As an opener to this meeting in Denver, I think it is good to review some key principles as to how the Accessibility Forum was founded and is being operated.

• The first principle is that it is an open Forum, open to all.
• Secondly we have made a concerted effort to keep the major stakeholder groups involved and represented in as many subgroups as makes sense.
• Thirdly, the work pursued by the Forum has and will be chosen and supported by the membership. Although the Forum Staff has carried on a majority of the behind the scenes work of planning, organization, execution, facilitation, often drafting and reporting, still the members of the Forum are responsible for the content and character of the final products.
• And finally, the products and outcomes of the Accessibility Forum will be placed in the public domain.

I’d like to talk to you a few minutes on what will first appear to be an unrelated topic. Bear with me long enough to bring the analogy home. I’d like to talk about culture.

The British anthropologist Edward B. Tylor defined the concept of culture in 1871. He used the term to refer to "that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society." 

Organizational analysts have applied cultural theory to their own ideas about how organizations work and why they act as they do. Usually there has been more disagreement than consensus on how this socio-anthropological theory should be applied, but the term culture is broadly used and understood as a base concept.

Generally the practitioners use this term as a convenient way to encapsulate the concept of ‘how things are’ and to contrast one organization or group with another. “It’s part of the culture,” means that the activity or belief is so well understood or acted upon in the community or organization as to be taken for granted. It can be a negative activity or belief that is viewed as holding back the community or it can be a positive aspect that holds the community together.

When two or more cultures come in contact with one another, these cultural influences sometimes clash. And, usually, the influence, authority, or pressure of the others modifies some aspects of each culture. Often the cultural diffusion that results is hard to differentiate in the long run, because it becomes such a part of life.

Take the diffusion of foods that comes when cultures cross paths. For example, can you imagine your diet without potatoes or corn, without tea or coffee, without black pepper, cinnamon, or vanilla, without chocolate? Yet all of these were introduced to the European (and our) diets from outside of Europe.

Many a man has had his life saved by a box of chocolates. Who among us, working at the office hasn’t trolled all the likely spots for a piece of this confection as a way to keep working on the current crisis or to answer a client’s last minute requirements? How many business assignments have been successfully completed on the power of chocolate? Seriously, the richness and variety of our Western diet are the results of cultural diffusion. Many cultures interacting created that richness and variety.

So what has this to do with the Accessibility Forum?

I continue to be amazed by the variety and complexity of the issues that are essentially cultural in origin. In January at a meeting in Washington dealing with Section 508, Tim Creagan of SHHH said it the most succinctly. He said something like “People just don’t know!” He was referring to ignorance about assisted hearing or alternative media. People lack exposure to what is available and needed. They just don’t know. But it applies more widely to the Forum.

Each person coming in has a perspective or outlook that is grounded in his or her experiences. Those perspectives cannot be as wide as the total experience of this whole group. Everyone coming into the Forum brings goals, objectives, hopes, plans, fears, and anticipation. But they are as different as the variety of stakeholder groups we represent. In fact, they are more varied than just the stakeholder categories we use, because we use those stakeholder categories as only general groupings, as convenient handles.

While we see some consistencies that cause us to make those groupings or categories of stakeholders, there is even more variety and diversity than we might have thought at first blush. Those convenient categories can be broken up more finely into many other cultures and subcultures. To extrapolate on what Tim said, “You don’t know what you don’t know!” Is there anyone who can’t learn something from someone else in this group? Some of you have been doing this for a long time, but I dare say there is more to learn.

If you have been following the Forum since its inception last year and have been involved fairly consistently, you must have had an epiphany or two in dealing with the wide range of stakeholders we have. If you haven’t then you aren’t trying hard enough. Everyone is learning if they are willing.

This Forum is doing its job best when someone says, “I didn’t know..” or “Oh, I see what you mean.” Or “That certainly is a different way of looking at it.” Or “I hadn’t thought of it that way.” We really can’t afford to dismiss a perspective out of hand and without examination because who knows which perspective might become the equivalent of chocolate in our diet?

The diversity, so well represented by our membership, coupled with the openness of the round-table discussion and participation, is both the challenge and the strength of the Accessibility Forum.

