KYLE COON:
“Instead of saying, wow, let's ask the question, how”.
Meet Kyle Coon, A two-time Paralympian and an avid technology user.
KIM NOVA:
“Do you like talking to people? Well, let's throw an element of a voice assistant into your new life”.
Learn from Kim and Chris Nova, the authors of Computer Basics for the newly blind user.
All of this, plus Sharkvember, on FSCast Episode 250.
OLEG SHEVKUN:
So hello, and welcome to FSCast for October 2024. I'm Oleg Shevkun here with my colleagues at Vispero. And one particular person I'd like to introduce right now is Elizabeth Whittaker and Elizabeth you might have heard her voice on our webinars, you might have heard her on other events, and I’m sure you will hear her and other colleagues with Vispero this coming Sharkvember. So Elizabeth, hello and welcome to the show.
ELIZABETH WHITTAKER:
Hi, and thank you for having me.
OLEG:
Sharkvember is a special month that we are really dedicating here at Vispero to our users, specifically to our JAWS users, and that's the second time I guess we're doing it. Can you tell us, just for those of us who probably don't know what it's all about?
ELIZABETH:
So Sharkvember, this is the second time we've done this. Sharkvember is a month-long celebration of accessibility and creativity, and we have a lot of events scheduled for Sharkvember. In fact, it's going to be a very action-packed month. So there's a lot for you to join us and help us celebrate on, and we're going to be talking about that.
OLEG:
Let's walk through the schedule of what we've got.
ELIZABETH:
First we have Webinar Wednesday, Let's Talk Teams. For this webinar we are partnering with our friends at Sight and Sound Technology, and we're going to be talking all about Microsoft Teams, different features like calendar, chat, teams and channels and more. That's going to take place on Wednesday, November 6th at two pm GMT. That's 9:00 am Eastern.
OLEG:
And I like you mentioning GMT because Sight and Sound is our distributor in the United Kingdom, right?
ELIZABETH:
Yes.
OLEG:
Okay, cool. So that's going international.
ELIZABETH:
Yes, absolutely. Next we have a webinar called Onyx OCR, a simple solution for students with low vision. Now this one was actually scheduled to take place in October, but due to the hurricane here in the US, we were not able to do that, so we rescheduled it for Thursday, November 7th at noon Eastern, and that is a part of our monthly Hardware Webinar Series.
OLEG:
And before we go any further, I'd like to thank those of our listeners who expressed your thoughts and your prayers during this hurricane season. Thank you for all your kind words and your support. That was really, really important for all of us to hear. So anything else?
ELIZABETH:
Yes. So next we have Explore Labels in Gmail with JAWS. So we get a lot of requests for Gmail training. A lot of you out there are using Gmail for home, school or work, and we wanted to come together and talk about what are labels, how can you use them to organize mail and why do we need them? And this is another partner webinar with our very own Dan Clark.
OLEG:
And Dan Clark is one of those people, for those who don't know, he's one of those people who actually started the training department here, not even at Vispero, but at Freedom Scientific or even a Henter-Joyce I should say. Am I correct understanding he's back just to do that guest appearance, that webinar?
ELIZABETH:
He is actually, he reached out to us and said, "Why don't we partner for a webinar?" And we said, "Absolutely. Let's do it."
OLEG:
That's pretty cool. Did I miss the date? When is that?
ELIZABETH:
That's going to be on Tuesday, November 12th at 7:00 PM Eastern.
OLEG:
Okay. And that's on Zoom, right?
ELIZABETH:
Yes, that's on Zoom. All of these are on Zoom.
All right, up next is our Sharkvember Next big thing event. This goes along with our next big thing contest. And this is a contest, for those of you who may not know, where users submit ideas to enhance JAWS and ZoomText, what's the next big idea for JAWS and ZoomText to make it better?
So we will be showcasing the three finalists. They'll be talking about their ideas, and a winner will be selected, and that's going to be Tuesday, November 19th at 7:00 pm Eastern.
OLEG:
I don't know if you will or if you have the authority to disclose this, but have you seen the contributions already?
ELIZABETH:
Can't talk about that, but-
OLEG:
I'm sorry.
ELIZABETH:
... there's some really, really, really great ideas though.
OLEG:
Okay, we'll look and see.
ELIZABETH:
Up next is our monthly software webinar. It's going to be on the new features of JAWS, ZoomText and Fusion 2025. And of course we're going to talk about new features and demo some of them. That'll be Thursday, November 21st at noon Eastern.
OLEG:
And by the time you're listening to this FSCast, the final version, not the final actually I should say the initial version of JAWS, ZoomText and Fusion 2025 has already been released. Just go to Freedomscientific.com, and it's got to be up there.
Now let me reiterate once again, the initial release of 2025 is just the beginning. There are updates planned for December and then on into 2025, but that webinar is going to be a great way to be introduced to some of those new features. And the date for that, once again was?
ELIZABETH:
November 21st, that's a Thursday at noon Eastern.
