The Access Rainbow

Leslie Regan ShadeFaculty of InformationUniversity of Toronto

Nunavut ICT Summit 2012November 1, 2012

7 GOVERNANCE6 LITERACY/SOCIAL FACILITATION5 SERVICE/ACCESS PROVISION

4 CONTENT/SERVICES

3 SOFTWARE TOOLS

2 DEVICES

1 CARRIAGE FACILITIES

Access Rainbowan architecture for information infrastructure

1. CARRIAGE FACILITIES

The facilities that store, serve or carry information

eg single party, digital switched, broadband, WiFi

• equitable allocation (addresses, routing, bandwidth)

• ubiquitous, affordable, interoperable, symmetric, standards compliant

2. DEVICES

Actual devices people operate

e.g. common PC’s, keyboards, PDA’s ....• affordable, adaptable, accessible, interoperable?• easy to install assistive software?• extensible for adaptive devices (eg haptic mouse)?

3. SOFTWARE TOOLS

• easy to learn/use, interoperable, reliable, secure• usable, accessible?• WAI Guidelines (Authoring Tool + User Agent)• designed or tested by disabled persons?

Programs that run the devices and connect to services

eg browsers, mailers, authoring, mounting, managing, tools

4. CONTENT/SERVICES

The actual services people find useful

eg email, WWW, newsgroups, social media

• 'basic/essential' data bases (e.g. employment, weather, health, political, educational, events ..) for disabled + targeted databases• affordable, authentic, diverse, multilingual...

5. SERVICE/ACCESS PROVISION

• public information institutions (eg libraries, schools, universities, POs), community centres,...

• employers, associations

• phone/cable cos., independent ISP's

Organization(s) that provides net access

6. LITERACY/SOCIAL FACILITATION

The skills people need to take full advantage of ICTs and the means to acquire these skills

•education/training programs, adapted for disabilities

•support for technical and 'local' experts

•climate of social/technical experimentation, innovation diffusion, digital literacy, self help networks

The means for deciding about the development and operation of the info/comm infrastructure

• public commons + private spaces + open, competitive markets (‘cyberspace’=public space?)

• regulatory bodies, Access Boards, ICANN NCUC

• social impact assessments

• Charter of Information/Communications Rights?

• publicly accountable, civically responsive,

openly+inclusively debated

7. GOVERNANCE