Amanda Unvarnished

In reply to @simon.

@simon @bryansmart @matt @cordova5029 I think it depends on which perspective you look at it from. It was likely a mix of better at some things and really bad at others.

In reply to @aurooba.

@aurooba Bottoms without deep pockets. These jeans I'm wearing have what are essentially token pockets, and while I like these jeans I absolutely hate the pockets because very few things fit.

In reply to @matt.

@matt @miki @bryansmart @cordova5029 @simon I'd have to double check specific companies, but I think in most cases it's been more like all the accessibility contractors were cut while in-house teams stayed. That's completely sidestepping the bit about no one actually listening t o their in-house accessibility teams but that's a road I don't want to go down because frankly I'll just go on for hours lol.

In reply to @matt.

@matt @bryansmart A bit of both, for different reasons. At least where I grew up, the alternative to mainstreaming was packing us all off to the Governor Morehead school When I lived in Columbus, at least the blind school was down the street.

In reply to @bryansmart.

@bryansmart @matt @cordova5029 @simon This is true, but now you have a 2+generation situation that you'd have to undo before they could become a drop-in. This would maybe be fixable if we were 10 years in, but 50+60 years is an incredible gap to bridge and I'm not sure anyone with enough resources has the willpower for that. To say nothing of what you do for the multidisability kids you'd necessarily have to displace.

In reply to @miki.

@miki @x0 @matt @bryansmart @cordova5029 @simon Unless something has changed drastically with publishers in the last 5 years or so, they don't become easier to deal with for college or non-high-school materials. Not in the U.S. at least. And they usually don't know what LaTeX is, let alone have anything other than the PDF, if that.

In reply to @bryansmart.

@bryansmart @matt @cordova5029 @simon Blind schools would have to be at least on par with mainstream education, if not better, in order for them to be a drop-in replacement. I get where you're coming from though.

In reply to @bryansmart.

@bryansmart @matt @cordova5029 @simon Yeah this.

In reply to @matt.

@matt @objectinspace @bryansmart @cordova5029 @simon I think he's cautioning you to try to aviod burnout. I'm also not sure that's possible in the accessibility/disability rights spaces.

In reply to @matt.

@matt @bryansmart @cordova5029 @simon And unless some org with very deep pockets decides to devote a ton of money and man hours to solving specific accessibility problems, it's not going to be the holy grail and we still need creators and publishers and other orgs to cooperate.

In reply to @matt.

@matt @bryansmart @cordova5029 @simon Taking matters into our own hands is only going to get us so far, unless there is a significant leap in the capabilities of commercially available machine learning, inclusive of large language models like GPT. ML is useful for very specific things, +

In reply to @bryansmart.

@bryansmart @cordova5029 @simon Ah yes the good old days of the Reading Edge. I didn't get my first laptop until 2001, and was mostly done with college by then, so I remember hooking up one of those big 4-track recorders so I could get the audio output. And math plus physics plus economics all had separat e tutors and tons of out-of-class lab time to get the work done.

In reply to @matt.

@matt @bryansmart @cordova5029 @simon the place it's coming from.

In reply to @matt.

@matt @bryansmart @cordova5029 @simon I expect that, when it comes to math and science, probably not that much more accessible. Unless something revolutionary has happened since the last time I took a college math course in 2010 or so. And yes, I'm aware of attempts to fix the situation from the assistive tech/other technologies end. This is why I'm not a fan of the bring your own accessibility strategy, however much I may understand +

In reply to @bryansmart.

@bryansmart @cordova5029 @simon I remember those days. I would not wish them on my worst enemy.

In reply to @bryansmart.

@bryansmart @cordova5029 @simon I remember those days. I would not wish them on my worst enemy.