Access on Main Street

The Pew Center sponsored a usability review of state websites providing election-related information, and found that on a scale of 1 to 100, the average overall usability score was a discouraging 58. Ten percent of the score was based on minimal accessibility implementation (use of ALT attributes, color contrast, Skip-Nav links, scalable fonts, and color indication of visited links), and the average there was only 49. Oof.

Pew Center: Being Online is Not Enough: State Elections Web Sites (PDF)

Microsoft is again in the news today for its interface research.  This time it’s kind of a Zen koan.  Instead of interacting with a touch screen, your fingers dance meaningfully all around the flat-on-its-back device, up to 10 cm. away.  For example, moving both index fingers clockwise could rotate an image on the display; moving them in opposite directions could zoom into the image.  Moving both fingers back and to the left will bring up the Zapruder film.

Radically expanding the range of a gesture interface like this, and not requiring that it be gripped, could have enormous potential for people whose dexterity impairment might otherwise rule them out for touchscreen use.  There’s still the issue of how blind and low vision users will interact with it, but reducing the target accuracy — make the right gesture anywhere in space — would help there as well.

Microsoft SideSight project promises to take multi-touch beyond the screen – Engadget

A small Northwestern company called Microsoft is doing research on tactile alternatives to vibration for technology-to-human interaction; options include tapping and rubbing. What we’re most intrigued by is that some of these percussive strategies could also be configured in unique rhythms and used as a nonlinguistic way to communicate small, repetitive pieces of information, such as “I’m leaving the office now,” or “This is the last time I’m reminding you to load the dishwasher!” Implications therefore for some people with cognitive disabilities, as well as Deaf folks.

PC Mag: New Ways That Your Cell Phone Could ‘Talk’ to You

Finetuna is no longer just something you get at Fisherman’s Wharf; it’s also a free and easy way to annotate images either on your computer or on the Web, and then email the annotated image wherever you like. If the notes can then be accessed by screen readers, it could be an interesting on-the-fly way of providing description of graphics to compensate for websites that still don’t make proper use of ALT or LONGDESC attributes.

Lifehacker: Finetuna shares images for group comments

Another link in the Yanko chain of fine design concepts: a motorized, remote controlled suitcase.  No matter what the airport security folks think about this, we love the idea of hands-free, lug-less luggage for wheelchair and walker users, strength- or stamina-challenged travellers, and probably others.  Remember, they all laughed at rolling luggage a generation ago; this is just one step closer to that jetpack we’ve been promised.  But please remember to rotate it so the price tag faces the other way.

Concept: Follow Up Wheely Motorized Baggage Automagically Follows You

Liquavista has a new electronic display technology called electrowetting (yeah, we laughed too) that claims to have better power efficiency and visibility indoors and out.  This could lead to larger, easier to read displays.  Electrowetting uses oil-based dyes instead of uni-colored light emitters, so — theoretically — they could build a display with carefully selected color contrast capabilities.  Right now the technology is aimed at secondary displays (like on the outside of a mobile phone) that use segments, but they’re working on reducing the size of each cell.

EcoGeek – Clean Technology: Liquavista Introduces Next Generation Displays

Swiss researchers have found four different ways of remotely detecting keystrokes issued from wired keyboards, even through walls and from distances over 65 feet away. A confidentiality issue, sure, but it could also be exploited to extend access when a user with mobility impairments needs to provide input to a computer located some distance away in a home or office situation–most wireless keyboards only cover about 30 feet. Yet another example of potential conflicts between the interests of accessibility and security.

Engadget: Keyboard eavesdropping just got way easier thanks to electromagnetic emanations