Hi Bryan, It does pose an interesting situation even if a bit unlikely. Making accesssible software like games is completely unimportant until it effects someone personally. It wouldn't necessarily have to be a CEO, but a family member, a board member, or one of the lead game developers for it to become a personal matter for someone in that company. That's always how change, real change, gets started. No one seams interested in making a change until it happens to the right person, at the right time, and then it suddenly becomes a personal matter of interest. The closest thing I can compare this to is Ted Henter coming up with Jaws for Dos around 1987. Before then if you were blind and wanted to use an IBM compatible PC running MS Dos or PC Dos there really wasn't much you could do about the situation. Then, Ted Henter had, I want to say, a motor cycle accident that left him blind, and instead of giving up on computers he got some sighted developers together and founded a company called Henter-Joice with the soul aim of creating screen readers and other adaptive software for the blind and low vision. That single change in one man's life has lead to a number of accessible products like Jaws and Magic which has greatly improved the lives of many blind computer users. I disagree with many of Freedom Scientifics current business practices, but I can say that what Ted Henter did was a dramatic improvement in my own life as I have used a number of his products like Jaws personally to get through high school, college, and even on some contract jobs. I think when it comes to mainstream accessible games something similar will have to happen to someone who has a lot of influence and power within a game company for that kind of revolutionary change in polacy to take place. What would happen, for example, if Bill Gates or someone he loves went blind tomorrow? Would he suddenly want the company he started to begin creating accessible XBox consoles and want a more powerful screen reader than Narrator to be incorperated into the Windows operating system? Would that event make software accessibility a more important issue for him and his company? As for Game Spot yeah I have noticed a number of posters there are pretty rude. I don't know the average age of the posters there, but they often strike me as young, very mouthy, punks with no respect for anyone out of their immediate circle of friends. There comments about blind people in general really irritated me as it was obvious to me the posters didn't have a clue what they were talking about and were just shooting there mouth off again. All they succeeded in doing is proving how truly ignorant they really are when it comes to anyone with disabilities. As for the Sony lawsuit I have to agree with you that it wasn't a good thing. For one thing there is no law mandating that these companies have to provide accessibility, any accessibility, making it a tough legal battle to begin with. Then, bringing attention to the problem via a lawsuit hasn't braught any sympathy to our cause. The mainstream gamers, like those on Game Spot, just think we are acting like spoiled brats demmanding our own way. Even worse the companies now like us less, because instead of trying to talk to them and get accessibility included through mutual cooperation and via peaceful means this one gamer has just braught the legal system into this trying to get accessibility into his favorite games through brute force. That just upsets the companies making them less likely to want to listen to organizations like Able Gamers and the Game Accessibility Project. The last thing we want is for this person to lose big in court, and then have the game companies simply tune us out completely. Which I am afraid will happen as a result of this court case. Speaking of your comment about accessible cars that was someone elses comment on Game Spot practically word for word. Someone basicly said if blind people are going to take Sony to court over game accessibility why aren't we taking automobile companies to court for automobile accessibility. They have a point, but you know and i know there is a big difference in playing a game and driving acar. It is far easier to make a game like Mortal Kombat accessible than make an automobile completely accesible to a totally blind driver.
On 6/9/10, Bryan Peterson <bpeterson2...@cableone.net> wrote: > Oh I know it's not likely to change anything, but it's worth imagining. > Because if he did discover that contrary to popular belief he could still > live and do things for himself, sooner or later he would, if he was a gamer > during his sighted life, want to find ways to get back into that. Then the > now former gaming company CEO would be right there in the same boat with the > rest of us, in a small market with very few games that are likely to satisfy > his need for an engrossing experience. Certainly MOTA and ENtombed and > possibly Time of Conflict might go some way in the right direction but not > many more of our games do. > As for the Gamespot thing, those folks are generally pretty rude to one > another anyway, whether someone blind posts there or not. I've read their > replies to other articles having nothing whatsoever to do with blindness and > that's pretty much par for the course over there. The same is true of the > Game FAQs message boards, where people who violate the TOS more often than > not tend to get off scott free while someone who didn't gets moderated as > though they had. But I did hear about the article over there about the > lawsuit against sony and, while I don't agree with the comments about blind > people I do agree that the lawsuit was rather riddiculous since it only > enhances the view that some sighted folks have that we blind folks are > spoiled brats. Next, why not sue the auto industry for not making cars > accessible? My next question would be how the heck would they go about > making a car accessible? > We are the Knights who say...Ni! --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gam...@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
