My Idea.

1. My Idea. • I want to help software vendors make their Linux products accessible to people with disabilities. • I will do this by providing consulting services, including: • Usability testing with disabled test subjects, • Automated testing and bug reporting using scripts, • Heuristic evaluation and design services, • education and training for design and development staff. • Companies need this because: • it's the law! • accessible technology can help reduce costs of time lost and money spent when an employee develops a temporary disability. (No need to hire temps, or to let work pile up while recovering.)

2. About Accessibility • “People with disabilities” is the only minority group that anyone can be a member of at any time. • Zippers, typewriters, and automatic grocery store doors are all inventions that were designed for people with disabilities. • All of us can expect our abilities to change over our lifetimes. • There's a lot of literature about the aging baby boomers and their accessibility needs; they will comprise 40% of the workforce by 2008. • Federal law provides two types of guidelines for EIT accessibility: hardware related and software related.

3. The Law • In 1998, Congress amended the Rehabilitation Act to require Federal agencies to make their electronic and information technology accessible to people with disabilities. • The law applies to all Federal agencies when they develop, procure, maintain, or use electronic and information technology. • Section 508 of the Americans with Disabilities Act describes in detail what “software accessibility” means. • Includes guidelines for user interfaces (no blinking text, etc) • Includes guidelines for compatibility with Adaptive Technologies • In the software development world, Section 508 is perceived as being very difficult to implement.

4. Why Linux? • There's a lot of money in Linux right now. Oracle's announcement last week, IBM's announcement on Monday. • Linux has a much better infrastructure for adding accessibility features than Windows or the Mac. The infrastructure was developed at Sun and IBM, and is open source (so it gets a lot of testing for free). • Linux is my passion and my field of expertise. • Making Linux more accessible for for-profit corporations will also make it more accessible for home users. So I can make money and build more equitable software at the same time!

5. My company: Who? • Management team: • Operations, Anna Dirks • Design, Garrett Le Sage • Legal, Anne Oestergard • Testing, Telsa Gwynne • Finance, Diane Massay • My background: • Novell, Ximian, Helix Code and the Open Source community • http://betterdesktop.org • Involvement in online disability communities • MIT connections

6. My company: Structure and Funding. • Structure • An “S” type corporation • Getting Started • MIT has an entrepreneurship center where students and alumni can get help with growing their businesses. • I want to convince MIT to incubate my business. They have great accessibility technology on hand, and they use GNOME. • Other MIT-related incubators could also work. • I don't want to borrow money. • My savings? • Angel investors?

7. My company: Marketing • Target Market: Large Linux Software Vendors • Nokia, IBM, Sun, Oracle, Red Hat, Novell, HP, etc. • Competitors • Sun's Group (but they don't do testing) • IBM's Group (but they don't do testing) • Open Source Community Efforts (but they don't work on corporate schedules, or do testing) • Pricing • Testing services: $110/hour + expenses (paying for test subjects) • Other services: $110/hour

8. My company: Marketing, continued • Location: Cambridge, Massachusetts (ideally at the MIT ATIC laboratory) • Advertising: • My Network • Planet GNOME • My Company's Website • Linux Conferences • Accessibility Conferences • Government Procurement Conferences

9. My company: Problems • Name! • I'd rather build products.