OLEG:
Okay, I'm sitting here and waiting for FSOpenLine. Is that happening or has it been canceled or what?
ELIZABETH:
No, FSOpenLine is happening. In fact, it's also on Thursday, November 21st at 8:00 pm Eastern.
OLEG:
You are working hard up there.
ELIZABETH:
We’ve got a lot going on in November.
OLEG:
And FSOpenLine is our call-in show. I hate to call it a show. It's a call-in what event?
ELIZABETH:
Event, yeah.
OLEG:
Where you can ask questions, where you can interact directly with our product management or some of our developers and find out what's going on here. FSOpenLine is a format that we know that many of you really, really enjoy. So November 21st is the day to put on your schedule.
ELIZABETH:
Yes. And I also wanted to mention here that for all of these events except FSOpenLine, you must register. All of these take place on Zoom, but for all of the events except FSOpenLine, you need to register. For FSOpenLine you just have a join link as usual.
Now, where do you go to find all of these events?
OLEG:
I guess Freedomscientific.com/-
ELIZABETH:
Sharkvember. And there you'll find all the events. They are organized under headings. So you can just navigate through those headings. You'll find each event and its description and then the link to either register or in the case of FSOpenLine, the link to join.
One more thing I wanted to add too. This isn't an event, but it is something that we will be doing throughout the month of November. We call it Sharkvember shortcuts. And every weekday in November, we will post a JAWS or a ZoomText keyboard command. We did this last year, we got a lot of great feedback. So we're going to alternate one day will be JAWS the next day ZoomText and so forth. So if you go to that Sharkvember page that we just mentioned, you'll find a heading there for Sharkvember shortcuts. You can go to that page and every day there'll be a new keyboard command.
OLEG:
That's pretty cool. And again, something to look out for and something to follow, something to expect for all of us. And this month on FSCast, we've got a lot more to cover. Let's move right into the program and Elizabeth will see each other in I'd say in 35 minutes at the closing of this episode.
ELIZABETH:
Sounds good.
OLEG:
It's not every day that we get a twice Paralympian, an accomplished athlete member of Team USA, a great speaker and an avid technology enthusiast here on FSCast. And while technically speaking, the following interview with Kyle Coon could have been recorded better. I'm still eager to share this with you. So Kyle, welcome to the show.
KYLE COON:
Thanks so much Oleg, really appreciate. It's great to be here today.
OLEG:
Suppose you are on a plane, and somebody asks you, hey, what do you do in this life, how would you answer?
KYLE:
I would ask, would it help if I give you an example of what I did? Then I would ask the person to put on a blindfold and say, I navigate life as a totally blind person. And quite often whenever people say just, "Wow, that's amazing." I come back with the, "Instead of saying, wow, let's ask the question how."
I think as blind people and people who are visually impaired, we get that wow response so much. But what we need to do is we need to remind people that with technology, with all these things in the world today, we can do anything we want. It's just a matter of how do we get it done.
OLEG:
Do you also get that wow response in the blindness community? Or is it more likely the, and so what response?
KYLE:
It depends. In the circles that I run in, with a lot of athletes, you tell people like, "Oh yeah, I'm a two-time Paralympian," yawn, "What's the big deal?" But then when you get outside of this tight little circle of Olympians and Paralympians that I live in, it really is, "Wow, how'd you find your way into that?" So it's been fascinating.
OLEG:
So the wow is not about blindness or your blind skills, but rather about athletics?
KYLE:
Exactly.
OLEG:
So how did that happen? I mean, you were not born blind, you literally lost your eyesight due to cancer. Is that correct?
KYLE:
That is correct. I lost my sight when I was six years old. So I had my left eye removed when I was five and my right eye just before I turned seven. I was interested in sport and all of that from a very early age. I was very fortunate to get connected with Eric Weihenmayer, who basically gave me that verbal slap upside the head, that we all receive at some point in our lives as blind people.
He was like, "Hey, just because you're blind doesn't mean you're helpless. Go try rock climbing." So that's what I did. I went, I rock climbed. I wound up rock climbing competitively for a few years. That spiraled off into a whole bunch of other sports, skiing, cycling, got into wrestling in high school, wrestled for a short little stint in college at the University of Central Florida.
As life progressed, I graduated college when I was 21 years old and I thought I was the hottest thing on the planet Earth, and I was very arrogant, I can confidently say that now. And so I decided that I was going to apply for every job, CEO and above.
OLEG:
Okay, cool.
KYLE:
And quickly realized that the world did not operate that way. So I started climbing my way down the corporate ladder until I fell off the bottom rung, hit the ground and started digging myself a hole and eventually looked up and realized that, "Wow, I'm not in a good spot." And I was a year removed from college, I was unemployed and just not in a good headspace mentally or physically, anything along those lines. So decided that something needed to change and eventually did find my way to employment, but decided that the first thing I needed to do was just get my body back in shape.
