Open source and accessibility: Empowering people with disabilities globally

Introduction and Panel of Experts

• The session on open source and accessibility is introduced, with a focus on how open technologies and open source software can help bridge the disability divide, which refers to the gap in outcomes experienced by people with disabilities across various areas of life, including education, employment, and civic engagement (33s).
• Approximately 1.3 billion people worldwide have disabilities, and technology can play a crucial role in bridging the disability divide (37s).
• A panel of experts in accessibility, including Christine Mendoza, Joe Devon, and Josh Mey, is introduced to discuss the topic (1m17s).
• Christine Mendoza is a first-year PhD student at Carnegie Mellon University, Joe Devon is the co-founder of Global Accessibility Awareness Day and chair of the GAD Foundation, and Josh Mey is a blind scientist and researcher who is the founder and president of the board of the Center for Accessibility and Open Source [98.56, 104.119, 117.119].

Defining Disability and Accessibility

• The term "disability" is defined using the social model of disability, which posits that disability arises from a mismatch between the environment and a person, rather than being a deviation from the norm (2m21s).
• The term "accessibility" is defined as the practice of building digital products in a way that is accessible, navigable, and usable by people with disabilities (3m8s).
• The term "assisted technology" is not explicitly defined, but Josh Mey explains that accessibility is simply usability for people with disabilities (3m30s).
• Josh Mey also shares his personal preference for using "blind first" language to describe himself, rather than "people first" language, and emphasizes the importance of putting his disability identity upfront (3m41s).

Assistive Technologies and Accessibility

• Assistive technologies are tools used by people with disabilities to interact with everyday tools that may not have been designed with accessibility in mind, serving as impedance matching devices to facilitate use (4m55s).
• Examples of assistive technologies include screen readers, eye trackers, eye gaze trackers, and alternative communication boards (4m34s).
• Accessibility refers to the properties of artifacts created by humans that make them usable by people with disabilities, and when combined with assistive technologies, can create a more inclusive environment (5m33s).
• A physical example of accessibility is a ramp leading up to a stage, allowing more people to use it, including those with wheelchairs (5m18s).
• If a stage is designed with a ramp as an explicit part of its design, it becomes an integral part of the stage rather than an assistive technology (6m0s).

Luminary: An Open-Source Accessibility Project

• Christine, an undergraduate student, created an open-source project called Luminary to solve a specific accessibility problem she experienced on her campus (6m21s).
• The problem arose when the fire alarm went off in her dorm, and she was unsure of what to do, highlighting the need for accessible campus navigation (7m15s).
• Christine's project, Luminary, aims to provide accessible campus navigation and information sharing to help people with disabilities navigate the campus more easily (6m41s).
• The project focuses on the accessibility of built environment features, such as physical features, and digital access (8m25s).
• Leveraging open source can help solve access problems not only for oneself but also for others globally who experience similar issues (8m35s).
• A small student organization with limited resources can utilize existing technologies through open source, making it extensible by others (8m59s).
• The app Luminary relies on Open Street Map, which is popular among bikers and has great pedestrian paths, as well as other standards built on Open Street Map (9m30s).

Accessibility in a Broader Context

• Technology is only a part of the solution and must work within a broader socioeconomic, political, legal, and bureaucratic context (9m51s).
• Accessibility is intertwined with many systems, including the physical environment, and can be understood through a model of the environment as a system of spheres (10m26s).
• The model includes individual characteristics, interpersonal relationships, local and working conditions, and broader systems, including data (11m1s).
• Data itself is an interface to many things and informs policies, especially in the age of tracking and AI (12m36s).
• The app Luminary aimed to represent people of all different disabilities in the actual data (12m59s).

