The Fourth Web Accessibility Challenge in conjunction with the W4A 2010 Conference will take place at the WWW 2010 conference in April 26 and 27 in Raleigh, NC.

Goal

The Web Accessibility Challenge is organised to give an opportunity to researchers and developers of advanced Web accessibility technologies for showcasing their technologies to technical leaders in this area not only from academia and industry but also from end-users. To encourage and accelerate development of innovative and practically usable Web accessibility technologies; the Challenge is one part of the conference in which new experimental systems and technologies are submitted, compared, and judged by our independent panel of experts as to the most significant advance in research technology in accessibility for that year.

Topic

Please note that submissions can be related to the theme, “Developing Regions: Common Goals, Common Problems?” but it is certainly not a requirement as all accessibility technologies are welcomed for the challenge.

Submission Materials

We invite you to submit your work by submitting a:

• Two-page abstract (see the W4A submission page)
• Demonstration movie (or audio recording) with audio description.
• Software is not required, but encouraged.

System Requirements

Any kind of system is acceptable, such as standalone assistive technologies, voice browsers, browser plug-ins, server-based services, and telephony systems. Other accessibility technologies can be accepted (e.g., tactile browser). Open source systems are welcomed. Please contact us, if you have any questions about the coverage (cc2010@w4a.info).

Important Dates

Submission deadline is 19th February 2010 (Midnight Hawaii Standard Time).

Labels: Call For Papers, Challenge, W4A, Web Accessibility

We are delighted to announce the W4A Google Student Awards, which will enable two students to attend this year’s W4A in Raleigh, NC, USA.

Thanks to financial support from Google, these Awards will provide financial support towards travel and accommodation, plus free conference registration, to two students conducting postgraduate research in the web accessibility field and who otherwise would be unable to attend W4A.

This award is open to any student in a postgraduate position (part time or full time) at a University or other Higher Education institution, AND who is carrying out research that is directly relevant to the field of web accessibility. We particularly encourage applicants from under-represented parts of the world.

We now invite submissions from interested students - the deadline is Thursday 4th February, midnight Hawaii Standard Time.

Please see the Google Student Awards page for more information including details of the submission procedure.

Labels: Google, Student Funding, W4A

Co-Located with the Nineteenth International World Wide Web Conference (WWW2010), in Raleigh, North Carolina, USA, 26-27 April 2010.

Developing Regions: Common Goals, Common Problems?

A revolution in the information society is now starting, based on the use of mobile phones in developing countries. The hyper-growth of mobile phone penetration is deeply changing the lives of people in most of the world; their ways of communicating, working, learning, and structuring their societies. The promising next step is obviously to access the Web. The Web has already touched the lives of over a billion people and now is the time for the next billions.

However, this expansion faces unprecedented accessibility challenges. Even the word “accessibility” needs a new definition for people in the developing regions. How can someone who is illiterate or barely literate access the Web? In some cases, a language may not even have a written form. The affordability of the technology is also a challenge, while access is constrained by low computational power, limited bandwidth, compact keyboards, tiny screens, and even by the lack of electric power. All of these constraints compound the problems of access and inclusion.

The desire for access in developing regions and the resourcefulness of the people who want inclusion unite the communities of people in developing regions and the communities of disabled people in the developed world. Will complex and highly graphical interfaces exclude developing regions from access? What problems exist, what are the newly appearing problems, and what solutions are required? How do the adoption patterns for Web accessibility and inclusion vary across cultures? What effect will the Web in the developing regions have on accessibility in the developed regions and vice versa?

Note that while the commonalities between Web Accessibility and Developing Regions are this years theme, please don’t be deterred if this somewhat unique area is not yours. We would like to see all quality work on Web Accessibility regardless of the particular field within accessibility. The overriding reason for a paper being accepted is its high quality in relation to the broad area of Web Accessibility. In this case topics of interests include (but are not limited to):

• Inclusion and Citizen Empowerment in Developing Regions;
• Inclusion and Literacy in Developing Regions;
• Enhancing Education in Developing Regions;
• Accessibility Problems in Developing Regions;
• Web Based Employment in Developing Regions;
• Web Based Health Care in Developing Regions;
• Evaluation and Validation tools and techniques;
• User Experimentation looking at Social Networking and Freedom of Expression;
• User Agents for Developing Regions and User Agent Guidelines;
• Web Authoring Guidelines;
• Design and best practice to support Web accessibility;
• Technological advances to support Web accessibility;
• End user tools;
• Accessibility guidelines, best practice, evaluation techniques, and tools;
• Psychology of end user experiences and scenarios;
• Innovative techniques to support accessibility;
• Universally accessible graphical design approaches;
• Design Perspectives;
• Adapting existing Web content; and
• Accessible graphic formats and tools for their creation.

Web Accessibility Challenge

Sponsored by Microsoft since 2008, the “Web Accessibility Challenge” is organised to give an opportunity to researchers and developers of advanced Web accessibility technologies for showcasing their technologies to technical leaders in this area not only from academia and industry but also from end-users. More details:
http://www.w4a.info/2010/submissions/challenge.shtml.

Submission

We will accept position and technical papers, and short communications. Position papers should only be submitted as a communication of (up to 4-pages) whereas technical papers should be in full paper format (up to 10-pages). Accepted papers and communications will appear in the Conference proceedings contained on the Conference CD, and will also be accessible to the general public via the ACM Digital Library website. The official language of the Conference is English. Submission details are available at:
http://www.w4a.info/2010/submissions/index.shtml.

Important Dates

Technical and Communication Papers:

Submission: 01 February 2010 (Midnight Hawaii Standard Time)

Web Accessibility Challenge:

Submission: 19 February 2010 (Midnight Hawaii Standard Time)

More details:

http://www.w4a.info/2010/submissions/dates.shtml

Labels: Call For Papers, Conferences, W4A