Re: Forming an Accessibility Steering Committee

[Eitan Isaacson <eitan ascender com>]

Hey hey.

On Tue, 2007-12-18 at 18:52 -0600, Brian Cameron wrote:
> 1) How would you like the committee to interact?  Via discussions on
>     this mailing list or via meetings?  If you think we should have
>     meetings, how often would you prefer to meet, and would you prefer
>     IRC or phone?

This is my personal preference. I am subscribed to so many lists that at
each given time I am ignoring 9 out of ten lists. I would prefer
meetings, it would force us to engage each other. I think IRC is a more
"open" medium, but I don't really mind phone either.

> 
> 2) What would you like to see the Committee be responsible for doing?
>     I would prefer specific and achievable things rather than vague
>     generalizations.
> 

I would like to see general evangelizing in the greater GNOME community.
This includes blogging about a11y. Coordinating a11y related papers in
GNOME related conferences, and taking the stage in wider GNOME
gatherings, perhaps a lightening talk at the next GUADEC.

Maybe start a blog ala "Debian package of the day", that would be
"Inaccessible application of the week/month", in which we poke fun at an
application (or a web site) that is doing something wrong. Of course the
tone would need to be constructive and friendly when we are addressing
fellow FOSS devs. But it could be a lot of fun to dis big web sites that
are largely inaccessible for silly reasons.

> 3) What do you see that is blocking progress (or hindering acceptance)
>     of GNOME a11y.  What do you think could be done to improve things?

Custom widgets and eye-candy are often overlooked. We need to set
examples about how you could be sexy and accessible at the same time.
In the blog idea above we could provide examples of how to fix a11y
issues.

> 4) Assuming that we can identify a list of tasks in the answers to the
>     above questions, would you be willing to invest time in the Committee
>     to chip in and take on tasks to make progress in these areas?
> 

Sure.