So people tell me that running is an inexpensive way to get back into shape. So I googled “how does a blind person run?” Found a website that connected blind people to people who wanted to be sighted guides, emailed a couple of people, one person responded. I said, "Beggars can't be choosers." Went met up with this guy, he happened to be a triathlete and convinced me that triathlon was a better way to get into shape than running, and my dumb self believed him.
OLEG:
That would include swimming and cycling, right?
KYLE:
Correct. So triathlon is swim, bike, run. Yeah, so that's how I wound up in the sport of triathlon and just fell in love with putting the puzzle together. Triathlon is one of those sports that you get really good at just by working really hard at it. It doesn't really take a whole lot of talent or anything along those lines. You just got to work really hard at it and you got to have a passion for putting together the puzzle.
OLEG:
But Kyle, you started late. If I hear it correctly, you started at age 21. I used to believe that to get into professional athletics like Paralympics and so on, you've got to start young, very young, in your formative years and you just busted a myth for me. Are you an exception?
KYLE:
That's the funny thing is that I'm not an exception, especially in the sport of triathlon. I would actually say that most para-triathletes are in their late 20s to late 30s. For the US Paralympic team we brought 17 athletes and two guides to Paris, and I'm going to be 33 years old in November, and I would say we only had maybe three or four people on our team that were under the age of 30.
Triathlon is a sport where you can be really, really good very late in life. I have a friend who's above-the-knee amputee who just won a silver medal at the Paralympic Games in triathlon, and he's 42 years old. One of the most famous triathletes from, at least from an age group perspective is Sister Madonna Buder, and she's in her 90s, and she started doing triathlon when she was 55 or something like that.
Now for the Olympic and Paralympic level, you're not going to find a whole lot of 50, 60-year-old people doing sport, but triathlon and other para-sports, if you're willing to work hard and you're willing to put in the time and the effort, you can succeed later in life. You don't have to be a upstart 12-year-old. You can be in your mid-20s and learn to swim like I did, and get good really fast.
With triathlon especially, you've got three sports to play around with and it's a great... I love it.
OLEG:
They say triathlon is a sports of endurance.
KYLE:
It's definitely an endurance sport that is for sure. At the Paralympic level, it's really funny because our race is called a sprint triathlon, and a sprint triathlon at the Paralympics takes about 58 to 60 minutes. It's a 750-meter swim, a 20-kilometer bike and a 5-kilometer run. And that whole one hour that you're racing, I mean it's a painful hour. I can't talk the entire time. I'm going so hard. So you have to be able to have this mental fortitude more than anything. Yeah, you got to be able to endure physically. But mentally, the emotions that run through you during the course of that race, both leading up to the race, during the race, and then after the race, it's an endurance race through and through.
OLEG:
Is Paralympics for you more about the process or about the result. Just running and having fun doing so, or is it more like winning and competing? Or is it a bit of both?
KYLE:
It's definitely both. I started triathlon about almost 10 years ago, and I wasn't competing at the Paralympic level right out of the get-go. I took three or four years of learning the sport of triathlon and figuring out if I was any good at it. And early on I was not good. And so it was just about having fun, becoming the best athlete I could be. Then I eventually did get kind of good at the sport and I wanted to test myself against the best athletes in the world. I wanted to win. I wanted some tangible goals to chase. So that is what I decided to do. I decided to chase some goals.
My grandfather taught me very early on in life that hey, winning is fun. And it is. We all like to win at something, and I'm a competitive person by nature, and so I wanted to win something. I wanted some shiny medals or something. But as I progressed in my elite sporting career, I did find that no matter what place I got, whether I won a race or I got third or I got eighth or anything, what fulfilled me was the challenge of the chase of pursuing those goals and finding out truly what the edge of my ability is.
Then once I find that edge of my ability, can I push those limits a little bit further?
OLEG:
How do you cope with disappointments in your athletic career, especially in your first several years when as you said, you are not too good at that, but you still pressed on?
KYLE:
I think it's a lot harder later. Once you've tasted success and then you start struggling, that's even harder. Even before I started racing at the elite level, I was just competing in age group triathlon, local triathlons and stuff like that. The process was all about just getting better. It was all about, all right, I just got to improve this time or improve that time.
There was always something tangible to chase, whether that be a swim time, a bike time, a runtime, a total time. So when I actually got to the elite level of triathlon, my very first race, I took fourth and I was only 15 seconds off the podium. And so that tangible thing of being so, so close kept me hungry to go back and do another race. Then I got second place at my very next race. Then actually over the course of the first two or three years of my elite triathlon career, I only finished off the podium a couple of times and then I had this big long streak of podium finishes in 2022, and it was actually injuries that caught up to me. And once the competition started getting really difficult, our sports started to grow. I was getting faster and stronger, but I was starting to not hit the podium as much. So managing the disappointment of “I'm still improving but the results aren't showing”, that was very difficult.
