Content today is increasingly delivered by audio both online and in the real world. We have radio shows and newscasts, and in recent years, podcasts, audio books and navigation/car assistance systems have been added to the field. Audio is more emotional, as sound effects and acoustic atmosphere enhance content to help deliver its messages. It also affords users the opportunity to interact with content while their hands and eyes are busy (i.e. when doing physical work, driving, walking, etc). However, the inclusion of audio often results in usability issues that make it difficult for users to access and understand content. Luckily, a wide range of techniques employed in information architecture, journalism, usability engineering and interface design are available. All that’s required is the knowledge to combine them effectively. This article presents a practical framework for designing and implementing audio-based content, such as podcasts.

Virtual guidedog is an attempt by a small group of Second life users to improve access to Second Life for disabled users. The first focus of the project is going to be on blind users of Second life, however the goal of the team is to later on expand and encompass as wide a range of disabilities as possible.

I know your thinking at this point, what do I mean access to Second life? well, take a blind user. At the moment, a blind user is unable to use Second life without help for several reasons. Firstly, Second life is almost entirely mouse driven, at least for interacting with the world, so we would like to give keyboard control over your avatar to a user. One fundamental problem the blind user experiences, is that it is currently impossible to log into Second life using the keyboard, and worse that screen readers, (a program to turn text on the screen into artificial speech) will not work with the log in prompt.

TextSL- a blind accessible client for Second Life Second life is popular virtual world that offers that offers a rich, three dimensional environment for social interaction. TextSL is an application that allows blind users to access Second Life using the JAWS screen reader. TextSL accepts commands from the user and supports commands for moving your avatar around, interacting with other avatars and getting information on your environment such as objects or avatars.