ITU



FINISHED COPY INTERNATIONAL TELECOMMUNICATION UNION JACAHF MEETING GENEVA, SWITZERLAND 12 FEBRUARY 2018 9:30 A.M. Services Provided By:Caption First, Inc.P.O. Box 3066 Monument, CO 80132 1 877 825 5234 +001 719 481 9835 *** This text, document, or file is based on live transcription. Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART), captioning, and/or live transcription are provided in order to facilitate communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the proceedings. This text, document, or file is not to be distributed or used in any way that may violate copyright law*** >> ANDREA SAKS: Good morning, everybody. I think we're ready. I will just wait for two more minutes to make sure everybody is in position. Welcome to the Joint Coordination Activity On Accessibility and Human Factors. We have a pretty full agenda. I would like to say that this? not only is this meeting captioned, we also have sign language interpretation for BSL, British Sign Language, and ASL, American Sign Language.I'm going to put up? we have the agenda. We've got the agenda up, and this is Kamori Inzuma, and without her, we wouldn't have the documents and everything else we need to do this. So we did have to change our time and day from meeting on the last session on Wednesday, to the first session on Tuesday? on Monday. God, what day is it?Anyhow, so what I would like to do is ask if everyone can look at the agenda and approve the agenda. If someone wants to add something, now is the time. Olaf? I believe you wish to make an addition to the agenda. Go ahead, please.>> OLAF MITTELSTAEDT: Yes, I would like to have a minute wherever it's suitable to make some announcements. Thank you, Andrea.>> ANDREA SAKS: Okay. Since we have had a conversation previously, we are going to put you in the agenda just after Simona de Nicola. And Olaf is from the consortium. Would you like to spell your name for the captioner for me, please.>> OLAF MITTELSTAEDT: Well, I think the captioner has it correct. It's Olaf. >> ANDREA SAKS: We can do it here.>> OLAF MITTELSTAEDT: Mittelstaedt. >> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you.Now, what I do usually is that I have everyone in the room identify themselves, and if their name is unusual, spell it for the captioner. So Mohannad.>> MOHANNAD: Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. My name is Mohannad mohannad. I'm vice chair of Study Group 16 and the cochair of 26. Thank you.>> ANDREA SAKS: And the next person up is Mr.?Kawamori, please. >> MASAHITO KAWAMORI: My name is Masahito Kawamori. Masahito kawamori, I'm the. Cochair of Study Group 16 with Mohannad.>> ANDREA SAKS: And then Ilham from ITUR.>> ILHAM GHAZI: Morning, Ilham Ghazi, Ilham Ghazi. I am head of the broadcasting division, and in three weeks? and since two weeks, interim as ITU SJ6 Study Group 5. Thank you and good morning again.>> ANDREA SAKS: I'm going to stand. Would you like to introduce, please? >> SHARMA: Good morning. My name is Debari Sharma. I'm from Nepal. So I'm just? just lovely to meet you all and thank you for having me. Namaste.>> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you. Can we spell his name for the captioner, please.>> SHARMA.>> ANDREA SAKS: Christopher, would you introduce yourself.>> CHRISTOPHER JONES: My name is Christopher Jones, and I'm the UK delegate and one of the three vice chair of JCAAHF.>> ANDREA SAKS: I'm going to move to Ken, please, to introduce himself. >> KEN GOULSTON: Good morning. My name is Ken, last name Goulston. I'm from the United States of America. I'm representing Sprint here today, the telephone company. >> SETH BRAVIN: And good morning. My name is Seth. Last name Bravin, and I'm also representing Sprint here today. It's nice to be here.>> ANDREA SAKS: No. No. No. >> SHOICHI SENDA: Sorry. Hello? My name is Shoichi Senda from NICT Japan.>> CHRISTIAN VOGLER: Good morning my name is Christian Vogler. I'm representing Gallaudet University and the corepresentative of FDOT Relay.>> BEAT KLEBB: Good morning, my name is Beat Klebb. I'm a delegate for the World Federation for the Deaf. >> SIMON DE NICOLA: Good morning. My name is Simon de Nicola. DE NICOLA, And I'm the head of publication for ITU Geneva.Thank you.>> KAMORI: Good morning, everyone. My name is Kamori, KAMORI as KSB and working as the secretariate for the group.>> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you, everybody. If we have any problems with the transcript, we have everybody's name and our captioner is Tracy. So remember to say your name before you speak. And if you have any big words, please spell them for her. She's very experienced with our technology. So everything should be okay with regard to that. If you need to look at the captioning, on your own device, the captioning web page is? oh, I have it right here. . The rest is in small case.Thank you.Okay. So now I think we can begin. Are there any other comments or additions to the agenda? Can we accept the agenda? Thank you. Now, if we also note? which I will not repeat that. We have our meeting documents also, just under the web page if you need a minute to bring them up, then you can access them yourself, but we will be displaying them. And if you need to borrow a computer from the ITU, that's possible and arrangements can be made for that later.Now remote