably think this to yourself if you suddenly found out that you can’t walk, move, lift your arms, or even just curl your fingers.

This could easily be anyone’s reaction if they’ve had a spinal cord injury and is left paralyzed from the neck down. But this doesn’t have to be so. For the many people living with quadriplegia, life doesn’t have to slip away from them even if it had slipped away from their limbs.

This is exactly what our friend will show us as he invites us to a day in his life. We will see the daily challenges that he has to face and how assistive technology and adaptive tools are helping him to overcome them.

It is considered good economic practice to include as many people inn the workforce as possible. The more people that are participating and contributing to the economy, the more productivity gains and economic returns we can expect for the community.

While people with disabilities have the capacity to positively contribute to the development of a country’s economy and social capital, many of them are not given this opportunity due to many barriers. One of these is the employers’ perception of costs and benefits of accommodating and employing people with disabilities.

Although there may be situations where accommodations have to be made to address the needs of people with disabilities, there are numerous ways companies can support people with disabilities with no extra cost. And the costs to accommodate them, if there are any, outweigh the contributions that people with disabilities can give to the economy.

Sparks flew at a hearing June 9 on HR 3101, The 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act, a bill that would update communications accessibility
provisions in the 1996 Communications Act and apply them to access to broadband.

Cable operators applaud the spirit of H.R. 3101, the Twenty-First Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act of 2009, but a National Cable & Telecommunications
Association executive plans to tell a House Communications Subcommittee panel June 10 that the letter of that proposed law should be adjusted to give cable
operators the "time and flexibility" to comply with its directives.

The bill is an effort to apply the rules on access to communications services for the disabled to the new world of increasing broadband video and audio
delivery. That bill includes closed captioning, video description, access to emergency information, and more.

When it comes to accessibility have you ever found yourself in the following situations?

• You wanted to make your site accessible but you didn't have the money
• You just finished a web site or application and then found out that it is not accessible or Section 508 compliant
• You thought a site was accessible and you found out that it really wasn't
• You were told that your web application needs to be Section 508 compliant by a certain date and you didn't have the time to fix it

These are all valid issues, and you are not the only one facing them. But once this is the case, it does not mean that you need to forget about accessibility as it is. There is another way to go around it, and not only to make your site accessible or to bring it to legal compliance, but to show your commitment and willingness to work on it.

While working with people on the accessibility of their site, I noticed one common concern. It’s very difficult to see for yourself what the problem is.

When people try to examine the accessibility of their site, they usually go “Hey, this seems easy to navigate. I can quickly find the stuff I need. What’s wrong with my site?”

Of course you can always ask a consultant to find out the site’s accessibility problems. But your web site is your baby, and before hiring one, you want to know for yourself what needs to be improved.

In reality, the only true way to be able to know the accessibility problems of something is to see it through the perspective of a person with a disability. Trying to use a site through the perspective of persons with disabilities can indeed help you better understand their needs. But there’s an even better way, and you can do this by...