[Hudlug] The Commonwealth of Massachussets (was Fwd: FOSS community, disabled ...)

[Ben Fowler]

On 3/20/06, Anne Wilson <cannewilson at tiscali.co.uk> wrote:
> On Monday 20 March 2006 15:01, Ben Fowler wrote:
> > On 3/18/06, Anne Wilson <cannewilson at tiscali.co.uk> wrote:
> > > Subject: FOSS community, disabled users must learn to communicate
> > > here is an article I wrote on this subject:
> >
> There has been some follow-up since that message was posted.  It was agreed
> that Massachussets and ODF format were not specifically accessibility
> problems.  In fact the ODF format raises much the same questions as arise
> whenever any person has to learn a new environment, be it a new word
> processor or the next version of MSWord.  This misunderstanding is not
> confined to the disabled community.  The fear of change is common among most
> computer users.

I have not followed this in detail: it seems (inter alios) that it is rather
unremarkable that Massachussets is taking a staunch line on a political issue,
and on this occasion they are simply right. This has upset those people
who were simply wrong, and knew that they were simply wrong. I am working
on the basis that the accessibility issue, if any, has been dragged in
to try to add emotion to any decision-making that takes place, and it
is possible that there are people involved who are simply lying - a form
of behaviour that one can teach kindergarten aged children to excoriate.

I summarised this as 'frankly embarassing', but my picture may be
poorly focussed or out of perspective in some way

Personally, I don't think that the FOSS community, or the disabled have
much to learn from what is going on.

Ben