participation is also being done. We're testing something called Zoom, and this is stage left, but it is to your right, you will see a picture of the beautiful Kiru right there, and the captioning is underneath. We are testing it and we would like those of you in the room to give an opinion of it later. We have our normal captioning screen there, for everyone, and also if we have? you have it on your laptop.Is everybody okay with what they need for accessibility?I think everybody is okay. But Zoom has also got a Streamtext caption? a mean, a? blah, blah, blah. Streamtext URL, should you need to use it. Okay.Now, there's information here to use your laptop, and speakers for voice if you would like to do that. Or if you are calling in, using a telephone. We don't today have a request for a callin, but we are always prepared for that, because sometimes some of the people cannot come and we can call them if we get that request in advance, but we haven't had that this time, have we? Okay. Thank you. She's the boss.So we can approve the agenda?Great.Now, the last report of the JCA which was the last meeting on? the 8th?of May, we pretty much looked at everything that? do we have a copy of that to stick up? We will stick it up. This was sent out sometime ago. I don't want to particularly spend a lot of time on it and going through it word for word, but if somebody has a comment regarding that, and we'll put it up, and scroll through it slowly so you can see it. As soon as we get it.It's not coming up? It's coming. Okay. That's it. There was something? just a little slower to people can see it. Now, Christian, you were mentioned. Is that accurate? can you go back down, please? That's too fast. Is that accurate for you? >> CHRISTIAN VOGLER: Which part am I looking at?>> ANDREA SAKS: 6.2, Gallaudet University. Is that pretty accurate?>> CHRISTIAN VOGLER: Yes. >> ANDREA SAKS: Okay. And some? we are? can we move it now a little bit? We did discuss peace apps. We are working with WHO which we will talk about later. And Daniel Battu will be participating remotely. He's not on yet, is he? From France? He is on.>> I don't know.>> ANDREA SAKS: Can we check to see. Daniel Battu participates from France remotely, and the? we're going to check to make sure that he's on. >> SECRETARIAT: He's on.>> ANDREA SAKS: Is there anything to note or comment on? If not, may I have your approval of that report? Thank you.That's pretty much all we have for housekeeping. Right, we'll move into item 5?>> Four.>> ANDREA SAKS: Four? I already mentioned that. You're still the boss. Don't worry.We will move to the next agenda item which is item 5, ITUR Ilham Ghazi will present the activities of ITUR and Working Parties 6B and 6C, including the draft revision of the report of BT2.22072 and I'm just going to call people by their first name, because I'm lazy.And also, it's? we're pretty informal here. Has just taken over for Hiam, who used to present that report.Are you ready to present your report? Are we ready? Go ahead, please.>> ILHAM GHAZI: Good morning again. Ilham. I'm very happy to be here. I myself had hearing problems 7 years old. I got an operation. It's not 100% going well, but I also? I don't know how? learned to read lips. So when someone speaks very quickly or not moving the lips enough, it really bothers me, especially when they are very far. So I will try to speak slowly and move my lips as necessary and also we have people here that help. So I'm? I'm really very happy to be here today.So this nobody even knows. Since 12 years I was in the ITU, nobody knows I have problems hearing and not 100%.Okay. Let me start. I have been asked? I'm sorry. It was a very lastminute, so I tried to focus only on the updates of the ITUR studies that were done on this matter, and I asked my other colleagues from other Study Groups and nobody had any update except two updates from the Study Group 6 and that I will mention.Let me go briefly. I know you all know and maybe even better than me, the structure of ITUR, the ITUD and the structure of the ITU. But I will very briefly as an introduction. ITUR Study Groups they are meant to develop the technical basis for decisions taken at WRCs, and develop global standards recommendations, report and handbooks on radio communication matter.It gathers more than 4,000 specialists from ITU Member States sector and associate members and academia too.ITUR group work in cooperation with other international radio communication organizations, it counts with six Study Group composed by 24 Working Parties.Working parties in general, they meet twice a year and in general also in Geneva unless we are invited in some exotic places, we like that. Currently, we have more than 1,000 recommendations and 517 reports in force, and 41 handbooks. There is a link, a web page for the recommendations, reports and handbook. So I will mention the tool later. You can go to them and go in more details.Study Groups, we have Study Group 1 in charge of spectrum management, and I have been informed that there is some recommendations concerning this work here. Study Group three, it is relating to radio wave propagation, Study Group 4, satellite services, Study Group 5, terrestrial services and it also has a joint task group, 5/1 that also has some recommendations concerning our issue.Study Group 