Notes # 13: Canada Progress Reports, Sign Language In The Parliament, Forza Horizon 6 ...

Personal Notes

In June, the İstanbul Music Festival will be organized for the 54th time. There will be 21 events across many different locations in the city. Artists from all around the world will perform mainly jazz and classical music in many unique venues, some of which are historical places. So, my wife and I didn’t want to miss this huge festival and bought tickets for 2 concerts when we saw the announcement.

Then I realized that there is an easy-to-read accessibility information guide for the event. In the guide, short information is written for every event, critical public transportation information was included, and physical accessibility facilities were detailed for each venue. The guide is very well-prepared and especially the public transportation information is very useful. Here is the link to the guide (in Turkish). Thank you, İKSV, for this great work.

I have just one criticism. In the guide, we saw that there is a 50% discount on tickets if you have a disability. Since we saw the accessibility guide after we bought the tickets, we paid the full price. In the ticketing system, there is no notification. Also, on the event website, there is no visible information about ticket discounts in the tickets section. So, a person with a disability has to read the accessibility guide to know about the discount. However, accessibility information should be mainstreamed. If there is a service provided for people with disabilities, it should be visible to everyone on a mainstream platform such as the ticketing website or event page, and everyone should know about it without effort.

News

The Deadline For Accessible Canada Act Progress Reports Is Almost Here

Source: Deque

With the Accessible Canada Act, the Canadian Government’s goal is to create a barrier-free Canada by January 1, 2040. Organizations should notify the Accessibility Commissioner periodically with progress reports to show what they are doing toward this long-term goal. And deadline for progress reports is almost here. In the progress reports, an organization must be able to clearly demonstrate where barriers exist, what progress has been made, who is accountable, and how accessibility improvements are being sustained over time. The Accessible Canada Act’s progress-focused model can be a great example for many other legislations. Below, I wrote an “In Detail” section on this issue.

Nepal’s Parliament Is Now Accessible In Sign Language—But Interpreters Face Challenges

Source: Kathmandu Post

From now on, the Deaf community in Nepal can follow parliamentary discussions on TV with sign language interpretation. While this is a great step toward equal participation in democracy, and this step has been welcomed by activists, Nepali Sign Language does not have standard signs for parliamentary terms. Also, interpreters struggle with the aggressive atmosphere of the parliament. It becomes difficult to decide whose words should be translated first when everyone interrupts each other. I admit that these are real challenges but can be overcome with the support of the Deaf community.

Forza Horizon 6 Accessibility Support

Source: Forza Support

Forza Horizon 6, a well-known open-world racing game, is newly released with many accessibility options. In the support page, they introduced AutoDrive and proximity radar to make the game accessible for gamers with different skill levels. These options are like driving assistant. I am wondering whether these options make the gaming experience enjoyable and competitive for me, as a partially-sighted person, as well. I am also wondering whether the high contrast mode is working in the race. Generally, my main challenge is not with the menu, actually; my main challenge is with the game’s complex atmosphere. Anyway, this is a good initiative. But the gaming industry should understand that I do not want to open the game and just experience the minimum. I want to compete with every player and feel the sense of victory.

Inspirations

AI-Generated UI Is Inaccessible By Default

Source: Frontend Masters

“Most LLMs optimize for visual output while generating near-zero semantic information for the layer that assistive technologies actually read. This article explains the architectural reasons and presents a five-layer enforcement system of prompt constraints. These include static analysis, runtime testing, CI integration, and accessible component abstractions that make semantic correctness automatic rather than aspirational. “ The most useful and practical article on accessibility and AI that I have ever read.

Introducing TongueType

Source: A Beautiful Site

AI sometimes causes privacy issues, but it is really democratizing the field. Everyone can build their own app by emphasizing their own favorite feature. In this article, TongueType is created mainly for privacy reasons. For TongueType, “nothing is uploaded. Nothing is logged. There’s no account to create. Zero telemetry. Your voice never leaves your Mac.” You can protect your privacy while using a voice dictation app for accessibility.

The Simplest Way To Write

Source: Blank Page

A browser app summarizing our modern world, where everyone has attention issues. There are so many apps, and every app has many features that we do not use. That’s why simplicity and minimalism will be the new trend in the near future. Blank Page is an interesting app by simplifying the oldest and easiest task in the world: Writing. World and technology are so complex that we should simplify every task, even the most basic ones. Or should we?

In Detail: Best Practices From Accessible Canada Act

Read this article on its own page

Since Turkish Airlines also has operations in Canada, we were affected by the Canada progress report process. The feedback we received during this process and the government’s expectations showed me some good examples regarding the implementation of legal regulations.

• Action-Orientedness: Most legal texts mention certain principles. Concepts such as inclusivity, equality, and diversity remain only on paper, and good intentions are presented regarding their implementation. What comes after, however, remains unclear. To be honest, when writing our progress reports for Canada, we also used some vague expressions in our first draft. However, the feedback we received indicated that every statement written must be supported by an action. The message is very clear: Let’s set aside conceptual discussions and talk about what we have done.
• Covering Not Only Customers But Also Employees: What I like most about Canadian regulations is that they keep the scope broad. Under EAA or American laws, it is sufficient for applications that interact with customers to be accessible. However, there are dozens of employee experience applications used within the organization. Canadian laws also care about and require the accessibility of these applications to support the employment of people with disabilities. We are not just people who benefit from services; we are also people who produce, and the necessary arrangements must be made for this as well.
• Taking Feedback Seriously: The most important part of reporting is feedback. You need to clearly present which disability organizations you contacted, what information you collected, and what action plan you prepared for them. I even think that feedback is valued more than standards. In the draft we submitted, we referenced the feedback we received rather than universal standards.
• Prioritizing Progress Over Targets: In progress reports, what is expected from you is not to comply with something by a deadline. In fact, we saw in recent weeks that such “deadline” approaches are not reasonable. Deadlines for laws such as ADA Title 2 and Section 504 were postponed. Canada provides us with certain checkpoints through progress reports. The progress made at these checkpoints is verified by the government and supported by feedback. It is actually like a mentoring process.