media: AbleTV's webcast of the GSA Access forum . . .

Heres hoping that I am getting this out with enough time for many of you to 
participate in the event.  Please remember to have the Real G2 player 
version 8 installed on your computer in order to view the webcast.  I would 
also appreciate it if this information could be forwarded on to other lists 
where it hasn't been viewed yet.  Thanks and I look forward to many of you 
to come and participate in the event.

Jeffrey Pledger
President, AbleTV, Inc.



PRESS RELEASE
TVWorldwide.com's AbleTV Channel to Webcast GSA's Accessibility Forum Event 
on Section 508, Live, Friday, May 11
Huge Government, Industry Participation Expected in Accessible Interactive 
Webcast, Friday, May 11, 9-12 AM EST at http://www.abletv.net on the 
TVWorldwide.com Network
For Immediate Release
Tuesday, May 8, 2001
Contact:        info@tvworldwide.com
TV Worldwide.com, Inc.
http://www.tvworldwide.com
(703) 961-9250

Jeff Pledger
able@abletv.net
http://www.abletv.net
(301) 890-5944
(703) 598-2253



Chantilly, Va. - TVWorldwide.com, Inc. announced today that AbleTV.net, the 
web-based TV channel for people with disabilities on the TVWorldwide.com 
network, will provide live interactive and accessible webcast coverage of 
the Government Services Administration's Accessibility Forum, Friday May 11 
from 9-12 AM from Gallaudet University's Kellogg Conference Center in 
Washington D.C. The event, sponsored by GSA's Center for Information 
Technology Accommodation (CITA) is an industry, user, and government 
partnership aimed at developing effective and broadly accepted metrics and 
methods to assess Electronics and Information Technology (E&IT) product 
accessibility for people with disabilities, as defined by Public Law 
105-220-408(B), Section 508. The free webcast will feature AbleTV.net's 
live captioned video streaming or "webcaptingsm" process to assist on-line 
participants with disabilities and serve AbleTV's growing audience. This 
AbleTV webcast is sponsored by TVWorldwide.com and its strategic partners, 
Booz Allen and Hamilton and Post Newsweek Tech Media Group.

"We're excited about the prospect of offering this important GSA event for 
accessible on-line participation worldwide, " stated Dave Gardy, Chairman 
and CEO of TVWorldwide.com.  "AbleTV is renowned for its webcasts 
addressing issues important to the community of those people with 
disabilities and we welcome everyone tuning in worldwide."

The mission of the Accessibility Forum is to provide government agencies 
and vendors of E&IT and Assistive Technology with effective and broadly 
accepted metrics and methods to assess whether E&IT products comply with 
Section 508 accessibility standards. The Accessibility Forum seeks industry 
leadership and user involvement in development of these accessibility 
assessment metrics and methods. The Accessibility Forum will also provide 
the infrastructure for continuing collaboration and dialogue between users 
and vendors. It should also provide a means for vendors to gain insight 
into accessibility needs that could be addressed in future products.

The webcast will be directed by Jeff Pledger, President of AbleTV.net, who 
lost his sight 17 years ago due to illness.  "We are pleased to provide 
captioned streaming for this live event webcast with TVWorldwide.com, " 
remarked Pledger. "GSA is fulfilling its commitment to make government and 
industry aware of Section 508 issues to level the E&IT playing field for 
people with disabilities."

The program will be archived with the captioning for later viewing after 
the webcast at  http://www.abletv.net and on TVWorldwide.com's federal 
education channel, Fed EdTV at http://www.fededtv.com.  Participants should 
have the free Real Player version 8 installed prior to the event. Questions 
can be directed to info@tvworldwide.com before and during the event and 
direct phone communication to the TVWorldwide.com webcast staff at (703- 
961-9250, ext. 223.)

About TVWorldwide.com and AbleTV.net
In addition to being a video streaming service 
provider,  TVWorldwide.com  is building a network of community-based 
Internet TV channels, each underwritten by a strategic partner, 
"aimcasting" to targeted B2B and special interest audiences worldwide. 
TVWorldwide.com has worked with one of its first aimcast channels, 
AbleTV.net, to pioneer live and archived video streaming with open 
captioning to aid web site accessibility for the disabled. With this 
advance, AbleTV.net has received charter sponsorship from Microsoft 
Corporation, Sun Microsystems and NCR.


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Received on Thursday, 10 May 2001 06:57:50 UTC