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Re: Accessible Webinar / Meeting products?

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From: Mike Bicknell
Date: Jan 13, 2015 9:00AM

You're welcome, Cliff. It will be interesting to see what happens as Lync
and Skype merge or rather as Skype for Business comes online incorporating
Lync.

Mike Bicknell



On 1/10/15, 1:59 AM, "Cliff Tyllick" < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:

>Huge help, Mike!
>
>Thanks,
>
>Cliff Tyllick
>
>On Wednesday, December 17, 2014, Mike Bicknell < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
>wrote:
>
>> A couple of years ago I tested Accessible Events, but found it didn¹t
>>work
>> for Macs. I¹m curious if that has changed.
>>
>> WSSB uses Microsoft Lync which is now included in Office 365 and free to
>> Education. A few years ago, the Lync accessibility team came down to our
>> campus for a week to make notes, ask questions, and to videotape. You
>>can
>> use a refreshable braille display with Lync. We use it to teach our
>> distance learning math classes and it works fine. We even had a student
>> download the Lync iPhone app and use it while in Hawaii on vacation. We
>> are also beginning to use Lync for web meetings with professionals. The
>> person who started the meeting can also record sessions and manage the
>> videos themselves. The scheduler integrates with Outlook if that is a
>> benefit.
>>
>> One problem Lync has is that there is no live captioning component as
>>with
>> Adobe Connect. One way to resolve this is to use a third party
>>captioning
>> company, who sets up a web page for the streaming captions. The third
>> party captions typically need lots of cleanup, so for archived videos I
>> don¹t prefer to keep the captions that are embedded in Adobe Connect
>> anyway. With any third party captioner you will get the transcript which
>> can be edited along with the video and create separate caption files
>>from
>> that text.
>>
>> Another difficulty with Lync for some presenters can be the complexity
>>of
>> the settings and preferences, though these are mercifully hidden from
>>view.
>>
>> My apologies for the length. I hope this helps.
>>
>> Mike
>>
>> ‹
>>
>> Mike Bicknell
>> Digital Learning, Research, and Development Coordinator
>> Chief Information Officer
>> Washington State School for the Blind
>> 360-696-6321, ext. 133
>> http://www.wssb.wa.gov
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On 12/17/14, 11:10 AM, "Tim Harshbarger"
>> < <EMAIL REMOVED> <javascript:;>> wrote:
>>
>> >What about "Accessible Event" by SeroTek?
>> >
>> >http://www.serotek.com/accessibleevent
>> >
>> >
>> >It has been some time since I used it but when I did, it seemed to work
>> >well using a screen reader--and the presentation materials in the
>>browser
>> >window seemed accessible. I gather it can integrate with other online
>> >conferencing products, but I don't know much more about it other than
>> >from the few times I did use it.
>> >
>> >