Raising awareness among designers accessibility issues

We are in the middle of a revolution similar to that of the industrial revolution of the 19th century, the Information Society. This revolution is affecting the way we work, the way we study, the way we shop, and many other aspects of our daily life. Concepts such as teleworking, e---commerce, co-operative work, tele---cottage or tele---training are becoming part of our regular vocabulary.The birth of this new society has many implications for everybody. It will open new opportunities, but it will close many others. Information is the keyword. Society might be split into two sectors: those who are wired and those who will stay un---wired. Although while you are an active participant in the events, it is difficult to analyze the facts happening in your world with some perspective, we feel that people with disabilities cannot afford to stay out of the loop.The concern of many people on these issues was the seed of ISdAC International Association. It was obvious that we had to inform our constituency about these changes. Conventional channels were no longer effective, and new approaches had to be found. In the middle of the fight, we must be aware of many accessibility issues. We realized that we had a twofold target: not only we had to reach our constituency, but we had to deal with content providers and software developers as well. We knew that we shall play the role of a bridge between the designers and a market sector which influence will not be negligible.This presentation will not focus in a particular technical issue, but will present some snapshots of our experience in relation with the topics of this workshop: Web design and software development.