What I wound up doing was I went back to my core values of why am I really doing this? Am I doing this for the medal results? Which I mean that's just fleeting. At the end of the day, it's a hunk of metal. Or am I doing this to truly find the edge of my abilities and to find my limits and to try and push beyond those limits? That's ultimately what has kept me in the sport for as long as it has, because I'm just trying to chase those limits and push beyond them and find what I'm truly capable of, whether that be physically and/or mentally.
OLEG:
Is there life after elite sports when you're at the age where athletic victories are mostly in the past, especially for a blind or partially sighted person who probably is not going to become a coach?
KYLE:
Oh, there's absolutely life after elite sport. There's this really popular saying out there right now that people are like, "Oh, it's all about balancing life between sport and family and all that." And I actually don't think that's true. We have one life to live. We just have these little phases of life. Look, I'm 33 years old now. I'm probably going to be transitioning out of elite sport in the not so distant future.
We all know the statistics out there, whether people who are blind or partially sighted, our unemployment rate is significantly higher. The amount of people that are in the workforce is significantly lower. We hear it all the time. No matter how you shake it. Then also the amount of people that are on government assistance and all that in the blind, vision impaired community is significantly higher than so many other groups of people.
And so I think it's ignorant for me not to think about that as I'm getting closer to the end of my elite sporting career. So I treat that phase of life very much like my sporting life, in that it takes dedicated training and effort to put things in place. That is why I do things like motivational and inspirational speaking to help bring in money so I can actually make a living. But it's also why I work to improve my technology skills.
I'm all about continuing to learn, because if you're not continuing to grow, then you're staying stagnant. I'm all about trying to continue to grow, whether that is from a physical standpoint, from a mental standpoint, from a skills' standpoint, because as we all know, technology is changing oh, so quickly.
I've seen it happen where people get behind on the technological advances and then all of a sudden you're left behind. I don't want to get left behind. I like to be on the forefront of things and I want to be working and trying to improve my life and give myself as many opportunities as possible. I think it's really important.
So whether that is going to get in my MBA to learn more business skills. Whether that is learning more technology, teaching myself doing more skills classes or something, I think it's super important to be looking at that now rather than when the athletic career completely slams shut.
OLEG:
You just mentioned your motivational speaking. Can you give me an example of a couple of most frequent questions that people ask you and also something that is unexpected or something that was unexpected to you where you would have to go, really?
KYLE:
Oh, boy. I think some of the more common questions that I get are a lot of the, what motivates you, or how do you stay motivated and all of that, or what inspires you or something along those lines. In terms of the motivation piece, I explain to people all the time that when we think about it, there's only three forms of motivation in the world, and motivation combines two words. It combines the word motive and the word action. And so motive is a reason. Action is to move. So the word motivation, all it means is a reason to move.
There's only three primary reasons why we, as humans, move. We move away from things that make us uncomfortable, we move toward things that make us more comfortable, or we do something that makes our heart sing. So I, at various phases of life, when I was struggling to find employment, I wanted to move away from being unfit, unhealthy, so I chased being fit and healthy.
So the combination of getting away from that unhealthy to getting more healthy, eventually that morphed into pursuing this sport of triathlon just because it's amazing. I love it. What makes my heart sing more than anything now is just finding my limits and trying to push beyond them.
Using that idea of those three forms of motivation and knowing when and how each of those comes into our lives is really important. So I think that's a big part of it. And as far as something that is unexpected, one of the best ones that I always get is someone inevitably always asks like, "Oh, does your guide dog do the triathlon with you?"
OLEG:
Oh, sure, yeah. I've got a Paralympic guide dog.
KYLE:
Yeah. It's like, no, no. My guide dogs are definitely, they're amazing dogs, but they can't guide me swimming. They can't ride a tandem bike, and they definitely cannot run as fast as I can and need to to be competing at the Paralympics. So that's one of the better ones that I get. And inevitably, "When you drive does your dog steer?" And all that kind of stuff, so that's kind of fun.
OLEG:
I have a feeling there's no statistics behind this, it's just a feeling, that blind people are generally more technologically inclined than the sighted population. But I also have a feeling that generally the blind population is much less athletically inclined than the sighted population of the same age group for various reasons. Would you agree? Would you disagree with that? And if you agree, is there anything we as a blind community or as members of the blind community could do to change that?
KYLE:
I think you're actually spot on both hypotheses. I'm living proof of that. I was a 21, 22, 23-year-old, pretty out of shape guy, but I was decent on the laptop. Then once I got my first smartphone, I was living it up, loving it. I have come across so many people who are blind or visually impaired that just eat up technology. They will eat it up, they love every bit of it.
But then when it comes to getting outside and wanting to do something athletic, there's a fear there. At least I've experienced this myself because even as a Paralympian, someone who has competed around the world, it's still scary to put yourself out there and ask for help when you need to find someone to run with, or there's this pressure of I need to be perfect at something, I can't make mistakes. And I think that exists out there.
One of the things that I try to get across to people is that, "Look, no one is perfect." One of the beautiful things about sport is that there's such a range of people who are just getting started to the elite of the elite, the cream of the crop that you fall anywhere there and you're not alone in sport. We have all of these technology groups online, there's fitness groups. We don't have to be perfect at anything. It's just a matter of are we willing to get out and try it a little bit.
