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Listen "EP01: Computer Vision: What People with Vision Impairments Experience and Want"
Episode Synopsis
Brief summary of the episode
Stephanie Enyart, Robin Christopherson, and Daniel Kish share about their experiences advocating for better visual interpretation technology for blind and low vision users as well as their experiences—as people with visual impairments—using such technologies.
Questions asked in the episode
[03:50] How did you get into your current line of work?
[13:50] What technologies do you use to overcome accessibility barriers you encounter in your daily life and what features do you find most useful versus least useful?
[20:15] Could you share a bit about your journey in developing photography skills needed to solicit visual assistance using technology, as well as any ongoing challenges you encounter with photography?
[26:00] For a few years now, computer vision researchers have been developing models for tackling two tasks of describing images for people with vision impairments. One task is to create captions for images and the second task is to answer questions about images. Could you talk about the usefulness of these different types of approaches in practice? In doing so, can you also comment on if one approach is preferable over another?
[32:05] What are your thoughts about researchers or industry service providers collecting and using data to provide visual assistance in order to improve upon existing algorithms, and develop new algorithms to provide visual assistance?
[36:10] If data collection is okay, what type of data record lineage should be provided? By record lineage I mean the record of who has handled data, what decisions are made with the data, and how. Please share about your individual perspective as well as any perspectives that you have heard from the community
[39:15] What level of interaction do you want from a visual assistant that interprets visual information? Also, do you prefer that assistance to come from humans or computers?
[39:15] What level of interaction do you want from a visual assistant that interprets visual information? Also, do you prefer that assistance to come from humans or computers?
[43:35] From your perspective, what are the most important open accessibility obstacles today that should be solved first? Please share about your individual perspective as well as what you hear from their community.
Guest bios
Stephanie Enyart is the Chief Public Policy and Research Officer at the American Foundation for the Blind. Stephanie serves as a strategic leader in developing policy that benefits people who are blind in education, employment, aging, and the intersectional issues of technology and transportation.
Robin Christopherson is a co-founder and Head of Digital Inclusion at AbilityNet. His work has led to accessibility improvements in many organizations spanning industry, government, and universities. Robin also has served as an expert technical witness around assistive technology in software, systems and websites.
Daniel Kish is the President of World Access for the Blind. He is a world leader in perceptual navigation and ecolocation, through which he has developed his own method of generating vocal clicks and using echoes to identify his surroundings and navigate.
Abigale Stangl is a CRA/NSF Computing Innovation Fellow at the University of Washington. Her research lies at the intersection of human-computer interaction, non-visual accessibility, and data privacy and ownership.
Links to resources mentioned
https://vizwiz.org/workshops/2022-workshop/
Stephanie Enyart, Robin Christopherson, and Daniel Kish share about their experiences advocating for better visual interpretation technology for blind and low vision users as well as their experiences—as people with visual impairments—using such technologies.
Questions asked in the episode
[03:50] How did you get into your current line of work?
[13:50] What technologies do you use to overcome accessibility barriers you encounter in your daily life and what features do you find most useful versus least useful?
[20:15] Could you share a bit about your journey in developing photography skills needed to solicit visual assistance using technology, as well as any ongoing challenges you encounter with photography?
[26:00] For a few years now, computer vision researchers have been developing models for tackling two tasks of describing images for people with vision impairments. One task is to create captions for images and the second task is to answer questions about images. Could you talk about the usefulness of these different types of approaches in practice? In doing so, can you also comment on if one approach is preferable over another?
[32:05] What are your thoughts about researchers or industry service providers collecting and using data to provide visual assistance in order to improve upon existing algorithms, and develop new algorithms to provide visual assistance?
[36:10] If data collection is okay, what type of data record lineage should be provided? By record lineage I mean the record of who has handled data, what decisions are made with the data, and how. Please share about your individual perspective as well as any perspectives that you have heard from the community
[39:15] What level of interaction do you want from a visual assistant that interprets visual information? Also, do you prefer that assistance to come from humans or computers?
[39:15] What level of interaction do you want from a visual assistant that interprets visual information? Also, do you prefer that assistance to come from humans or computers?
[43:35] From your perspective, what are the most important open accessibility obstacles today that should be solved first? Please share about your individual perspective as well as what you hear from their community.
Guest bios
Stephanie Enyart is the Chief Public Policy and Research Officer at the American Foundation for the Blind. Stephanie serves as a strategic leader in developing policy that benefits people who are blind in education, employment, aging, and the intersectional issues of technology and transportation.
Robin Christopherson is a co-founder and Head of Digital Inclusion at AbilityNet. His work has led to accessibility improvements in many organizations spanning industry, government, and universities. Robin also has served as an expert technical witness around assistive technology in software, systems and websites.
Daniel Kish is the President of World Access for the Blind. He is a world leader in perceptual navigation and ecolocation, through which he has developed his own method of generating vocal clicks and using echoes to identify his surroundings and navigate.
Abigale Stangl is a CRA/NSF Computing Innovation Fellow at the University of Washington. Her research lies at the intersection of human-computer interaction, non-visual accessibility, and data privacy and ownership.
Links to resources mentioned
https://vizwiz.org/workshops/2022-workshop/
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