Part of the challenge deals with the diverse language we use – terms of art that come with our particular cultural approach, beliefs, knowledge, education, work environments, and experiences. We often misunderstand one another because our choice of language gets in the way. What Edward Taylor took for granted in his definition, was the key place that language takes in the culture. But you can’t take language for granted in understanding cultural differences. One word can mean so many things in so many different contexts. Our lexicons are not synchronized.

As Dr. James Crupi says, “It doesn’t matter what I say, it only matters what you hear.”

This is easy to expect in arenas where the languages are clearly different. I spent five years in Germany and a couple beyond that as a technical representative to NATO working groups. The language problem is easier to note, understand, and forgive in that arena. But what about when we are all supposedly speaking English? My French counterparts at NATO had a difficult time understanding that the same English word might have more than one contextual meaning. After all, they have had the French Academy to dictate meaning and proper utilization of the French language since 1635.

English standardization is made more difficult by the adaptive nature of the English language. We will take any word and adopt and then adapt (and some might say corrupt) it for our own purposes. And then we will change the meaning of the word over time. We aren’t the only language that does that. Many a word has started life meaning one thing and end up currently meaning the exact opposite. The word we use for school is from the Greek ‘schole’ (S C H O L E). Its original meaning was leisure. After all, youth in those days only got to go to school when they weren’t working at home or in the fields. My sons would not agree that school, however well related to the original Greek, means leisure.

There is no worldwide agreement on English spellings and pronunciations.

The story goes that an Englishman commented to the American about the "curious" way in which he pronounced so many words, such as schedule (which the Englishman insisted should be pronounced shedule). The American thought about it for a few moments, then replied, "I don’t know why we pronounce it schedule. Perhaps it's because we went to different schools!" We each like things the way they are most familiar to us.

As another example the word ‘rank’ (R A N K) has more than one meaning. It is something favorable if you possess rank, but it is something distasteful if you can be described as rank. Generally if it is a noun you are okay and if it is an adjective, you aren’t. Our past, and usually most recent, associations determine the context we assume at first. 

Can I ask you to make sure that you know what others mean by the words they chose before drawing a conclusion? It will save a lot of misunderstanding and time. Asking rather than assuming will also bring greater value to the joint effort. You need to apply creativity here and open your mind to new possibilities and categories. Don’t limit yourself to the vocabulary you brought with you!

Let’s move away from language for a moment and discover another way of examining the challenge of Section 508. Let’s take note of some of the forces at play around the issue of Section 508. We have created a graphic to depict this, which we call Balancing the Pressures of Section 508.

The successful implementation of Section 508, the Promise of Section 508, is depicted as a rather amorphous cloud, no clear barriers or walls and irregular in shape. From all sides this shape has forces pushing against it, represented by arrows and given names to identify the force at work. The chart and my description are not meant to be all-inclusive, nor particularly scientific, but rather to just demonstrate the concept. Let me try to describe it to you.

Some of the pressures come from the Letter of the Law; making sure that purchases are in compliance with Section 508. These has been some concern voiced that meeting the letter of the law in terms of the provisions of Section 508 might not always end in greater accessibility or that, having met the requirement we could have fallen short of the spirit of 508. Whether or not this is true, it is a concern for some.

Government and Industry costs also play a role. How much will it cost industry to modify or ensure that their products meet the provisions? What increased cost will that produce for Government? Will cost be prohibitive for either sector?

There is also the pressure for increased, even Complete or Universal Accessibility. That pressure can work to expand the accessibility needs beyond what is in the standard. Let me reiterate that the Accessibility Forum is solely interested in 508 – no more and no less.

Government has a mandate and industry has a need to Expand the Labor Pool by making E&IT more accessible to a work force that can’t reach its full potential without tackling the obstacles to accessibility. This is also a moral imperative for many who participate in this Forum.

There are always pressures for Rigid and easy to understand Standards that consist of hard, fast specifications like the Government developed in the good old days. But those standards have become a real issue in some areas and can never provide the needed flexibility in technology arenas. The TTY standards have revealed some of those issues, as I understand it. Additionally, while there is a need to take into consideration the standards that are being formulated in a variety of organizations, national and international, those efforts could prove both too restrictive and may take much too long.

Another pressure comes from the continuing changes in Technology and Innovation. The technology is not standing still nor is it moving slowly. Everyday there are different products, different approaches, and greater possibilities. We need an approach that accommodates these changes.

