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US blind organisationst take initiative
Transcript
24 February 2013
Roberta: Last week two good news stories for the blind and vision-impaired community came out. Both saw the involvement of American blind organisations, the American Foundation for the Blind and the National Federation of the Blind.
While one organisation helped develop an accessible app for note-taking, the other helped improve the accessibility of job search website monster.com, and here to fill us in on the details is Clarizza Fernandez from Media Access Australia. Hello, Clarizza.
Clarizza: Hi, Roberta.
Roberta: Now, tell us about the good news.
Clarizza: Well, the first piece of good news is that the National Federation of the Blind in the US worked as a team at Monster to help create some improvements to the website. So Monster is a job search network where people can post, search and apply for jobs, but often these websites are highly inaccessible for people with disability.
The other good news is that the American Foundation for the Blind launched an app called AccessNote. It's a note-taking app that you can download on your Apple smart phone or tablet with loads of accessibility features that will assist blind or vision-impaired users in writing and reviewing notes. The most exciting feature for me is that it allows you to plug in a Braille device and use it with a keyboard so you can control it, so you can navigate with the keyboard.
Roberta: Those are certainly both exciting pieces of new. So Monster is a job search network in the US. Is there anything similar in Australia?
Clarizza: Well, Monster has a lot of websites around the world, so it's fantastic that such a big organisation has taken the time to help improve the employment situation for the blind community, particularly when most people find and apply for jobs online.
This is a great help to the community, and we can trust that they are getting good advice about how to improve their website for the blind community because they've been consulting with the National Federation of the Blind. So in Australia there are similar sites, like Seek. However, Monster is known here as Career One. We had a look at the site recently and the site has been overhauled with a lot of accessibility improvements, as is the American version.
According to the Career One website, they've made some improvements for screen readers, so the software that reads out text on a page for people who are blind or vision impaired. So they've put in alternative text for images for people who can't see them. People can now identify what parts of the site are headings and lists, and their forms for applying for jobs, obviously one of the key reasons for using the site, have been improved. You can also find a list of instructions for using Career One with a screen reader on the website.
Roberta: What about the AccessNote app?
Clarizza: The American Foundation for the Blind launched the AccessNote app. As you may know, traditional note-taking devices can be expensive. So coming up with an app that does the same thing is great because it's currently more affordable. What makes this app accessible is that it works with the Apple screen reader voice over so all the notes you take with the app can be read out by the screen reader, and you can also navigate the app using voice over. You can also adjust the text and colour contrast as well as use zoom to magnify the screen.
Roberta: And what did you say your favourite feature on that was?
Clarizza: My favourite feature is the Bluetooth keyboard compatibility ...
Roberta: Yes.
Clarizza: ... yeah, which means you can plug in a Braille device to convert your notes to Braille as well as a wireless keyboard to use keyboard controls for navigation. There are also some really useful keyboard shortcuts so you can get to some features by pressing just a few buttons. So one, for example, is if you press the option key plus the C key it opens up a new note. There is also a review feature which is probably my second favourite, or just as close to my favourite as the others. It reads out your notes, so that's really useful when you want to review them.
Roberta: That's exciting indeed. What great efforts.
Clarizza: Yes, it is fabulous, and the one thing I should mention is that AccessNote is available in Australia for only $20.99 at the iTunes store.
Roberta: My goodness that is cheap, isn't it?
Clarizza: Yes. It is.
Roberta: Well, thanks for all that today, Clarizza. If you want to keep up to date with technology developments like this that are happening in Australia and abroad, do have a look at Media Access Australia's website which is www.mediaaccess.org.au, or you can phone Clarizza and her colleagues on 02 9212 6242. Thank you.
Clarizza: Thanks, Roberta.
Roberta: And I've been speaking with Clarizza Fernandez from Media Access Australia, and I'll just give you those details again, mediaaccess.org.au, or you can phone Clarizza and her colleagues on 02 9212 6242. Media Access Australia are supporters of this program.