So I think you're spot on on both of those accounts, and I think we just need to be willing to be messy. I think a lot of us are not afraid of trying something new technologically because we know that we can fix the piece of technology and maybe there's a fear out there that, oh, I might get hurt or something like that. Sure, that's a valid concern, but I could run out of money too. "If ifs and butts were candy and nuts, we'd all have a Merry Christmas," but we got to be willing to try and we got to be willing to get a little messy.
That's where the magic happens, and that's where the beauty of life is, is when we get messy and we get out there and try. If I had not reached out to the online fitness community, I would not have the friends that I do today. If I had not been willing to put myself out there and to get out for that very first run, which was more of a shuffling walk than a run, I wouldn't be a two-time Paralympian. So you have to start somewhere. That goes for if you're starting in your fitness journey or your technology journey.
OLEG:
Well, Kyle Coon was with us today. Thank you, Kyle. I am hoping it's going to be an impulse at least for some of our listeners to start and get messy, not just technologically but athletically as well. Great talking to you, Kyle.
KYLE:
Thank you Oleg. I appreciate it.
OLEG:
So recently I was reading the National Braille Press Catalog and one book caught my attention. The title of the book was Computer Basics for the Newly Blind User, and the authors of that book are Chris and Kim Nova.
Well, I realize I often help or try to help newly blind computer users and sometimes it feels like we're speaking different languages, so I thought it might be interesting, not just for me, but for some of our listeners as well, to invite Chris and Kim to join us here on FSCast and ask them a few questions. So Chris, Kim, welcome to the show.
KIM NOVA:
Thank you.
CHRIS NOVA:
Thanks for having us.
OLEG:
So you run your own company and that company is named, is it Mystique Access or is this Mystic Access?
CHRIS:
It's Mystic. M-Y-S-T-I-C.
OLEG:
So what's in that name, why Mystic?
CHRIS:
It's a long story. It was more or less we were naming the company and we wanted to be kind of mystical or kind of fantasy oriented type of thing, and then Access, so we chose Access for accessibility. So that's why we came up to be Mystic Access.
OLEG:
Are you fans of fantasy books?
KIM:
Maybe.
CHRIS:
She is.
OLEG:
So who would be your top authors?
KIM:
Well, Tolkien has to be at the top of the list, certainly.
OLEG:
But now to your book, if I understand it correctly, at least for one of you, it's been written from your personal experience, is that so?
CHRIS:
Yes, that would be training with... I've done over the past 30 years or so. I don't even remember anymore how long, but I started out doing vocational rehabilitation instruction for the New York State Commission for the Blind, and it was very, very interesting. That's where I learned my lot in life. I didn't go to school for it, so I didn't go to college to learn accessibility or screen readers or any of that stuff. I picked a lot of that stuff up doing on the job training and actually training other customers.
Now I was born with cataracts turned into glaucoma. So for about the first maybe 20 years of my life, I had vision, which would decline quite a bit. So I have an idea of what things look like. I've never seen Windows 3.1, 95, 98, so I've never actually seen any of that stuff. So I don't really personally know where things are, but I have a mental image of what I think the computer is supposed to look like, and that may or may not be a good thing. If I were to get my sight back and look at a computer screen, I'd be like, what is this? I don't know.
OLEG:
Why wouldn't that be a good thing though?
CHRIS:
Well, just because I would be floundering around just like other people. I'd have to relearn all the stuff all over again. I have an idea of where the title bar is, the menu bar and things of that, even the ribbon. But I have an image of what I think the ribbon looks like, which would be completely different than probably what it actually does look like.
OLEG:
And Kim, you've never seen a computer screen, correct?
KIM:
Absolutely correct. No, I've been total from birth and was three months premature, and so I've never had access to viewing any of that information visually. And like Chris, I was someone who did not necessarily learn this stuff easily. I was not necessarily into technology so much as a young kid and coming up, but it was something that, especially by the time I got to college and got internet access easily made available to me. I got to become a very fast typist very quickly because I was very anxious to explore and learn and have always been a very curious person. So I think that helped me in pursuing some of these skill sets that I needed to become more technically advanced.
OLEG:
Getting back to Mystic Access, is it fair to say that it's your family business?
CHRIS:
Yes.
KIM:
Definitely. Yeah, we're a married couple and weren't obviously when we began Mystic, when Mystic became a thing, but he asked me to join what was at the time, an earlier version of the Mystic Podcast in about 2014. So it began like that for the two of us to do this thing together and then increased over time.
Our first audio documentation that we did together for Mystic, and audio documentation is sort of Mystic's thing. That's primarily what we do is various audios on both mainstream and blindness related technology. So our first one was on HumanWares, Victor Stream, which at the time was the second generation, and it has just expanded tremendously from there.
So it's a fun gig and we podcast as well. So it's very interesting to teach from that perspective to those who are primarily audio learners.