6, broadcasting service, and I will detail a little bit more this one. And finally, the Study Group 7, which is relating to science services. We also have some other groups, Coordination Committee for vocabulary, CCV, and, of course, the conference preparatory meeting, CPM.ITUR series, of course I mentioned we have recommendations, handbook and reports and you can see that the subjects have some initial for the series. So, for example, I will be mentioning BS, which concerns broadcasting service, BT, broadcasting television, sorry, BS for sound and BT for television. Just to differentiate.Now, ITUR Study Group 6, which concerns. Broadcasting services. Its scope is? concerns, of course, the broadcasting matters, including vision, sound, multimedia, and data services, principally intended for delivery to the general public and I see today that with the captioning, and with the subtitles, if I may say that, you are already doing a great job. So that's what? again, there's a part of the works of the ITUR Study Group 6, but on the television level.It encompasses the distribution of programs, vision, sound, multimedia, data, et?cetera, as well as contribution, secrets among studios, including primary delivery, to delivery nodes and secondary distribution to consumers.The Study Group 6 is composed of three Working Parties. Working Party 6a, terrestrial broadcasting delivery. Working Party 6b, broadcast service assembly and access, and Working Party 6C, party, program production and quality assessment.What was the update since the last meeting of JCAAHF? Well, there is now a draft revision of the report ITUR BT.2207 version 2. So BT, it concerns television. And this revision concerns the accessibility to broadcasting services for persons with disability. And the revision includes the latest development of technologies and some additional editorial to revise the use of certain terms and grammatical errors.And we have also now a working document, which is new think. Just the output of the October?2017 meeting, and it concerns a preliminary draft new report ITUR BT. For now, it is still a working document. So it doesn't have a number, but between brackets, you can see signing, because it concerns signing and it is relating to technical realization of signing in television.So the revision of the already existing report, I already mentioned that it concerned some editorial and change of some terms. Here I put together the revisions and where you can find them, they are referred to. For example, update to Section?2 of this report concerns the realtime closed captioning using speech recognition, to include an automatic closed captioning technology that compares program manuscripts with the recognized speech and instantly identifies the lines in the manuscript corresponding to speech. The update to Section?4 of that report relates to machine, translation to sign language with CG animation, and is to include information about automatic sign language generation system.Update to Section?6, easy to read language broadcasting service and language conversion support technology to reflect the latest statistics.There is a new section, number 7, and this one concerns the sound level adjustment system with the speech rate conversion for channel based stereo signals.And there is also additional editorial updates to use such an example to modify elderly people and grammatical errors. So mostly editorial.The new document or we call it working document towards a preliminary draft new report on signing concerns the technical realization of signing in digital television. So this is really in a very beginning stage. For a little bit of history, as in March?2017, Working Party 6B received two contributions. One describing the open representation of this sign language interpreter on the TV screen, the second one deals with the possible technical realization of closed signing, meaning the possibility for the end user to switch the signer video on and off.So the open representation or the open mode is something that you will have on television and you cannot switch it off. But the closed, you can put it on or switch it off. So based on this and some earlier input documents, Working Party 6B concluded to start a new work stream on signing with an emphasis on closed signing in digital television.And at the end of the deliberation, it was decided that optional representation of the signer may derive between countries and vision.Various techniques may be considered for closed signing in digital television. Therefore, ITU members were invited to submit pertinent contribution to the October?2017 meeting. And when this meeting took place, 6B received another contribution on closed signing, and concluded to start a working document towards this preliminary draft new report.The first attempt for such a working document is compiled during the October?2017 meeting, on the basis of the input documents, of course, and you can find the details in annex 7 to Working Party 6B chairman's report.And as I said, it is still a working document so you may also follow up. 6B will have a meeting in April and I think that maybe there will be some contribution and some enhancement for that report.So the content of this new report there are sections? one section concerned real concern vs. Avatars, open vs. closed