Here here. I've saved up and purchased all of my assistive tech over the
years. No group of people is entitled to things for free just because of
what may be wrong with them. Remember that virus that disabled all of
the pirated copies of JAWS a couple years ago for Christmas? I'd really
like to shake the hand of whoever put that crack together. I still
chuckle about it when the incident comes to mind.
Steve
On 3/2/2010 10:21 AM, Amanda Rush wrote:
Thanks for the compliment Doug. Now let me open up another can of worms.
I'm not necessarily going out of my way to piss people off, but if it
happens, oh well.
I think that, to a large extent, a lot of blind people think they're
entitled to accessibility from the private sector, and not only that, but
entitled to it for free. Yes, it would be nice if we lived in a perfectly
accessible world, where everything worked and we didn't have to pay extra
or put in any extra work. But we don't. And at least in the US, (I live in
the US so I can't comment on the UK or other countries), the ADA, which
has very few teeth in itself, doesn't apply to the private sector, unless
they're receiving government funding. And even then, there's the
"reasonable accommodation" clause. So we really are, in most cases, better
off hacking our own solutions together, and maybe sharing them with each
other so there's less re-inventing of the wheel. Because trust me, if I
were to, say, call FS and tell them that all this Red Hat crap I'm dealing
with is almost inaccessible, and I want better support for terminal
emulators, they're pretty much going to tell me to fuck myself because
there's not enough of a market share for that sort of thing, and same goes
for virtual machines and all these other nice new technologies they don't
officially support.
-----Original Message-----
From: mai...@andrelouis.com [mailto:mai...@andrelouis.com] On Behalf Of
Doug Langley
Sent: Tuesday, March 02, 2010 10:12
To: talk2
Subject: Re: The Talk2 List Fw: [access] WFA User Protest
Also, the WFA concept of free life time upgrades also put a nail in its
coffin. Wheres the insentive for Vodaphone to develop a program which
wont bring them any sort of positive cash flow? This is a gps program
and it needs updated data on a regular basis and wheres the insentive
for vodaphone to do *anything* that wont bring them at least the ability
to break even? First and formost its about money and 777 blind people
that signed a petition who arent obligated (by the license agreement) to
ever give them another penny arent going to be insentive enough to do
anything about it.
On 3/2/2010 7:03 AM, Doug Langley wrote:
I'm glad to see someone else with a brain. No one ever takes these
internet petitions seriously. I signed it but only because it can only
help more than hurt. That being said, if people spent as much time
working on a new solution instead of trying to save an old dieing one
we would probably all be better off. This is vodaphone. they hear
from more people in a single hour than they will in this hole
petition. And all this petition is doing is asking for a reason why.
so we can spend 3 months getting 778 signatures so they can say,
"because it didnt make business sense." Thank you for contacting
vodaphone we hope we can service you in the future.
On 3/2/2010 6:57 AM, Amanda Rush wrote:
K this is a record. I was turned off by about the second line of this
guy's message. I totally get being angry about accessibility or the
lack
thereof, but begging for signatures is like begging for charity.
Neither
one works very well, and getting angry with the people you're trying to
get signatures/charity from isn't a good thing either. Also, IMO, (and
it's probably only my opinion, and we know what those are like, but
this
is the crux of the entire accessibility fight), companies like this one
and every other one ignore these sorts of petitions because, even if
every
single blind user were to call their bluff, we're not a big enough of
their market to matter as far as sales or whatever. And in the case
of the
FS petition, we can all bitch and whine till we're out of breath, but
the
fact is that 90% of their clientel is government contracts. So they can
pretty much do whatever, and the other AT companies will eventually go
along or go out of business, and so there's no real insentive for FS
to do
anything positive. Note: I'm not a huge FS fan. At all. So I hope no
one
takes this as rooting for them.
And wow, DJ Patty, haven't heard from you in *ages. I was wondering
what
had happened to you. Good to see you're still around.
Amanda
-----Original Message-----
From: mai...@andrelouis.com [mailto:mai...@andrelouis.com] On Behalf
Of Dj
Paddy
Sent: Monday, March 01, 2010 17:35
To: talk2
Subject: RE: The Talk2 List Fw: [access] WFA User Protest
Guys just displaying understandable anger over loss of access.
Barry
-----Original Message-----
From: mai...@andrelouis.com [mailto:mai...@andrelouis.com] On Behalf Of
Brandon Hicks
Sent: Monday, March 01, 2010 8:45 PM
To: talk2
Subject: Re: The Talk2 List Fw: [access] WFA User Protest
Agreed. This message speaks of childish tantrums. Even the Freedom
Scientific petition didn't get much over a thousand signatures, if even
that. This one's not going to get much more. I thought about it until I
got to about the third line of the message.
Brandon
Stephen Clower wrote:
So... he wants more signatures, but the only way he feels he can get
them is to insult everybody? I won't sign now simply because of the
author's attitude, despite his good intentions.
Steve
On 3/1/2010 2:12 PM, Onj wrote:
I haven't seen a message on this list for months. Why not let the
content of this message speak for itself?
From: Neil Barnfather - TalkNav<ta...@talknav.com>
on Monday, March 01, 2010 6:02 PM
A quick note to all of you who have, and those who as of yet have
not signed
the WFA user protest site.
Before I start my message the link right here and now is
www.talknav.com/protest
Firstly, a note to all of you who have signed, thank you, but I have
to at
this stage say that it is way too few who have made this effort. We
are
nearing 700, yet for Vodafone to take this seriously we need
thousands.
To date we've not even got close to even the number of users of the
application signing, let alone additional support.
Can I especially ask those of you who either work with or for the
organizations that supposedly represent us as blind folk, yes you
lot, those
of you at the RNIB, CNIB, AFB, NFB, etc, etc, you lot really have
made me
rather upset and irritated.
To date I've posted two messages via each of your web-sites
informing you
all of our protest, has any one of you got back to me to ask for
more
detail, have you mass mailed your members, have you lobbied in our
favour,
have you, no sir. Is this an outrage, is this a complete lack of
competence
when it comes to supporting those who you claim to represent? This
individual thinks so. So if you represent, or have a contact at your
local
blind organization please forward this message, we, or certainly I,
am very,
very disappointed in you all.
As for those private individuals who have not yet signed, even if
you do not
own Access or a Symbian phone, your name should be on this list, the
list
says something about who we are and what we stand for as blind
folks, it
says that we will not lay down and be ignored whilst our tools to
freedom
and mobility are stolen from us. It says we have a voice and we are
prepared
to use it when necessary.
This protest is about more than just Wayfinder Access, it is a
symbol, now
please, I urge you all, we need this link spreading, we need it
sharing,
Face Book pages, Twitter, those of you who produce pod casts,
mailing lists
etc, etc, if you believe in your freedom to mobility and your rights
to
accessible products then make your mark.
More than this, those you know need to say that they too are in
support of
our cause, so get your address book and forward this link,
personalize it
with a few lines of message, get the word out there.
The protest site has a league table on it at the bottom of the
public
signatures page, it's dynamic and countries move about on the list.
To date
we've only had a tiny portion of blind people around the world sign
up.
Spread the word folks.
www.talknav.com/protest
This issue rests squarely in your hands, make a difference today...
Regards.
Neil Barnfather.
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