OLEG:
What I'm about to ask you might be a question out of ignorance, but I'm going to ask it anyway. With companies coming up with their own documentation and manuals and whatnot, is there still a market for audio documentation? Does the market really want and take what you are offering as a company?
KIM:
I would say a resounding yes to that. And I think one of the values of audio documentation, at least in the ways that we have discovered it over the years is the demonstration aspect. So we have the ability to actually show what the process looks like in addition to just saying, when you press this or when you hit this key combination or do this thing that you're going to hear X.
In terms of the audio, they'll actually hear the screen reader speak that and maybe get a better concept of how something is supposed to work and what one needs to do. And perhaps it's just a slightly different way of learning that information just because it's being done directly in front of them as it were, through audio.
OLEG:
I'm reminded right now of our interview with Eric Damery on the previous episode of FSCast, and Eric was telling us how they recorded the first JAWS training tapes with Ted Henter. Quite frequently JAWS would not perform the way they expected and they would have to go back to developers and ask to fix things. Now, this was back in the 90s. We're recording this in 2024, is that a familiar experience for you? Have you ever had things break as you record your manuals or training tapes?
CHRIS:
Oh, yes.
KIM:
Almost every time we record, yes.
OLEG:
I'd love to ask you for examples, but I'm not sure you'll answer this one.
CHRIS:
Sometimes we work with pre-release products. So we might have a beta of X and we're trying to record the documentation for it, and it blows up, not literally blows up, but what you're trying to do isn't going to work properly. So then you have to go back to developers and say, "Fix this."
OLEG:
Yet that means you've got your channels to give feedback to developers, and that must be helpful as well, is it?
KIM:
It is. And we have the magic of audio editing, which is also very helpful because sometimes you don't necessarily need to record each and every little thing. You've got some pieces that you might be able to keep from a previous recording, which can be really helpful because the one thing about audio production of course is, its very time-consuming.
OLEG:
Yeah, audio editing and audio production today are amazing. You can do really incredible stuff with that. But then you also write books. Why writing books when you can just narrate everything with audio? Why books then?
KIM:
I think I was a writer first, and when I got the opportunity to write for National Braille Press, it was just a really wonderful situation for me because it's another way that I love to communicate and have become hopefully quite proficient at communicating that way. So it's just another way to learn.
I think giving people the various communication methods is very helpful because there are people who are going to learn better through reading something than through listening to it and vice versa. And maybe some would like the combination of both, and maybe one concept won't necessarily click until they read it or they listen to it. So I think having different avenues to foster learning can be exceptionally helpful. I know it is for me personally, and I know that's the case for many people. So I think books is just another great way of being able to spread knowledge on different technologies that we have and try and make them a little less complex through hopefully clear-cut information.
OLEG:
And this brings us to this speaking different languages' analogy that I alluded to at the beginning of this conversation. I've been legally blind all of my life, and I try to help newly blinded individuals, and sometimes it seems like there is no understanding. I don't quite understand their needs. I try to explain the keyboard, I give them 100 keyboard shortcuts, or at least a few dozen, and it's overwhelming. So I realize I'm giving them information that's too much. Where do I start? Where do you start? How do you begin working with somebody who has just lost their eyesight?
CHRIS:
Usually what I do in that type of newly situation is to not start out with shortcuts. The reason you don't start out with shortcuts, or at least in my opinion, is that you want to teach them how to get there in case the shortcut either changes or it doesn't work. For menu items, press down arrow five times, that might change with an upgrade. So now the down arrow is six times or eight times. So you want to teach them the very, very basics how to edit. How do I edit my document in Word? How do I edit my email? Those kinds of things.
But having shortcuts, absolutely, they're wonderful, they're great, but like you said, there's like hundreds of shortcuts. Look at how many shortcuts are in Word, for example.
KIM:
And they're coming from an environment where maybe they've really never used the keyboard for anything other than typing. They may be overwhelmed by learning those hundreds of shortcuts. First and foremost, maybe they just need to be able to have one surefire way to get to say their task bar or their desktop or whatever that is, and more slowly learn the process because they're coming from a mouse oriented way of navigation to now suddenly they're having to use a keyboard. And that in and of itself is a struggle for them. So it's just a matter of a slower, gentler introduction into some of these very new concepts.
OLEG:
A few years ago, one of the issues was helping people to understand synthesized speech. Now, speech synthesis has developed tremendously in the last 5 or 10 years. Is that still an issue though, understanding the computer when it talks?
KIM:
I expect that it's still very much an issue, and it's not so much an issue of understanding. It's having the attention to listen and listen carefully to those details. And that's why we say in the book, "There are skill sets you may have and that you may have previously worked on when you were sighted, that may help you when you were blind." So if you are a detailed oriented person, it may be easier for you to listen to all the details of what the synthesizer is saying to you. Or if you're someone who has listened for your job, let's say you were a therapist, and maybe that's something that is a skill you have honed previously, it will be easier for you. But if you've done something else where maybe you've done a very visual job in the past, then you may not have honed those skills. And so whatever the speech is, no matter how good the voice is, a lot of it's going over your head and it's really not as easy to pay attention to that. So you have to work towards honing these new skill sets that maybe you haven't really used so much before. So I'm not sure so much of it is understanding the voice as just having the concentration to know what you need to do and when you need to do it.
