We last caught up with AudioEye on the CSUNATC19 Exhibit Hall floor with news of their advancement into the kiosk access space. The internet has evolved a lot in the 2+ years since that interview and that is where J.J. starts with Dominic Varacalli, President, of AudioEye. The pair discuss the hot button topic of overlays, user testing and how the company is educating their customers to understand that access is a journey rather than a one and done service environment. If you are interested in joining the user testing program, visit this page for more information. Also, to obtain services, travel to the AudioEye website for more details.
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For the latest news and accessibility information on mainstream and access technology, Apple, Google, Microsoft, and Amazon offerings, access technology book reviews, and mobile apps, and how they can enhance entertainment, education and employment, log on to AccessWorld, the American Foundation for the Blind's free, monthly, online technology magazine. Visit <www.afb.org/aw>.
Transcript
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Hide transcriptTranscribed by Grecia Ramirez
Direct from Orlando, Florida; St. Louis; Las Vegas; Dallas; Sparks, Nevada – everywhere – it’s Blindbargains.com virtual Exhibit Hall coverage brought to you by AFB AccessWorld.
For the latest news and accessibility information on mainstream and access technology; Apple, Google, Microsoft, and Amazon offerings; access technology; book reviews; and mobile apps and how they can enhance entertainment, education, and employment, log onto AccessWorld, the American Foundation for the Blind's free monthly online technology magazine. www.AFB.org/AW.
Now, here’s J.J. Meddaugh.
J.J. MEDDAUGH: Welcome back to Blind Bargains virtual Exhibit Hall coverage. Today, talking about accessibility overlays, a process to add a bit of code or more to a website to make the website, hopefully, a little bit more accessible. They’ve gained quite a bit of traction over this last year or two, and, given the business practices of some, also gained quite a bit of controversy. While some companies focus on overlays as a one-stop solution, AudioEye does a little more than just that.
We’ve brought on Dominic Varacalli, president of AudioEye, to talk about what you guys are doing with overlays and much more. Welcome to the podcast.
DOMINIC VARACALLI: Thanks, J.J. Glad to be here.
JM: So we’ve had people from your company on before. And incidentally, AudioEye is a company that has been around for a few years now, but kind of gone in a few different directions. So why don’t you update our listeners on the main goals of your company currently and what you are currently offering.
DV: Yeah. So our main goal has always been to eradicate barriers to digital access. Over the years, the company has taken a couple of turns, from websites offering a lot of services to kiosks or all kinds of other solutions. But in the past year or two, we’ve really focused on websites and hitting the broadest part of the market as possible, because we need to solve accessibility everywhere in order to solve it for anyone, so we want to make sure it’s accessible for everyone to purchase a solution for accessibility.
JM: So walk us through the process. If a company comes to you and says, hey. We need to make our website accessible stat. What’s the process that you would take them through?
DV: Yeah. So first thing is sign up online, install our overlay, which, just to be clear, the overlay for us is not only a toolbar, but mainly, the value there is the fixes that get applied to the DOM behind the scenes to a visual user. And once they install that, we also walk them through the process of signing up for our service offerings, which do bring in people who are CPACC certified as well as JAWS certified to walk through that website, find issues that automation can’t find and automation can’t fix, but then apply those fixes. They get delivered through our overlay, but we also provide recording after the fact to say, here are the things we still couldn’t fix with our overlay, even with people. So you should try to fix those at source, or let me train you and show you how you can get better over time. And we offer training programs for those companies as well. So, really, the full suite. And we try to help people bring everything to the table. But there is some picking and choosing that customers can do to fit their needs.
JM: So you say on your homepage that the service that you provide does meet ADA, WCAG, which which is the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. At what point, for a customer, would you say your services meet that? Is it right when they install the overlay, is it further down, or what would they have to go through for you to guarantee that level of compliance?
DV: Yeah. So I like to break apart compliance from conformance with WCAG. So compliance is legal, law, and has to do with, you know, the ADA and case law. So things hold up differently in court. So that’s one thing. So compliance can really start as soon as you have a program and a plan in place and you’re making progress. So from that aspect, people can be compliant early on working with us. But conformance with WCAG and actually providing a usable experience takes time, it takes effort, and it takes commitment. So from that aspect, that doesn’t happen day one. Someone’s going to install that and get better with our automation, and then after we go through a round of QAing that site and applying manual fixes, it gets even better. But then, we continually monitor that site and look for new issues. And that’s when we have more conversations with the customer around either creating more automated fixes for those types of problems or creating more custom fixes for those types of problems or teaching them how to do it at source.