signer. Methods of providing closed signing. So the broadcaster? there are two possibilities or two proposed options. The broadcaster provides two video signals, one with and one without the signal? the signer. So the viewer can choose.The other option is when the broadcaster provides the signer video, as additional stream. And I heard that Andrea will something on HBTV and IPTV, and so we'll hear about it.Selection of video signal, reception of the signer video only, parallel to the TV broadcast signal. This includes technical realization of a virtual signer, using video glasses and finally some conclusions on methods of providing closed signing.So you would be? you might be very interested to have a look on this working document and it is still a working document. So maybe you will come to 6B with some input documents and contributions.So that ends my presentation. I hope I wasn't too quick, and I thank you for your attention and if any questions on this, please I am here to answer. Thank you very much.>> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you. I learned something. I did not know that the closed signing issue was being taken on by ITUR, which is very, very important. I was only going to make a comment, not a presentation.Now, I would like to open the floor to people who would like to make a comment or ask a question. And I already see that Christopher Jones is ready to make a comment or a question.So please go ahead Christopher.>> CHRISTOPHER JONES: Yes, it's Christopher here. I'm very pleased to see this happening within ITUR. We need to make sure that Deaf people contribute. This is vital. So I really hope that both Beat from the World Federation from the Deaf and Christian from Gallaudet University and myself will get together to provide our contributions. So there we go. We've got some work to do. >> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you, Christopher. Since you mentioned Beat and Christian from Gallaudet, would you like to comment on what was presented and the comments from Christopher Jones? Christian, go ahead.>> CHRISTIAN VOGLER: Hi, this is Christian. And I do have a comment, yes. You mentioned looking at providing closed signers through glasses. And I'm just wondering? maybe it would be a good idea to have neutral technology? to be technically neutral.So my biggest concern regarding this is my focus on how the? the delivery of the closed interpreter services, and I worry less about how to show it on TV. I'm more concerned about the actual delivery mechanisms.>> ILHAM GHAZI: So if I understood your question. The first was eliminating to neutrality of technology. And I also mentioned this is a preliminary document. So it is still being worked on. And whatever is on the document is only from the contributions received. So the? the interest would be to receive from any others, in order not to be restricted to one technology.Honestly, I cannot tell you much about the technical part about delivery on the video glasses. I said I'm on this since two days. So I didn't dig enough concerning the video glasses but I understood it as an option. It's not? it wouldn't be the only way.So my understanding is that a report to present all the possibilities, and my understanding is that the report would also give some directions to the industrials, the manufacturers, to be able to present choices on set top boxes or TV sets. So I hope this covers more or less.Thank you. >> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you. Mr.?Kawamori, would you like to have the floor, please?>> MASAHITO KAWAMORI: Thank you, Madam Chair. My name is Masahito Kawamori. I have a few questions. Actually, we had the opportunity to? the pleasure of reviewing this report in the Macau meeting, and it mentioned a report from NHK, about signing Avatar which was not adopted by the broadcaster, even though the NHK R&D wanted to push it. And one of the reasons is the quality is not good. And I was wondering how many persons with disabilities are involved in the discussion of the report, and also what would happen to the work? the working document, as well as its report. Is it just for information or does it have any implications on the implementations of our service providers?Thank you.>> ILHAM GHAZI: I will start with your last question. So the report as I mentioned is really a document that will try to have all the options, all the technologies or all the possibilities; however, depending on the contributions. So that's very important, I think.Now, are for the real persons vs. Avatars, I read something yesterday that the kids have no problem with this Avatar signing, however, older people, they prefer human than Avatars.I think there were some studies and some questionnaires, and then the information based on is that except for kids, the normal aged people, they don't really respond to the Avatars.And concerning the participation of this group to 6B, I think that you are better placed than me to respond. I still didn't have the opportunity to counsel Study Group 6B meetings. So in April, I will know, but I know that Japan is very active on this report. So thank you.