OLEG:
Well, as you're sharing this, I'm thinking of a specific scenario where a person hears a chunk of speech that says something like, list box or check box, all those control types. And they're not tuned to listen out for those things. So that's very, very easy to miss, right?
KIM:
Definitely. And then they have to know, now that I'm blind and I can't use my mouse, how do I open that list box or check that check box or that radio button? And so all these different overwhelming scenarios can crash down on a person very quickly, which is why there's so much of a process to it. We've certainly seen exceptions to this rule in our trainings and working with people, but for most people, that's why it takes a significant amount of time to transition to using a screen reader successfully, because there's so much new information or information that they have to digest in a new way. Not only do I need to hear list box, but now I need to know how to navigate it with keys.
OLEG:
Losing their speed and efficiency. I mean learning to use a computer with a keyboard rather than a mouse and realizing they're now working two or five times slower, is that a barrier for some people? Do you have to deal with this? And if so, how?
KIM:
It's definitely a disconcerting reality for many people. One of the things that we encourage them in the book is, that may be the case right now, but eventually going back to our shortcuts discussion and being able to learn how to move proficiently through some of these areas on your PC, maybe eventually you'll be as fast or faster than when you were sighted. It might not be now, it might not be a year from now, but it may eventually happen for you. I can't guarantee that. We all learn in different ways. None of this is a one size fits all approach by any stretch of imagination. And you have to work at your own pace and slowly introduce yourself to these concepts and learn these concepts. But it is possible that eventually your speed will increase to either get close to where you were or maybe depending on who you are and how you use your computer surpass where you were when you were sighted.
A lot of this depends on the task as well, of course. It's not going to be the same for every task that you're doing, but eventually this may happen for you. But in the meantime, yes, you must learn patience and you must learn that this is all going to take time. You are essentially learning to navigate completely differently in the world than you did before. You can certainly build on skills you've had previously when you were sighted, but it's a very, very different way to view the world.
OLEG:
So I realized there is no scientific answer on the following question, but still I wonder about your own experience or the way you feel about it. Is there a certain preference with newly blinded individuals as to which interface they would like to use? Are they more comfortable generally with the keyboard or with a touchscreen interface, or does it really depend on a person and it's hard to generalize?
CHRIS:
I think it really just depends on the person. Some people just don't want to use touch screens. Some people prefer buttons. They prefer the keyboard and pressing yes. And also it really might depend on the task as well.
For me personally, when writing long emails or documents and things of that nature, I'll gravitate to a computer using a keyboard rather than using an iPhone with even a Bluetooth keyboard or the virtual keyboard, of course.
OLEG:
And about the age of your students, is it fair to say that most of these people are in their senior years?
CHRIS:
Yes.
KIM:
Absolutely.
OLEG:
But that also means that these people have got their own life experience, their own background, their own preferences. How do you account for all that in your training?
KIM:
It requires a lot of discussion. Sometimes it requires patience and compassion because they really are struggling and we have to discuss those things in their past. What were your skill sets? What did you enjoy? What made your life fun? Because as strange as it may sound and as paradoxical as it may sound, or there probably needs to be, if possible, an element of fun in some of these learning processes that people need to go through. Because if it's not fun, you're eventually just going to throw it down and walk away from it. So we try and tailor that in as well. What made you have fun? Well, did you like talking to people? Well, let's throw an element of a voice assistant into your new life. I mean, there are different ways to tailor it for each client, but it does require a lot of conversation and in many times a lot of experimentation as well to figure out what's going to work for this person and what they find not only easiest, but most proficient.
OLEG:
So then how about the expectations your students may have? Do they ever need to adjust them? Are the expectations normally realistic or does there have to be some work?
CHRIS:
I think normally they do have realistic expectations. We had one individual that we worked with a couple of years ago who lost her sight in February. And by August she was very, very proficient using a screen reader and doing what she needed to do. She was getting training other places as well, but she just said, "Well, I can sit in my chair or I can get back to work." She got back to work and she was a go-getter too.
KIM:
I think expectations differ for each person, and that has to be a thing at the outset to say, "What do you want to be able to do? What do you normally do? How do you normally use your PC? Or how do you normally use your phone? What are the tasks that you primarily need to become familiar with again?" And really discuss what can you feasibly do? And some of it is seemingly pretty miraculous what someone can actually accomplish. She's a great example of that. What can you accomplish in six months? Well, it can be pretty incredible depending on the person. So there are definitely expectations that one may need to meet or hopefully eventually exceed. But we always discuss with people the need to be flexible in what they're working towards as well. So there's a lot to be discovered.
