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Re: Podcasting and Accessibility

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From: Joseph Karr O'Connor
Date: Feb 1, 2006 1:15PM


Joshue O Connor < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
Just as an aside:Are Podcasts themselves really mis-sold(if sold is the
right term) by the likes of Apple etc? So it can be a new "thing" to
get excited about.

Joshue,

ROTFL! Our local Apple rep was here the other day extolling the
magnificent educational benefits of Podcasting. Of course, what he was
pushing was Apple as the distributor of our content. We can have Apple
authenticate our users through iTunes, and deliver lectures that way.

When I mentioned the fact that we'd be doing transcripts of the
lectures, citing a lack of labor, he said "would you stand in the way of
new technology?" over an issue like that? I WOULD! Unless all of our
students have access to new course materials, then no students will have
access to new course materials.

There's no way to display a SMIL layer on an MP3 player. If targeting a
video capable iPod you could deliver open captioned video, but that
wouldn't be an audio stream per se and only a very small minority of
users have video iPods.

No, you'd have to make a transcript available in text and stream it in a
SMIL layer. At the very least, you'd have to make a transcript
available. That way users could access the transcripts via screen
reader. But lectures are not always just the instructor speaking, there
are questions from the students, and interchanges between instructor and
student. This would make for complicated transcripts = labor.

I told the Apple rep that I need a software solution for transcriptions.
Of course, that solution is still a few years away.

Then there is recording the lectures. You'd need sound support with
audience mics and a body mic for the lecturer or it'll be awful audio.

My initial foray into Podcasting will be to make selected lectures
available to the public, not making them part of course work, and
providing transcripts of those lectures. I'll select notable lecturers
on various topics I feel the public would like to experience. This is a
good way to open up our process to the public while making the lectures
available to all users.

--
Joseph Karr O'Connor
Manager University Web Communications
California State University Northridge
818-677-7917