The Importance of Open Source and Accessibility

• Open source and accessibility are crucial for people with disabilities, as they provide equity, support education and employment opportunities, and expand possibilities, which is particularly important for the over a billion people with disabilities worldwide who are disproportionately underserved in terms of opportunity and economic development (14m20s).
• Ensuring that open source projects, including big projects like Linux, Drupal, and WordPress, are accessible and usable by people with disabilities is essential, as well as supporting smaller projects like open-source screen readers, Braille translators, and eye-tracking systems (15m8s).
• It is critical to support the expansion of people with disabilities' participation in open-source communities by breaking down barriers on the tools used and the assumptions made, which will naturally lead to better outcomes for accessibility (16m15s).
• As more people with disabilities are involved directly in the creation and conversations around the delivery and development of open source, the better open source will be at building equity for people with disabilities into its systems and deliverables (16m43s).
• The Center for Accessibility and Open Source aims to sustainably bring accessibility into the open source world and open source communities by building disability inclusion into the communities that sustain open source projects (17m14s).
• There are various ways to support people with disabilities in an open-source context, including education, improving the accessibility of open-source tooling, and helping organizations like GitHub think about accessibility, with the goal of creating better outcomes for people with disabilities (17m35s).

Supporting Disability Inclusion in Open Source

• Hackathons can be a great way to promote accessibility, but often miss the mark for disability and accessibility, and creating an environment for disability and accessibility hackathons could be beneficial (18m10s).
• Working directly with open-source maintainers, participants, and contributors can help people with disabilities participate in those communities, and internships for students with disabilities could help break down barriers (18m32s).
• Organizations like the Center for Accessibility and Open Source, GitHub, and the Gad Foundation are eager to collaborate and promote accessibility in open-source projects (19m2s).
• The Gad Foundation and other organizations are doing great work in this space, and creating a network that brings stakeholders together to focus on disability inclusion in open-source projects could be beneficial (19m17s).

Open-Source Tools and AI for Accessibility

• Open-source developer tools like axc cor, P11y, Accessibility Insights, and Lighthouse are helping developers create mainstream software that is also accessible (20m7s).
• The use of AI co-pilots like Co-Pilot is allowing developers to create more accessible software, and open-sourcing this work can help the entire community do more with it (20m51s).

The Global Accessibility Awareness Day (GAAD)

• The Global Accessibility Awareness Day foundation, also known as the Gad Foundation, has been promoting accessibility awareness for over 10 years (21m24s).
• The Global Accessibility Awareness Day started as a grassroots movement over 13 years ago, with the goal of improving accessibility for people with disabilities, particularly in the context of online banking (21m50s).
• The movement gained significant traction after a blog post about the issue went viral, reaching over 220 million people on social media (22m21s).
• The movement eventually led to the creation of a foundation, which established the GAAD pledge, a commitment for open-source projects to make accessibility a core value (22m52s).
• The GAAD pledge has been taken by several prominent open-source projects, including React Native, Ember JS, Drupal, and Intel's OpenFL project (23m46s).
• The goal of the GAAD pledge is to change the culture of open-source development to prioritize accessibility, making it a core value of the project rather than an afterthought (24m5s).
• By changing the culture, the hope is to create a more accessible world, as developers will bake accessibility into their products from the start (24m26s).
• The importance of thought leadership from open-source projects in promoting accessibility is emphasized, as it can have a significant impact on the culture of development (24m35s).

AI and Disability

• The conversation also touches on the topic of AI and its potential to benefit people with disabilities, while also acknowledging the risks of exclusion (25m14s).
• The question is raised about how AI is being made accessible for people with disabilities, highlighting the need for discussion and action on this topic (25m38s).
• The intersectionality of disability work within open source communities is a crucial topic, and Josh has valuable opinions on the matter (25m41s).
• Despite being a common topic in AI panels, many AI researchers are aware of bias in data but choose not to address it, and the focus should be on inspiring them to understand the benefits of doing so (26m1s).
• Artificial intelligence aims to emulate human abilities, and everyone has different abilities, including those with disabilities such as being blind, deaf, or in a wheelchair (26m46s).
• The tech industry has studied the differences in people's abilities, and by taking data from this community, better models can be built (27m15s).
• Involving people with disabilities in the AI community is essential, as their exclusion can lead to incorrect assumptions and models (27m37s).
• New technologies, including AI, can be both beneficial and scary, and it's essential to remember that technology is not a solution to accessibility problems on its own (27m52s).
• AI can be used to solve accessibility problems, such as describing visual images for the blind, summarizing documents, and adding markup to documents (28m22s).
• However, AI can also be used to create inaccessible things, such as chatbots with inaccessible UI or biased data sets that provide wrong or harmful answers (28m42s).
• The key is not to focus on the technical problems but to address the same issues that need to be solved in every accessibility situation, which are often not technical (29m39s).