The Government has a Mission Imperative. The program and project E&IT managers are responsible to accomplish their Government mission objectives-to get the job done! We must interrupt that flow and inject the need for Section 508 technical requirements. And we have to help make that a practical thing to accomplish. We have been asking how we can help Government make informed decisions. Maybe we should be asking how could industry better communicate their accessibility features to government.

We have the driving force in industry to see Profitability. That is not a bad word; it is just the bottom line imperative that we should all easily understand. It is complicated in 508 because only the Federal Government requires 508 at this point and the remaining and the majority of their customer base may not care. At this point, however, regulation has only defined the initial market. There is potential for a larger market as functionality provided for accessibility becomes accepted by the wider consumer market. That could dramatically change the profitability calculation.

Certainly there is the tendency in some quarters to Ignore the Law and hope it will go away. Who doesn’t want a return to simpler times? Isn’t what we have already enough? Of course those in this room realize that it isn’t nearly enough in terms of meeting the standard, nevertheless the moral imperative.

There is the Complexity of Federal Procurement in a 508 world. How does the Contracting Officer know that his requiring official has adequately taken 508 into account? How do requiring officials know what meets the technical requirements of 508? Whose promises do they believe? Which set of technical requirements best convey 508 in a fair and equitable manner to offerors? Should I rely on third party testing? When is enough assurance really enough? Does the Voluntary Product Accessibility Template give enough assistance? These questions reflect some of the complexity facing Federal purchasers.

There is also some consideration for the Changing Demographics in our country-an increasing need for greater accessibility by an aging population that both wants to use and increasingly must use E&IT to perform the most basic of government interactions. The number of people who need access goes up while the number of people who require consideration for accessibility also increases.

There are those who need interoperability solutions now and who have found Ad Hoc Solutions to Interoperability between E&IT and Assistive Technology. They must continue to provide those ad hoc solutions to make it work until something more like a consistent dialogue between E&IT and AT exists. Some of those solutions are the result of a lot of hard work by companies that may not be interested in changing to a more defined or robust solution. But a stable, adaptive, well understood, and widely followed interface would be extremely beneficial.

I feel sure we have not provided insights into all the pressures that exist; surely we have missed something. But we don’t pretend to have been all-inclusive, nor to say all the concerns are true, nor to have given a full hearing to the forces we have mentioned. That wasn’t our goal. Our goal was just to defend the concept that a variety of pressures are at play and to remind you of some you might now have uppermost in your mind.

Likewise, none of these forces should be viewed as inherently good or evil. Nor should they be viewed as necessarily opposing forces. They are just viewpoints brought to the table by individuals and organizations with some stake in the implementation of Section 508. These pressures are all attempts to answer or respond to Section 508. They represent tensions that should not be ignored.

I would like to suggest that there a continuing need for consideration of all of these forces, not because any one of us likes all of these pressures or agrees with all of them, but instead because they exist in reality and must be dealt with. Let me also say that we purposely depicted the overall concept as an ill-defined figure without clear definition because we don’t assume that the solution to implementation of Section 508 is in the dead center and symbolically we don’t assume we know what success would be.

But we do have in the middle ground of all these forces something we call Fulfilling the Promise of Section 508. We have shown the open door to information picture that is the Forum’s logo as part of that middle ground. We believe that both the place and the way to achieve the promise reside in the Accessibility Forum. The promise can only be realized by making tradeoffs between the external pressures and building a nexus of acceptable, practical, pragmatic implementation approaches. The Forum provides all those involved with the level playing field and an open venue to pursue that practical implementation.

Where the exact ground of reasonable solutions exists is yet to be determined. But the Accessibility Forum can provide a broad voice to recommend solutions, an aid to self-certification and better communication, and continue to seek the promise of product innovation and effective accessibility.

I believe it is safe to say that solutions must be found that, in some way or another, either release, lessen, or remove those pressures over time. Any one particular force conquering the others will not be an optimum solution for all of us. Can I ask that each of us consider the forces that are at play, seek to understand them, and then move to solutions that answer as many viewpoints as possible?

Can I also express the opinion that the force of apathy and waiting until it all goes away is dangerous? Why? Because if we fail to find equitable, pragmatic methods of implementation, we risk a stronger and less advantageous solution being forced upon us in the long run. Someone has said it this way: “Standing in the middle of the road is dangerous. You will get knocked down by the traffic from both directions.”

