Online media

It’s that time again for the people of the Northern Tablelands state election. Some people view it as a right, others say it is an obligation. Either way, the law requires we cast our ballots in a by-election.

Here in New South Wales, the NSW Electoral Commission has spent considerable time developing an online voting application for use in state elections and by-elections. It’s called iVote, and was first used at the last state election in 2011 to great success.

While Google has made significant steps to improve the accessibility of some of its applications, including Gmail and Chrome, Shandra says that the company fails to integrate the needs of disabled users into its product development.

Shandra identifies the social network Google+ as an example of a product which has been released to the public with inaccessible buttons and form fields.

In the presentation, Hollier and Wood discuss how the course, the only one of its kind, enables the Australian government to comply with international web accessibility guidelines.

Their paper highlights the challenges faced by the Australian Government as it progresses towards WCAG 2.0 conformance, and how the course equips government web professionals to meet them.

Someone with a print disability is defined as a person without sight, a person whose sight is severely impaired, a person unable to hold or manipulate books or to focus or move his or her eyes, or a person with a perceptual disability, such as dyslexia.

Organisations with speakers at the conference include Vision Australia, the Australian law Reform Commission, Royal New Zealand Foundation of the Blind. Media Access Australia has two speakers: CEO, Alex Varley, and project manager, Dr Scott Hollier.

Mika Pyyhkala and Lindsay Yazzolino claim they could not get past the H&R Block log-in page when they attempted to file their tax returns in 2012. The complaint alleges H&R Block's website excludes blind taxpayers from accessing the same online service available to other taxpayers.

Article 114 of the Massachusetts Constitution states:

The annual World Wide Web Conference, opened by Tim Berners-Lee, brings together professionals at the forefront of the web. Web For All (W4A) is a stream within the conference which focuses specifically on how web content can be made available to everyone regardless of disability. In its tenth year, W4A will look at how accessibility holds an increasingly prominent place within the future of the web.

First Dog On The Moon (as the cartoonist likes to be known) takes a cast of animal characters and has them play out the political stories making headlines. In this universe, Prime Minister Julia Gillard becomes Power Fox and Senator Barnaby Joyce a talking pumpkin scone. The cartoons, while visually simple, involve many frames and long exchanges of dialogue.