The Biggest Problem in Accessibility

• The biggest problem in accessibility is not technical, but rather people's lack of understanding that individuals with disabilities are human and need to be included as users for anything that is built, and to help people understand the specific needs of people with disabilities rather than building things based on assumptions (29m52s).
• The best way to address this issue is to meet and hang out with people with disabilities, as this is the most effective way to learn about disability and understand the needs of people with disabilities (30m36s).
• The GAD Foundation has a program called the GAD Exchange, which helps developers and designers connect with people with disabilities to create a more inclusive and accessible environment (30m58s).

Exploring AI Models for Bias

• One approach to exploring AI models for bias is to probe them with lists of features and ask them to pick from a list of terms, which can help identify biases such as gender bias or disability bias (31m52s).
• AI models can also be asked to tell stories or pretend to be a specific persona, which can help identify biases and stereotypes in the models' responses (32m51s).
• When exploring AI models for disability bias, it's essential to recognize that each category of disability is not a monolith and that individuals with disabilities have diverse experiences and needs (32m29s).
• Representation of people with disabilities in AI models is crucial, as it can help increase exposure and reduce fear of engaging with disability (33m31s).
• The concept of "inspiration porn" was mentioned, which refers to reducing a community to its inspirational value, and an example was given of a large language model's story about a person overcoming their disabilities and becoming an inspiration to others, which oversimplifies the complexities of living with a disability (33m52s).

Disability, Technology, and Open Source

• Many everyday challenges, such as finding accessible apartments, can be difficult for people with disabilities, and technology can play a crucial role in addressing these issues (34m27s).
• Disability has always been an integral part of the human condition, and technology is now essential for many aspects of life, including education, employment, and social interactions (35m7s).
• It is up to the people working on technology, particularly those in open-source communities, to decide whether everyone gets to participate in technology and modern life, and to make technology inclusive and accessible (35m38s).
• Open-source communities can provide an "on-ramp" for making technology more inclusive and removing barriers to participation (36m10s).
• Josh emphasized the importance of making open-source technology accessible to everyone, including people with disabilities, and encouraged viewers to watch the documentary "Crip Camp" to learn more about disability and accessibility (36m30s).
• Josh also stressed that people with disabilities disproportionately need access to free and open-source software, and that it is essential to prioritize accessibility in technology development (37m27s).
• The documentary "Crip Camp" is available on YouTube and Netflix, and it provides valuable insights into disability and accessibility, making it a worthwhile watch for those looking to learn more about the topic (38m11s).

Contact Information and Call to Action

• To find out more about Josh, he can be reached at ca.org, or on social media platforms such as Twitter (@berkeleyblank), LinkedIn (Josh Mey), and GitHub (38m46s).
• Many people are inspired to work on projects that matter, and creating accessible technology can be a fulfilling and innovative pursuit (39m19s).
• Building technology with accessibility in mind can be a fascinating space where individuals can make a difference and work on innovative solutions (40m24s).
• Josh can be reached on social media platforms such as GitHub (@joevon), Twitter (@joevon), and LinkedIn (joevon) (40m36s).
• It's essential to be open to learning about accessibility and not be afraid to step out of one's comfort zone, as there are many resources available, including online communities and organizations (40m54s).
• Collaboration and asking questions can lead to positive changes, such as the creation of an elevator API at UNCC, which was initiated by student developers (41m32s).
• Christine Mendoza can be reached on social media platforms such as GitHub (Christine iym) and Reddit, where she is easily found (41m53s).
• Appreciation is expressed for continued partnership and the exchange of ideas. (42m23s)
• Everyone is invited to reach out during the final day of the conference to discuss tech, accessibility, and open source. (42m27s)
• The opportunity to talk will be available for only a few hours, and the invitation is extended to have conversations about the mentioned topics. (42m35s)
• Gratitude is expressed to attendees for joining the panel, and a great rest of the conference is wished for them. (42m45s)