OLEG:
Okay, so when I, as a pretty experienced user, want to help somebody who's just lost their eyesight to master the computer or the phone, what would be one most important advice you would give me?
CHRIS:
Take it slow.
OLEG:
That goes against my natural instincts.
CHRIS:
Slow down. Again, those 100 shortcuts, they don't need to know them all at one time. So you just take it slow. Have them go with one task at a time until they're proficient in that one or two tasks they want to do.
OLEG:
Imagine you're talking to screen reader developers, screen reader producers. Have you heard your clients saying, I wish my screen reader could do this or that? And no, I don't mean a screen reader frying eggs, although that might be cool sometimes, but something more realistic, what is there that it would be nice if our screen readers could do?
KIM:
So maybe some really clear cut introductory information. Whether that be a tutorial or something demonstrative that they can use to say, you really can do X, Y, and Z with your screen reader and be able to show people maybe what some of these things. Like if you tab through, you'll be able to see these pieces of your document or arrow through your emails and show people some realistic pieces that they'll be able to access later on. Perhaps that would motivate them to become more proficient with their screen readers. So maybe some introductory something, that someone would be able to access to maybe give them a list of items that they will be able to accomplish fairly easily and succinctly when they learn to use their screen readers. But like Chris said, it is so overwhelming for people that doing that in a way that doesn't overwhelm them further may prove difficult.
OLEG:
Right now, I'm reminded of a particular episode in my life. I was trying to help a friend who was new to Access Technology, and I installed JAWS on their computer and configured it what I thought the best possible way. And of course, I set the speech rate slower than usual. But then in a couple of days, that person called me and he said, "I'm reading the manual, and JAWS is supposed to give me tutor messages, and it's also supposed to tell me shortcut keys and hot keys, and it doesn't do any of that. Why?" And I go, "Well, it's because I disabled all of that stuff." He says, "You disable it. Why would you disable it?" And I go, "I don't know. I guess it's just muscle memory for me. I mean, I've been doing it all my life or actually for many years. So that's why." Again, is that something we should unlearn?
KIM:
Yes.
CHRIS:
Just yes.
KIM:
Yes, most definitely. Because again, they're new to this process. And for those of us, like you and myself who have never had physical sight and have been using these things for years, we have our own ways. I never use echo typed characters or words. I turn all that stuff off because it drives me crazy. And if I were working with someone, that would be something that I would have to learn to deal with if I was having to listen to someone learning to type on a keyboard without sight. And that can be difficult.
So for us, it's hard to unlearn those things and then exercise the patience and compassion that's necessary to help someone through a process that is old hat for us. It's something we've done our whole lives. This is a world that we know and understand to someone who is new and has never been a part of this before and doesn't really understand or know how to navigate in this way.
OLEG:
So I'm really happy for those people who will be getting your training. And I would appreciate it if you could share with us where people can find you, like purchase your books or your manuals or find out more.
KIM:
Well, if you want to visit us, you can go to mysticaccess.com. That will take you to our main hub. And from there you can access more about us. You can hang out at our bi-weekly podcast. Every other Tuesday we get new episodes. There are tons of free downloads available for you as well. Probably hundreds of hours by now of event recordings and all kinds of goodies.
If you want to learn more about our books in particular, you can visit National Braille Press, which is nbp.org for National Braille Press, and you'll be able to access all the books we have written for them over there. And they're purchased through National Braille Press, not through us.
OLEG:
So Chris and Kim Nova with Mystic Access, thank you for joining us on FSCast and sharing from your treasure trove of experience.
KIM:
Our pleasure. Thank you for having us.
CHRIS:
Thank you for having us.
OLEG:
Chris and Kim Nova, talking about helping somebody who has just lost their eyesight to master the computer or a mobile phone. And Elizabeth, you are doing this all the time. How often in your training department do you get emails from people who say, "Well, I'm just learning," or "I have friends or relatives who are losing their eyesight?" How often do you have the privilege, I should say, to help these people?
ELIZABETH:
I just want to first say what a great show and great resources here that you've shared. I think it's extremely important for people to know where to go to get that information and what to do if they're losing vision. We do get quite a few emails from people who are very new to our products, who are very new to assisted technology in general, and it's wonderful to be able to help them find the resources they need and to also see them as they are on their journey to learning how to use these products.
OLEG:
We are here to be with you and to assist you and to partner with you on this journey. And FSCast is one of those ways that we do it, but there are also podcasts and YouTube videos that are produced by our training department. And to find them, I guess you go to freedomscientific.com/training, is that correct?
ELIZABETH:
Yes, absolutely.
OLEG:
And how do you reach the training department by email?
ELIZABETH:
You can email us with questions, feedback, training ideas. We would love to get those emails, send them to training@vispero.com.
OLEG:
And for FSCast, you send your ideas to FSCast@vispero.com.
Thank you Elizabeth for joining us this month. It was a fantastic experience to host this episode together.
ELIZABETH:
Yes, thank you Oleg.
OLEG:
And see you all next month on FSCast for November 2024.