Parallel

93: The Last Show

92: Dystopian Skynet Future – Sometime Next Year

91: I'm VR Curious

90: I Want to Pinch and Zoom the World

89: Low Vision Pro

88: How Hard Could XCode Be?

87: A Fish On Your Washing Machine

86: An Immigrant in the Country of the Blind

Andrew Leland's memoir "The Country of the Blind" tells a story about his ongoing journey into vision loss. It's also a kind of history of blindness, and blindness technology, with stops along the way to unpack the literary deployments of vision loss by other writers. He talked with me about the book, about the technology he uses, and some of his encounters with people made uncomfortable by low-vision.

85: AI Will Not Fix Accessibility

Even before ChatGPT brought AI into the mainstream of collective consciousness, companies touted artificial intelligence as a way to make your web site accessible – a magic bullet that meant web devs could skip the accessibility checks normally done by humans. And technologies like computer vision had brought AI into devices and image software. Today's guest has a few bones to pick with what marketers call AI, and some good things to say about computer vision.

84: Now that We've Had Some Time to Process...

My colleagues from the Maccessibility Roundtable join me for a conversation about Apple's Vision Pro and accessibility. We still don't know a lot, but be know more than we did an hour after the WWDC keynote.

83: AI, AI, IO

Taking a look back at this year's Google I/O events, with an eye toward accessibility. Our favorite followers of the Goog are back! We talk AI, Android, Pixel phones and tablets, and how Google does its spectacle.

82: Entirely Individualistic Low-Vision Girl

This week, Apple previewed accessibility features coming to the Mac and iOS. It's an annual event, which even sat briefly atop TechMeme. Want to know more about what Apple discussed and how these new features fit in with the existing accessibility suite? We've got you!

81: Tools and Tips for Mobile App Developers

iOS developer Rob Whitaker returns to Parallel for a chat about APIs and tools developers can use to make their mobile apps more accessible.

80: When Success Means Buying A Smaller Suit

Starting or maintaining a fitness program is a challenge for anyone. If you have accessibility needs, you might experience barriers related to touchscreen devices, coaching that doesn't address a hearing or visual disability, or a need for accommodations related to physical limitations. With its Fitness+ service, Apple has taken on some of these issues, and opened up the program to many more people with disabilities, We'll talk with a Fitness+ user, and someone who has worked on Apple accessibil...

79: Story Book

Ten iOSes ago, I wrote a book called iOS Access for All. Here's how it has evolved over the years.

78: So Many Thoughts and Feelings

AppleVis, an excellent community of blind and visually-impaired Apple users, surveyed its members to get their thoughts on how well Apple's platforms provide accessibility. We talk over the survey, and add some impressions of our own.

77: What is CSS Speech?

What if you could design the experience of listening to Web content in the same way you design the experience of seeing it? That's the premise of the CSS Speech Module, a retired W3C proposal that's now being championed by my guest. She knows a thing or two about CSS and the W3C, as a member of the standards group's board of directors. So is CSS the way to design spoken experiences, or is it a hindrance for screen reader users? Let's talk about it.

76: Some of My Automations are Fragile

We're talking automation - mostly on macOS, with developer Brett Terpstra and fellow automation fan Darcy Burnard.

75: A Deep Dive into WCAG 2.2. And Beyond.

The W3C's Web Content Accessibility Guidelines – WCAG – is the standard against which Web developers test for accessibility. Like most good standards, WCAG is evolving, with a new release anticipated within a few months. We talk about what the 2.2 candidate includes, and what's next for this important standard.

74: The Swipey on the Stem

Parallel is back from summer break, and glad to be! We gather to review Apple's latest hardware announcements: do we like them, do we want them, are they accessible? Behold, the iPhones 14, Apple Watch Ultra (and otherwise), and AirPods Pro, 2nd gen.

73: A Week with Apple's Accessibility Preview

We take a look at new accessibility features coming later this year to Apple platforms.

72: Building Accessibility Products as a Startup

Creating products intended to serve the needs of people with disabilities requires all the hard work of any software project, along with special challenges for small, bootstrapped startups. We'll talk with a cofounder whose company builds mobile apps for people with vision loss and hearing impairments.

71: Clicking the Box Offends Me

Whether we're motivated by a creative passion, the need for extra income or something else, taking on work outside the 9-to-5 comes naturally to a lot of people I know. So we're talking about what it means to juggle several "jobs."

70: Helping Astronauts Maintain Mental Health in Space.. And a Lot More

Mily Mumford researches the impact of space travel on the mental health of astronauts, and how mixed reality could eventually be used to help them cope. That's a lot, but they're also a theater creator and filmmaker. We talk through the multitudes, including a conversation about ableism in the way we choose astronauts.

69: Jobs and Disability: Beyond the Interview

People with disabilities experience appallingly high rates of unemployment. But convincing an employer to interview disabled candidates is just the beginning. We talk about how people with all kinds of disabilities can get, keep and thrive in jobs.

68: Can You Describe It?

Audio description gives people who are blind or visually impaired the information they need to fully enjoy TV, movies and even live events. We're focused mainly on TV, and how which streaming service you use and which platform you use it on, has a lot to do with whether you can get described content. My guest wrote the book on the current audio description landscape.

67: A Character on My Own Show

I, your humble host, sit for an interview about my career, my decision nine years ago to finally write about accessibility, and the book I wrote about Apple's iOS. We also talk about some accessibility problems in iOS 15.

66: Beyond Gaming: Designing VR Experiences for People with Disabilities

Enjoying a theme park attraction or playing on a playground isn't always an option of you're a wheelchair user or if you're a kid in a hospital. But virtual reality offers all sorts of ways to make experiences accessible. I'll talk about that with someone who's done it.

65: Accessibility is a Spectrum for Gamers, Too

Talking about gaming accessibility for a variety of users. We cover hardware, how gaming studios address accessibility, and what it's like to advocate for and write about it, too.

64: What Does It Mean to be a Cyborg?

Lawrence Miller identifies as a cyborg. He, like a lot of us, has many identities. We talk about some of them, about art and about how augmenting one's body with technology is both a functional and a performative experience.