[Nfbc-info] Conversations with Jeff wieland

[Michael Peterson]

Here are exerpts of my correspondence with Jeff wieland at Facebook He is 
very aproachable and I think if enough of us dialogue with him so he sees 
blind people really are concerned he will assist us in doing everything 
possible to improve accessability.
He isn't standoffish like MySpace where you can't even contact the right 
people. Accessability is a problem with games on all the social networks not 
just Facebook.
Sometimes we can do as much without using the sword of the law other times 
we must.  This time I really urge each of you to write Jeff.  Share the 
dialogue with the group if you like.
I could change my mind if we have a communications breakdown but I don't 
think that's the situation here at least not just yet.
I really wish Jeff could have attended the convention but he wasn't able to 
perhaps though he will be able to attend if he's invited by another State or 
Better still National.
I think he will listen and help.
His email is jeffw at facebook.comConversations follow Mike
Hey Michael,
Awesome - I really appreciate it. Also, feel free to point folks in my 
direction
(jeffw@) if you come across any complaints or feedback about our product. I'm 
always
available to talk about improvements to Facebook.
How did the panel and conference go?
Best - Jeff
On 10/25/09 8:11 PM, "Michael Peterson" <
its.mike at att.net
> wrote:
   Thanks Jeff.
Sounds great.
I will definitely keep you in the loope regarding conferences that you might 
be able
to participate in and will let our state president know of your interest to 
be involved
in anything on the horizon.
Mike Peterson
----- Original Message -----
From:  Jeff Wieland <
mailto:jeffw at facebook.com
>
To: Michael Peterson <
mailto:its.mike at att.net
>
Sent: Thursday, October 22, 2009 12:11  PM
Subject: Re: An idea
Hey Michael,
Sorry for the late reply. I'm not  sure I'm going to be able to put this 
together
by Saturday (I'm OOO starting  today). I'm still extremely interested in 
participating
in any panel  opportunities with the NFB - are there more opportunities 
coming up
for  that?
I'm actually in the process of coordinating some training for our  design 
team with
regards to improving our code accessibility, so once that's  over let's 
revisit the
idea of building ownership in the developer community  on this issue. Sound 
good?
Best - Jeff
Hey   Mike,
Definitely keep me posted on any events in the future -  I'm very 
interested in
having an opportunity to chat more in-depth  with the community  on web 
accessibility,
and Facebook's  accessibility in general. I think it  would be interesting 
to do
an  open workshop with developers interested in  improving their app's 
accessibility
at some point but this is a tricky  problem.  We  have thousands of 
developers building
applications on top of  our  platform, so if we were to try to improve 
accessibility
on that front I'd   like to come up with a solution that is as scalable as 
possible.
I  do urge you  to reach out to the developers of the individual 
applications that
you use to  inform them of your experience and any  difficulties you've 
encountered
(either  via Facebook or their main  web site) - I've found that ultimately 
the best
way  for developers  to learn of bugs/fail points is to hear it from the 
people that
experience these issues.
Best - Jeff
On  10/16/09 1:02 PM, "Michael Peterson" <
its.mike at att.net
>  wrote:
 Hi Jeff.  I didn't see a   contact link there might be I didn't scroll down 
I'm
not really  sure how  they could adapt it Litterally you can't use the 
applications
to much in  window-eyes, or access to go from what I  know my wife has a 
small amount
of  sight and says it would be  impossible to use these type applications. 
I wonder
if  perhaps you and I could try to set up a meeting where we  could get 
some of
these developers together with you me and some of the NFBC   students or a 
broader
group of blind consumers.  Maybe even  in a  setting where hands on we could 
work
with the developers and  show them what  needs to be done or at least what 
doesn't
work.
We could call it an  accessability developers clinic or  something.
One experiment I tried was  to switch to mobile.   That helps for many 
things but
not for the game   applications.
Interestingly at least so far not one of the game   applications is 
accessible at
least not in my experience.
if  you look at  my facebook account you probably can see some of what  I've 
tooled
with.
You could download the window-eyes demo or  access to go and see if  for 
example
you could build a farm in  farmville without using the mouse. If  you used 
the mouse
affectively could it be done not looking at the   screen?
The one application I did use that worked was a   twitter application that 
connected
facebook and twitter but that  got anoying  to people so I took it off.
We will definitely  advise you of other events  and I'll do my best to see 
the invites
are always open to you to advance our   dialogue.
 Mike