JM: I’m guessing a lot of customers come to you looking for the quick fix and maybe aren’t prepared to go through all this extra stuff. Are you finding that to be the case, or are a lot of customers understanding that it does take more than just a one-time Band-Aid solution?
DV: Yeah. It’s really an education problem. So that’s something that I think has also gotten harder over time, given just how the accessibility market has evolved. So we do try our best to educate customers that this is a journey and not a once-and-done approach. As long as you’re changing your website and as long as you’re adding to it and hopefully our customers’ businesses are growing and that’s happening, there’s going to be accessibility needs that come along with that over time. So we really do try to educate.
But most companies come in, and they want a quick solution. We’re able to provide that for them, but we have to guide them and educate them on what real accessibility is. And we have a lot of programs to try to educate those customers and help them move along that path.
JM: So obviously, you can’t probably give exact numbers, but what would you say, looking at the companies that come to you? Like, what percentage, or what amount of companies go through the entire process that you would prefer them to go through, and how many just come in trying to do the code and running away and never touching it again?
DV: Yeah. You know what? The nice thing is, I would say, it’s more than you’d think who go for the full solution. And part of the reason is agencies who support their customers want to do the right thing. And we only have to educate one person in that world to then hit thousands of websites. So we really focus on educating those types of folks on why it’s important. And when we hit a company that has that type of a scale, and we’re able to educate, you know, the main contact owner, whoever that is at the agency, we can then create unique solutions for them that apply to all of their sites, whether that’s making a menu navigatable, fixing that with the customer, but then that applies to thousands of sites. So that’s where the scale comes in. And we are able to get people on that process pretty well.
JM: I noticed a testimonial right on your homepage from one of your customers who compared your solution to that of UserWay and AccessiBe, you know, having more manual involvement having that one line of code. So it really seems like that’s where you’re trying to come down and have that full picture as opposed to just the one line of code solution.
DV: Yeah. And as a company, we’ve always had that services component. We’ve always had experts involved. So, really, adding the overlay was an evolution from doing all the manual work first and saying how can we make this more affordable to more people than it was the other way around.
JM: So as I mentioned at the top, there has been a lot of controversy around overlays. There was a petition circulating that a few hundred people signed in regards to business practice, especially with AccessiBe, but some more generally speaking, as far as overlays in general. So do you feel that the public opinion of overlays has been tainted in the past year or two, and what are you doing, if so, to try to combat that?
DV: So there has been a lot of confusion in the market. And I think that comes from different business practices, but it also comes from, I think, the people who are looking for solutions don’t fully understand accessibility. And that’s where, you know, us and others in the industry really have to advocate and educate people on what accessibility is. So our approach has been to always be transparent and upfront with what we do versus what we don’t do and also try to be transparent with where automation can get you, where people can get you, and as long as the customer has that knowledge, then it’s up to them to really take as many steps as possible to create an accessible solution. And we’re there along with them, educating them, helping them.
So while that has been hard and we are taking steps to educate and be transparent in the market, we’re really looking for ways that we can partner with others in the industry to also set the record straight on overlays and where they can add value and where they don’t add value.
JM: There are some that take the position that overlays should never be deployed at all, and that every site should be, you know, manually tested and remediated. Obviously, you don’t entirely agree with that, but what would you say to someone who has that opinion?
DV: Yeah. I mean, I really look at outcomes when it comes to how we solve this problem. So I would love the entire internet to be accessible at the very beginning for everybody. We’re not there yet. So what are all the solutions we have to bring to the table? If we could bring the resources and get everyone to, from the beginning, create accessible websites, that would be great. We’re not there, so it’s going to take people advocating and educating developers when they’re in school to teach them how to do that from the very beginning as well as people creating overlays further down the pipeline for websites that aren’t there already, as well as, you know, companies who understand are committed to accessibility, building teams, and hiring resources and building training programs to make that happen for their companies. So if we – the outcome we want is accessible websites, I think it’s a multipronged approach where we’re at. And if in, you know, another 30 years, the education has brought forward a set of developers and designers who are doing this from the very beginning, you know, maybe our position in the market is different at that time. But right now, I think we need as much creativity in the marketplace as possible. And our solution, I think, brings the best of people and overlays to the table.
JM: Great. In fact, you’ve mentioned a multipronged approach and bringing people into the equation. So you’ve been doing that with users. And there might be an opportunity for some of our listeners. So why don’t you tell us about that?
