Robots That Clean

Now imagine that you’re in a wheelchair and you don’t have anybody to help with housekeeping. A vacuum is usually difficult to maneuver and difficult to handle. Now, if you’re deaf, the vacuum has vibrations. However, if the vacuum isn’t sucking up the dirt, you would’ve not known because the vibrations are the same.

How would a vacuum be improved? There are robotic vacuums that are on the market, but many models are out of reach in terms of affordability. It is excellent for those whose mobility is limited and who don’t have extra help around the house. Robot vacuums aren’t perfect yet because it doesn’t have the capability to store much dust and dirt without a dustbin and they can’t navigate stairs yet. If someone lives in a house with a few steps, a robot vacuum would struggle with cleaning all the rooms. I know I haven’t tried them myself, but I wonder if there are ways they will notify the user if they need to be charged or if they’re trapped if the user doesn’t have their phone with them. I would never hear beeps and alerts at all, and I wonder if it was even considered in the product design.

I know robot mops came on the market as well, which is even better if someone with a disability struggles to clean their floor. It has the exact same problems as a vacuum though.

All those robots do include the curb cut effect but in the opposite way. They aren’t designed for disabled people at all, but it does help part of the disabled populations with cleaning. Not only that, it helps busy parents, the elderly, and anyone who struggles to clean their residence.

An Old Essay From My University Days Regarding Accessibility.

When I attended Fashion Institute of Technology in NYC and majored in Art History and Museum Professions, I was assigned to tour The Cloisters (part of the Metropolitan Museum of Art) using an audio guide. As a deaf person, that was a completely stupid and useless assignment because I cannot use the audio guide at all. However, me and an interpreter managed to do the assignment and I wrote about how it is not accessible for deaf visitors at the museum. This essay was written in spring 2016 I believe.

———

As a deaf person, my analysis of the audio tour at the Cloisters will be different due to having an interpreter interpret the audio tour and informing me the subtlety of the voice and emotion involved in the tour. If I actually used the audio tour, I would not understand a thing and all I would hear are muffles. The audio guide is not deaf friendly or user friendly for anybody. Audio guides are used as one part of the visitor experiences at museums around the world. People use audio guide to enrich the experience of seeing art in a church like setting at the Cloisters and to bring a greater understanding of the Medieval Age.

The audio guide was very detailed about the Cloisters such as how the building was from several places in Europe, such as the apse and the columns in a room and how it arrived in New York and explained about the history of the museum and how it became to be in NYC. The displays provided information and the context on the art shown and the guide expanded on it with interesting facts that wouldn’t be on the display. Without the audio guide, nobody would look close at some columns for the heads in the room. As a deaf person, it would be easy to miss out on those tiny details because it may have not been mentioned in the displays or information of the room or art. The audio guide also connected between two objects that held body parts when the voice said to find the matching golden arm while looking at the golden bust of a saint. I found that interesting that the guide included a small scavenger hunt to find the matching arm and made me more interested in the objects itself. Little details like that make the audio guide interesting for me, at least for a moment when it comes to audio guides. Navigating the museum is easy, even without the audio guide because you can go anywhere and not get lost unlike at the Met, and the audio guide didn’t impede with navigating the museum.

The voice in the audio tour was monotone and even I got bored paying attention to the interpreter for the audio tour guide. There’s no emotion or interest in the voice, only factual information that did not leave the viewers with any imaginations of the original context of the art in the actual original site. How hard can it to be to imagine the room with the fresco from Spain in its original context? Not easy with the audio guide being boring. Some sections included chorus and chants as imagined in an actual religious setting in the Medieval Age to try to add some interest to the audio guide so it’s not all voice. The music and chants are meant to aid the listeners with visualizing the atmosphere and using the sense of being transported to the era to get a better idea of the context behind the art and objects in the Cloisters.

For the deaf, the audio guide is free, not $7 as usual. I feel that is pointless because in general, deaf people cannot hear and it’s not something that is to be used. Another thing, if the museum decides to have the audio guide updated, it should include subtitles/captions to make it more accessible for everybody, not only for deaf people. The technology could be updated to make it more user friendly as well. My interpreter had to press a number, restart a section after the audio buffered and skipped something, which is an example that the audio guide isn’t user friendly. The museum could expand on the information in the displays so everybody can have an equal understanding and knowledge of interesting facts that are presented in the audio guide.