If we don’t fix it, someone else may. And probably their solution, lacking the variety of perspectives we have right here, will be much less satisfactory than this body of stakeholders is capable of producing. Further, many folks are out there actively proposing options they feel solve the problem. Industry worldwide is seeing an opportunity to meet a need. I would hope that the industry partners in the Forum would have the advantage. That is why I challenge you with the opportunity of the Accessibility Forum. Think in a new way and prepare to take some risk. Even a turtle can only progress when it’s willing to stick out its neck!

Unlike the turtle, however, we need to progress quickly, while this opportunity is available to forge a mechanism that will continue the work of the Forum begun by GSA’s sponsorship. What needs to happen? The invaluable cultural experiment represented by the Accessibility Forum must demonstrate a clear alternative to over regulation and intense, highly specific, highly restrictive, government mandated standards. Those kind of standards have not proven as adaptive as technology requires, but when people get frustrated with other approaches, they often fall back on the parent’s final excuse: “Because I said so!” That would not be optimum nor would it fulfill a key aspect of 508’s promise. Some movement that allows self-certification and provides better information to Government is preferable to all concerned.

And we have just about one year of continued sponsorship from GSA in which to make some headway and find a permanent home for the Forum or its work. One of the tasks for the Strategic Management Council is to spearhead that effort. This valuable network, provided by the Accessibility Forum, needs to continue beyond that initial sponsorship.

The Forum must present some clear-cut deliverables that benefit the stakeholders and show the longer-term promise of such a network. The Forum must develop a plan for continuing its work after the GSA sponsorship has ended. These are key issues and the Strategic Management Council is tackling them, but whether their efforts are effective depends on the full Forum’s participation.

We need you to be fully engaged in this enterprise and to contribute to an open, broad-based set of solutions to the issues of implementation of Section 508.

As I said earlier, this group of stakeholders holds both the challenge and the strength of the Accessibility Forum. Finding the balance is possible so long as we approach the issues with frankness and with a spirit of cooperation. Finding the right set of tradeoffs to achieve the promise of Section 508 depends on all stakeholders. Everyone I meet on this issue wants to see increased accessibility for people with disabilities. That good will is essential to success, but it must be followed with concrete involvement.

Why have I subjected you to this series of reflections? Because, as I have stated, the challenge is also the heart of the potential of the Accessibility Forum.

• Finding practical and adaptive ways to improve Government Procurement of E&IT is beneficial to all.
• Increasing the availability of products and services that include Section 508 requirements is beneficial to all.
• Increasing market share with more and more capable products is beneficial to all.
• Increasing the definition of interoperability between Assistive Technology and E&IT is beneficial to all.
• Finding the right tradeoffs is beneficial to all.
• Therefore, coming to resolution with the various cultures and forces found in this Forum is beneficial to all.

Let me summarize what I have been trying to point out.

The Forum’s diversity produces challenges and opportunities.

The challenges are ones of different cultures and lexicons.

The opportunity is to reshape the way we respond to standards.

The makeup of the Forum is ideal to explore the possibilities of Section 508.

The Forum approach provides the best chance to finding longer-term solutions.

The Forum’s diversity increases the chances of broad acceptance.

Success and continuity depends on participation by all stakeholders.

On August 16, 1936, a failing jockey, down to his last 27 cents, a sugar cube, and a flask of cheap liquor came up to a horse that was undersized and had crooked legs. Neither the horse nor the jockey looked right for winning races. His guardian abandoned him at age 15 at a makeshift racetrack in Montana. For 12 years he would sleep in a horse stall, ride bad horses in the day, and take some beatings as a part time boxer in the evening.

He was not the typical jockey. Because he was too tall he would starve himself, sometimes to the point of fainting. He would lay in manure piles to sweat off weight and swallowed tapeworms to keep thin.

He had a terrible string of bad accidents on the track, causing the loss of sight in one eye, crushing his chest, having nearly lost a leg and many of his teeth, a broken back, and skull fractures.

But you see, on August 16, 1936, Red Pollard walked up to a horse named Sea biscuit and won the job of jockey on the horse that, with him in the saddle, would far out win the others in that era. In 1938, Sea biscuit got more press than FDR or Hitler. It took the cooperative effort of the owner, the jockey, and the horse to make that success story happen. I’m willing to play either end of the horse if the rest of you will give the Forum the cooperative effort it needs to succeed.