Thread Subject: Re: Tomorrow's conf call

From: Dave Singer
Date: Tue, Oct 09 2007 4:00 PM

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At 15:31 -0400 9/10/07, Larry Goldberg wrote:
>
>We will discuss today's Plenary meeting/conference call, suggested changes
>to the enclosed draft, and hopefully come to a conclusion regarding the
>"caption button"/"top-level menu" proposal.

As worded, I really don't think I can -- or we should -- agree to
these, unless they are restricted to 'classical analog television'.
They are both making into mandates a question of the design of the
system.

The furthest we should go in this direction is a recommendation. We
simply do not know how to design these products, and inserting a
design mandate may well have a counter-productive effect:
manufacturers who were willing to meet the spirit of the regulations,
and provide accessible equipment, may well not wish to meet the
letter of such a design mandate, and consequently (since they would
no longer be able to claim compliance) do nothing.

I am also wondering why the people needing captions need to have this
explicit access method, but those (for example) needing audio
description of video are left without even a guideline as to how it
should be enabled?

Finally, what happens to option (2) when the menus on a system are
enabled some other way than pressing a menu button on a remote?

So, trying again, I'd like to *broaden* the scope of the *mandate*
while leaving product design only recommended:

* * * * *

For all accessibility options, including but not limited to Captions,
and Audio Description of Video [or whatever the term we settled on
is], the enabling and disabling of that accessibility option must
also be readily accessible to those desiring it, meaning that the
control must both be easy to find, and easily used by someone needing
it.

For captions, recommended approaches include:
1. A caption on/off button on the TV remote control;
2. Caption control(s) on the first menu that appears when on-screen
menus are displayed;
--
David Singer
Apple/QuickTime

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