DV: Yeah. So we started a group about six months ago, where we invite people with lived experience with a disability into, essentially, a testing process. We guide and moderate an experience with someone to give us feedback on a site. And, they’re not perfect, by the way. So we find things that we can do better. And we bring that to our team when we try to fix those issues, but we also bring that to our team that maybe builds a comment remediation and say, how can we make this work better in these scenarios? So really trying to be inclusive and bring people into the fold there. So if your listeners are interested, we’ll give you a link, and you can include that in the show notes or some way, but love to bring more people into the fold there.
JM: Great. It’s a – yeah. It’s a really cool program, and I’ve been involved in it myself, and it’s a really interesting way to, kind of, remediate, but while also helping you guys improve your product.
DV: Yeah. It’s brought a lot of learning, not only to myself, but also the thing that I’ve been most happy with is it brought empathy to the problem. A lot of people who don’t understand accessibility have no way to understand it, so having someone go through a site with them or see an experience that someone had where there was a problem, it really connects the, oh, there was no announcement on that menu that opened to someone who can’t see that doesn’t understand there’s more things they can click or do or things like that. So really brings that empathy as well to their product.
JM: Wanted to give you an opportunity to comment on a resolution recently passed by the National Federation of the Blind regarding overlays and a few steps that were outlined in the resolution for overlay companies to follow, including knowing that an overlay is available, being able to turn it on or off, having contact information for the overlay company, being able to control various aspects of, you know, display or other settings based on the user’s needs and profile. What are your thoughts on that? Are these attainable goals for your company, or where do you come down on this?
DV: Yeah. I think they are attainable goals. So knowing whether the overlay is available or not, right now, we apply our overlay automatically because we wanted to treat all users the same whether they came to us without any need for overlay solutions or they did. So we’re not segregating users. We’re making them take an extra action. But I think there’s not harm in saying we can allow users to turn that off or have that choice. And then, bringing contact information or a way to contact the overlay owner, so we do that right now. In our toolbar, we have a Help Desk which allows people to submit tickets or issues they’ve experienced on the site. And we can make that more obvious in other ways, but when anyone submits an issue there, what we do is we remediate that on the site for free regardless of the level a customer’s paying us, and we also inform the site owner.
So we have some of those already, and where we don’t, I don’t think there’s anything here that seems out of bounds.
JM: One more thing before we go ahead and do the contact information at the end. There was a comment, and it wasn’t made by you, but it was in the first AudioEye interview. Actually, I kind of see where you’re at now. “The hope was that” – this was the first AudioEye interview we did in 2017 -- that – “was that someday, all website errors can be fixed automatically through code.” Do you still feel that way, or do you think things have changed a little bit since 2017?
DV: Yeah. So since I’ve gotten involved with the company last year, my perspective, you know, has also been shaped by people like yourself and others in the industry who’ve come before me, is that the internet is constantly evolving. So the types of issues are constantly getting more complicated or changing. So if there was a pause button, maybe automation would be able to solve everything, but there’s not. The internet’s evolving, sites are evolving, technology’s evolving, so I don’t think we’re going to get there any time that I can see, where it’s 100 percent all the time. But I think that has to do with the evolution of the internet is always going to happen.
JM: Well, thank you very much. We definitely appreciate you coming on and being very candid about your company and what you’re working on. So if people want to get in contact or maybe learn more about the user testing or services you provide for companies, what’s the best way of doing that?
DV: Yeah. So actually, I’m going to have to provide you a link. It’s not accessible on our website because we don’t usually promote it. But we do have a community group. You can find it by the link I’ll provide to you.
JM: All right. We’ll put it in the show notes.
DV: It’ll be in the show notes. And then, if you need – have any questions for me or about the company, there’s a Contact Us on our site. If you run into an issue with any AudioEye website, in the toolbar, there’s a Help Desk. Please submit those tickets. We’ll be happy to partner with anyone who runs into an issue to make sure we fix that.
JM: And that website address?
DV: www.audioeye.com.
JM: That’s a-u-d-i-o-e-y-e.
Dominic, thank you so much for coming on. We really appreciate it.
DV: Yeah. Thanks, J.J. It’s been great.
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Joe Steinkamp is no stranger to the world of technology, having been a user of video magnification and blindness related electronic devices since 1979. Joe has worked in radio, retail management and Vocational Rehabilitation for blind and low vision individuals in Texas. He has been writing about the A.T. Industry for 15 years and podcasting about it for almost a decade.
