RE: Recording teleconferences?

Anne van Kesteren wrote:
>
> Vicki Stanton wrote:
> > It does seem to me,
> > however, that we should be enthusiastically leading the way, not be
> > dragged kicking and screaming into compliance with W3C policy.
>
> Initially it was a question whether the W3C Systems Team could manage
> it. When it turned out I or someone else could easily do the recording
> it became a social and legal problem.

In a world beyond technology, respect for privacy and human dignity are not 
'problems', they are social ideals that help hold together the notion of 
civilization.  Both of these 'problems' are easily overcome if they are seen 
as simply things that we must do, rather than 'extra work' or a burden to 
progress.

Asking a person if it is OK to record their words and publicly post them 
over the internet is not a problem, it is a simple yes/no question - and if 
they choose no, then they are advised to not speak as collectively the group 
has decided they will publicly post the proceedings.  Providing a text 
transcript is neither hard nor expensive, and it respects the fact that not 
everyone can hear the proceedings. It has the added benefit of being more 
easily translated, it is archived and easily indexed for search, and it aids 
in overall comprehension for all.

You see problems, I see possibilities and opportunities.


> And now I'm being told that in
> order to publish that data I first have to find some money source that
> donates USD 80 each week to get the minutes transcribed. The result of
> all this negative energy is of course that it will not happen at all
> and nobody gets any better. I think that's a shame.

I do not see how insisting on equal access for all is 'negative energy' - 
why do you consider it so?

* Apple: 2008 revenue report of $7.9 billion USD 
(http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2008/10/21results.html )
* Google: 2008 net income was $1.31 billion USD 
(http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/17/technology/17cnd-google.html )
* Mozilla: reported 2007 revenue: $75 million USD 
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozilla_Foundation )
* Opera: 2008 Net income (approx) $14.75 million USD [NOK 89.9 million] 
(http://www.opera.com/media/finance/2008/annual-report-english.pdf)

Transcription: 52 X approx $80.00 USD = $4160.00 / year (to serve a global 
audience - pricing based upon http://tinyurl.com/oey8so - it may actually be 
slightly more or slightly less)


(JF wonders aloud how much it costs each of the above companies to hand out 
promotional T-Shirts each year...)

Anne, I offered to pay the first recorded session from my own pocket.  Would 
you pay the second one?  And who, following this thread, will step forward 
and pay the third?  If we collectively cannot find a sponsor for this 
important contribution, then we should find a means to do it ourselves. 
Continually it is driven home that this is a 'can-do' working group that 
wants a more accessible web.  Blues legend Albert King once wrote: "Everyone 
wants to go to Heaven, nobody wants to die".  So, who else will cough up $80 
and put their money where their mouth is?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3hn6fFTxeo

>
>
> (I also think this is a problem with WCAG. Once it gets more and more
> into government regulation data will just be hold back because it
> becomes too costly to publish.

And so the solution is to simply ignore those people who cannot hear? To bar 
them from active participation simply because we need an accurate 
transcript?  Anne, have you really thought about this at all?  Seriously?


> I was a in Dutch government media
> related meeting a little over a month ago and apparently there's a 100x
> increase in cost in getting already recorded videos accessible. In not
> so many words it was stated that if things actually became required it
> would just mean that a bunch of data would get lost. That would be
> terrible in my opinion.)

Accepting that it is OK to discriminate against people simply because of 
their disability is even more terrible in my opinion.  And in many countries 
around the world, it is, in fact, criminal.

As long as you continue to see this as a 'problem' it will be a problem: the 
moment you see it as a solvable challenge a solution will emerge.

That we must still have this discussion with highly intelligent people in 
2009 is extremely sad.

JF

Received on Saturday, 15 August 2009 19:16:09 UTC