Ed Markey pushing for disability-friendly Internet gear
May 3rd, 2008
From CNETNews.com:
Congressman Edward Markey (D-Mass.) is advocating for changes that would require Internet phone and video products to be made accessible to people with disabilities. Markey, who chairs the House telecommunications and Internet panel, is drafting a bill that would require Internet-based devices to be able to decode closed captioning and deliver oral narration.
“The wizardry of the wires and the sophistication of the software programs do little for those who cannot affordably access or effectively use them,” Markey said at a subcommittee hearing this week.
Among those supporting Markey’s efforts was actor Russell Harvard, who starred with Daniel Day-Lewis in There Will Be Blood. Harvard urged Congress to take closed captioning law “to its next level.”
“I and others who cannot hear are left out of this whirlwind of technological change (because) hardly any of these smaller devices display closed captions,” said Harvard, who is deaf.
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on Saturday, May 3rd, 2008 at 10:22 am and is filed under celebrities, deaf/hearing impairment, law, politics, technology, television.
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