Chris, I'm not interested in getting into a pissing contest over this issue, but if what you say is true, then why has iWorks become accessible at all? Sure I guess you could point at a few factors such as if their peers in the OS group are doing it, then we should at least put some effort out as well. You could say that perhaps senior management placed a requirement that a certain level of accessibility had to be included in the product. You could even say that perhaps they just thought it was the right thing to do. SOmehow I suspect it's a lot more than that and your using your experience, which admittedly is all you have I guess, but in this your painting a broad picture of developers who in general don't care or only are driven by the dollar. Of course the dollar puts food on the table, so that in itself is a motivator, but I'd like to think that perhaps Apple really as a company in general is interested in accessibility. If they were not so concerned, there would not be an accessible iPod, iPhone, or OS for that matter and all this done in considerably less time than it has taken for accessibility to come into its own for the PC world. THis required a lot of resources, still is a lot of resources, and honestly a gamble on whether it would even work. I'm not saying they couldn't do more and far from it and obviously they are motivated by market share, which translates into cash and cash keeps the wheels of a business rolling and I don't have any problem with that at all. I of course also hold Apple to a higher standard because they have accomplished a lot and have done some incredible things with touch-screen interfaces etc. It is up to us as a "community" to keep them motivated and on target. After all, if the users of the product do not let them know where the issues are, they may not know themselves. My experience with Apple has been that they take customer feedback and concerns seriously. Of course like any large company, it may not be obvious in all cases they are paying attention, but I believe they are. One other example is just look at the company that develops ProTools. Now once you put a human face to the issue, it obviously had an impact and gee they did something about it. I have to give them a lot of credit here and perhaps the truth is getting an e-mail is not always the motivator one would hope. Sometimes putting a face and I mean a human face to the problem brings an entirely different perspective to a developer. Of course we all can't go flying about the WOrld trying to get developers to see the benefit of making their product accessible and that is unfortunate, so you have to be creative and try to show business cases and examples of how accessibility can benefit them and be cost effective to implement. Just my thoughts on this subject.
On Nov 29, 2009, at 7:34 AM, Chris Hofstader wrote: > Apple has a pretty flat management structure with different teams acting > nearly autonomously as if they were separate companies. > > The iWork team is one such business unit and may or may not place a high > value on accessibility. The access technology group who make VO and the > other universal access features plus maintain the accessibility API in the OS > need to try to "influence" other teams within the company. > > The biggest motivator for a team to add a high quality accessibility > experience is, of course, how much more money will they gain from performing > this task. Thus, legislation like Section 255 of the telecommunications act, > 504 and 508 of the rehabilitation act, IDEA and lots of state regulations can > cause a product to shutdown sales to government agencies, school districts, > etc. if they aren't accessible. The iwork team probably doesn't sell much > into these market segments so will not be terribly motivated to meet their > standards. > > So, just because Apple and, for that matter, Microsoft have accessibility API > built into the OS, programs they develop may ignore accessibility entirely if > there is no urgent need to sell the program to government agencies. > > Sorry for being a bit cynical but this is my experience working with > mainstream developers for a whole lot of years now. > > cdh > > On Nov 28, 2009, at 11:10 PM, Rich Ring wrote: > >> Isn't iWorks Apple software? Are they not aware of Voiceover? And, if not, >> why not? >> ----- Original Message ----- >> From: "Brett Campbell" <blindinnova...@gmail.com> >> To: <macvisionaries@googlegroups.com> >> Sent: Saturday, November 28, 2009 9:57 PM >> Subject: Re: Spreadsheet software was Powerpoint on the Mac >> >> >> I use a spreadsheet program called Tables. It works great for me and the >> developer is mindful of VoiceOver. >> >> >> Brett C. >> >> On Nov 28, 2009, at 8:51 PM, Dan Roy wrote: >> >>> Les, speaking of Iworks, have you had a chance to check out the >>> spreadsheet program, IE the Excell equivalent? If so, how well does it >>> work? if not, maybe someone on the list will know the answer. if the >>> spreadsheet software in Iworks isn't readily and easily accessible, can >>> someone suggest an alternative? >>> >>> >>> On Nov 22, 2009, at 3:48 AM, Les Kriegler wrote: >>> >>>> Hi, >>>> >>>> In iWork, there is an application called KeyNote which is the PowerPoint >>>> equivalent. I purchased iWork from Amazon.com for $56 plus tax US >>>> currency a few weeks ago. Good luck. >>>> >>>> Les >>>> >>>> -- >>>> >>>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >>>> "MacVisionaries" group. >>>> To post to this group, send email to macvisionar...@googlegroups.com. >>>> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to >>>> macvisionaries+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. >>>> For more options, visit this group at >>>> http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries?hl=. >>>> >>>> >>> >>> -- >>> >>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >>> "MacVisionaries" group. >>> To post to this group, send email to macvisionar...@googlegroups.com. >>> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to >>> macvisionaries+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. >>> For more options, visit this group at >>> http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries?hl=en. >>> >>> >> >> -- >> >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >> "MacVisionaries" group. >> To post to this group, send email to macvisionar...@googlegroups.com. >> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to >> macvisionaries+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. >> For more options, visit this group at >> http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries?hl=en. >> >> >> -- >> >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >> "MacVisionaries" group. >> To post to this group, send email to macvisionar...@googlegroups.com. >> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to >> macvisionaries+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. >> For more options, visit this group at >> http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries?hl=en. >> >> > > -- > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "MacVisionaries" group. > To post to this group, send email to macvisionar...@googlegroups.com. > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > macvisionaries+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries?hl=en. > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "MacVisionaries" group. To post to this group, send email to macvisionar...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to macvisionaries+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries?hl=en.
