Accessibility: student critiques

[amyjko]

I think the third paragraph (starting with "However, this bias is also unreasonable") is supposed to really drive the point home that accessibility affects more than we think. However, the figures you cite (1 billion are disabled) and the example you give ("take off your glasses") actually make the paragraph less poignant. Without reading the paper you cite, it makes me think the 1 billion encapsulates "small" disabilities like fixable vision impairments and things that "normal" people deal with everyday, that I deal with everyday. And then I think about my "disabilities" and see that I do not really have a problem with interfaces. So then I think that you are exaggerating, and now I do not know how many of these people are ACTUALLY affected so much by their disability that they are unable to use interfaces well. And I think, "okay, so it's not exactly a billion. He was including all these other populations that aren't even THAT affected by their disability, so it must be an insignificant amount." The number and examples make me feel like you are citing a technicality, and thus make me skeptical of your whole following argument in the paper.

I honestly think not trying to make it hit closer to home with that bit about “Take off your glasses” would be better. I know that you provide some detailed examples of how people with disabilities are affected by lack of accessibility for a lot of interfaces later in the chapter, but just a little preview here might drive the point home a little better than trying to make it personal to the reader.

I think the last paragraph is your strongest of the chapter. It has impact in being “surprising,” but bringing some of these ideas to the beginning might make a reader who is skeptical about accessibility more convinced earlier about the importance of accessibility.

Some Grammar Issues

I apologize in advance over how nitpicky I got with some of these and hope the tone does not come off as condescending or patronizing, as that was not my intent at all. It’s just that I learn so much from your chapters and feel apprehensive about making suggestions on the content. I am definitely not an expert on interfaces and don’t feel qualified to critique those aspects. However, I am confident in my grammar.

“We can speak, we can control over 600 different muscles, we can convey hundreds of types of non-verbal information through our gaze, posture, and orientation.”

These are technically comma splices/run-on sentences/independent clauses incorrectly joined by commas. I understand you’re probably going for impact, but this was noticeably bothersome. I suggest periods or semicolons.

Colons technically should come after independent clauses only. However, it is used incorrectly in so many places anyways, so this usage might be fine colloquially. When you leave off with the colon here, though, it makes me think that you are continuing that phrase, “Access technologies include things like…” But when I read it out like that, the bullets don’t make sense grammatically. For example, if I were to read it all the way through, it would read, “Access technologies include things like screen readers convert text on a graphical interface to synthesized speech…” which is not grammatically correct. I would suggest something like, “Access technologies include things like the following:” or, “Access technologies include things like: screen readers, which convert text …”

Now I’m just being nitpicky, but double colons is just a little jarring.

Commas

[amyjko]

Add discussion of neurodiversity and ideas for how to address. Luz Rello's work?

[amyjko]

One piece of advice for this chapter is to include how people with disabilities currently interact with daily technologies such as cell phones or computers. In the videos included in this chapter, there were testers in the video interacting with prototypes for new design ideas, and I could tell that they were quite skilled in interacting with cell phones. However, I don't know what enabled them to be able to interact with cell phones. I once had a professor who were blind but could use laptop to operate many tasks. I would want to know existing and main stream functions that help people with disabilities to use technologies.

[amyjko]

I love this chapter in general because it is very clear and straightforward. However, even though the universal design is an ideal and great idea, it normally won't get executed due to time or resource limitation and the marketing choice, especially in industry. In my opinion, it will be beneficial to talk about the limitation and the reality of accessibility. Also, maybe talking a little bit about the use cases of accessibility design in the industry will be fun. How are those techniques implemented in the real world and delivered to the user?

[amyjko]

Resolved student concerns.