Another issue with the audio guide is that it comes in a touch screen format like an iPhone, but blind people can’t see and press anything on the audio guide due to the interface being touchscreen. The museum tries to be accessible for everybody in terms of museum education and visitor experience but it didn’t succeed. Deafs and disabled people don’t get the full visitor’s experience due to issues with accessibility. Yes, it’s nice that it’s free for disabled people, but it’s not useful at all. There needs to be more access at museums to include everybody and increase the understanding of the art contained in the museum. There needs to be improvements such as a tactile way for blind visitors to grasp art, subtitles on the audio guide for deaf visitors to improve accessibility. For example, in Quito, Ecuador at a museum dedicated to Pre-Columbian art of the region, the museum had a book that details on everything at the museum in place of the audio guide so deaf visitors can read it and know the information of the object in depth like if in an audio guide. Another suggestion is to add more iPads around the Cloisters that details the information, contains music used in the setting, facts, and include other pieces of art from the Met to link with the objects at the Cloisters. A perfect example of the iPad connecting objects between the Cloisters and the Met is in the stained glass room where one piece of the window is at the Cloisters while the other is at the Met, to make a recreation of the abbey the windows used to be in and show how it is viewed in that context while connecting the objects between the two buildings. That would increase access for deaf visitors and others who are visiting the Cloisters and can’t take advantage of the audio guide and provide a better context of the art for everybody.

Audio guide has their place in museums as an experience that visitors can use, but it’s not useful for everybody due to various reasons. It can be a great addition to learning about the art of the Middle Age for people in general, but it’s not accessible for others. The museum needs to diversify the education aspects so all visitors can have access to the same information.

———

By the way, I don’t identify with capital “D” deaf. Will explain later why.

Washers, Dryers, Oh My! How Inaccessible They Are!

How many times have I forgotten clothes in the washer or dryer due to not hearing the beep of it going off? Too many times. What about having clothes removed from washer and put elsewhere instead of leaving it in the washer in a common space? That gets me pissed off since I do not like anybody touching my clothes. It happened before even though I set an alarm on my phone and go put clothes in the dryer or remove it from the dryer.

Why can’t the washer and dryer have an integrated app on a phone or tablet to inform that the cycle is completed. Maybe an alert on the computer? Or even better since Internet of Things are susceptible to hacking to have an actual flashing light on the washer and dryer itself, but it doesn’t always work due to not being in sight of them. Actually, back in the old days, a doorbell was wired to a lamp where somebody press the doorbell, the lamp flashes. Why not use that technology, but for household appliances where it needs your attention such as washer, dryer, ovens, and even doorbells. It would make our lives easier, but it doesn’t solve the problem if the washer/dryer is shared in a common area. We will have to figure that out for the future.

What is Accessibility and Why Should you Care?

Accessibility is a catch all phrase used in many industries playing lip service to disabled people. In America alone, there are 61 MILLIONS of people living with a disability, in other words, 1 in 4 Americans are disabled (1). You would be forgiven to think disability means though in a wheelchair or deaf/hard of hearing, or blind. Aside from these, there are many other types of disabilities out there from cognition to invisible disability such as chronic pain or on the autism spectrum to name some. There is no one exact model of disability, so why should accessibility be a one way thing?

Myself, I am deaf and I have Nager Syndrome, a super rare disability that affects my appearance. I’m not going to get in detail myself, but this is who I am. I also am an avid traveler, an animal lover, loves learning about new technologies, and being challenged. Disabilities does not define my life, however it impact a lot of things. I will go in depth why everyday products that are taken for granted are not accessible to someone like me and for others who are disabled. Some might not be a big deal for me, but is a major hurdle for people with other disabilities.

Accessibility should encompass multiple things and many options should be presented to the user. Those that are deaf/hard of hearing would not use something that’s audio based, but needs visual cues, and in the case of things online, presented in their country’s sign language along with subtitles. Blind and low vision needs audio cues and voice over to navigate things in everyday life. A touch screen that does not provide an audio option is useless to them. Nobody should have to deal with complicated jargon or impossible to navigate menus and options when dealing with technology.