Ebu Access Cast 17
Dec 22, 2019
We are back with the latest episode of the EBU Access Cast and as it happens the last one for the year 2019 and the teens of this century. As Christmas is drawing closer, we began this episode with some tech gadget Christmas gifts discussion. Mario bought a Fossil 5 Gen Wear OS smartwatch and shared his experience of setting it up for the first time. His brief demo of this device's possibilities can be found in the demo Time section of this show.
We kicked off the news section by mentioning the winner of this year's Accessible City Award of the European Commission the Polish capital Warsaw. This was an opportunity for Paweł to tell a little bit about various initiatives, projects and good practices applied in the city to make it friendly for its visually impaired inhabitants. Among the projects discussed there was the Invisible Exhibition which explains life with blindness to sighted visitors, the social campaign "Path of Accessibility: Share Your Space" which raises awareness of issues connecting to navigating the public space of Warsaw by persons with visual impairments and the in-door and outdoor beacon-based orientation system Totupoint.
You can learn more about the Accessible City Award by watching a described Video created by the European Commission in cooperation with the EBU represented by Tanja.
WE returned to Seeing AI with its important update for many users across Europe as support for new languages is introduced.
We then mentioned some good news for all of our musician listeners as the Musescore music notation software adds new accessibility features and SM music Reader, the first Android and in general mobile app for accessible reviewing and drawing of music notes appears on the market.
Coming back to Poland for a while, Paweł shared an example of a good accessibility practice introduced by one of the local operators of self-service package pick-up stations.
This was not the only accessibility innovation in terms of self-service devices that we discussed as we also delved into what manufacturers of touchscreen-based payment terminals do to allow operation by blind customers. Valina and Pax A920 will be one of the first solutions to tackle this challenge.
New year is the time of resolutions and decisions to do something different. WE bring you some inspiration with BeMyEyes's hand-picked list of accessible museum and art experiences, most of them located in Europe.
If you prefer consuming different forms of art from the comfort of your house, we also took a look at See, one of Apple's exclusive TV shows available for their brand-new streaming platform Apple TV Plus. The show takes place in a world inhabited by a population where almost everyone is blind. We invite you to hear and read how it is like directing an action-packed show with blind actors in cast and consulted in close cooperation with blindness organizations.
Before concluding the show we also talked about one of EBU's current campaigns focused on the Marrakesh Treaty, European Accessibility Act and the accessibility in the book publishing industry. We will hear more on the matter from Antoine Fobe from the EBU who will be interviewed by Tanja.
Remember that you can send us your comments and suggestions through our email and Twitter. WE will be happy to hear them.
Last but not least, we at the EBU Access Cast would like to wish all of our listeners a merry Christmas and all the best for the year 2020. May all of your plans and goals come to fruition and new ones come to mind.