>> MASAHITO KAWAMORI: I'm sorry. My question was: If there are any persons with disabilities participating in your discussion, not from this group. >> ANDREA SAKS: I would like to intervene here. There is a group that does exist, which is called the intersector group on audio/visual accessibility, and there are problems with persons with disabilities who are not members or who go through the G3ICT process which is how I operate. And G3ICT is acknowledged with getting a membership within ITUR that we could attend these meetings through G3ICT but we also could do some of this work in the intersector? I'm going to come back to you, Mr.?Kawamori, because you are a chairman of the intersector audio/visual accessibility, because it's important that persons with disabilities are attending these meetings.Mr.?Kawamori, would you like to continue?>> MASAHITO KAWAMORI: Yes, Madam Chairman. My name is Masahito Kawamori. The chair has a very good point and the intersector rapporteur, and by David Wood and he represents ITUR. And I was sort of? I was surprised to see this report because I didn't have the opportunity to review it during our RG meeting because it's very pertinent to our discussion.So in the future, I think it would be beneficial for both of us to have more closer? closer collaboration in exchanging information about the work items that we are doing, so that we won't have no surprises. All of a sudden we have the reports.And actually the contributor to this report is a participating member of IRG AVA from NHK. So I was rather surprised.So it would be nice if we can exchange more information and collaboration. Thank you.>> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you, Mr.?Kawamori. I totally agree with you. The JCA is sort of the group that helps coordinate some of the information. If I can make a suggestion, that there are liaisons sent to question 26 of Study Group 16, to the IRG AVA, and also to it the JCA with any work that is done on accessibility so that we can have access.The JCA is open. So there may be a small problem with contributions not being available at that time for the open public, but certainly the mail lists of Question 26 and the AVAR are possible useful. The other thing, this report, I think if it's possible? if it is possible to post that on the JCA? and I wondered if you could find out if there would be any objection so that the Deaf community could actually see the work that is being done on closed and open signing.What I was going to say, where I said I was going to make a small intervention is that the problem is closed signing and it is welcome? HBB TV is being deployed without closed signing, which is a big problem for the Deaf community because the hearing population does not want to see signing, therefore, it is for concern programs that are selected. They are minimal and it is for the news and, of course, emergency or any other pertinent political broadcasts or things that they feel are urgent.So from is a discrimination in broadcasting because of the fact that closed signing is not available and this is a big problem.So there have been discussions through different countries about this. I don't know if? if Mr.?Masahito Kawamori would like to say more about this or you were not planning to talk about IPTV, but if you would like to take some time with that. You are going to be discussing Question 26 in your presentation. We could come back to that.Or if Simon wouldn't mind, if we altered the order, and had it go to Mr.?Kawamori and then you present afterwards so this discussion flows. Would that be okay? (off microphone comments).>> ANDREA SAKS: No. No. No. Just one moment. Kiru is the boss on the timing.If there are any further questions.You are staying right there. You are not allowed to leave because this will all be involved with you.I would like to introduce Mr.?Nakatani who has entered. Mr.?Nakatani works with IPTV in Japan. We are happy could you join us. I wanted to say that.Maybe what we can do is change the order of the agenda and give the floor to Mr.?Kawamori to discuss the work in Question 26 and we could save the WHO listening thing for the correct order. But since this is pertinent. Would you like to do that, Mr.?Kawamori? >> MASAHITO KAWAMORI: Yes. Thank you.>> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you.>> MASAHITO KAWAMORI: Thank you, Madam Chair, my name is Masahito Kawamori and I'm reporting on the work of Question 26. Question 26 is as many of us? of you here know, dedicated to the work of accessibility and especially in multimedia area. And we have been working in several areas. One is IPTV, which includes a profile of functionalities that can be provided to? provided to broadcasting? okay. Thank you. Broadcast programs.And which has been approved as H.702. And so if this is one of the things that we are working on this H.702 enables closed captioning and audio description, as well as closed signing. And by using IP in addition to incoming broadcast signals if necessary.So we have been working together with are manufacturers in Japan as well as elsewhere, and demonstrated and luckily? and happily I can report that H.702 has been recognized by the Japanese government as a device for the persons with disabilities, so that now persons with disabilities have what they call the resister deaf people can buy the set top box at 10% of the price or something. It's very, very inexpensive, and now they can watch broadcast programs with closed signing. This is a good opportunity for especially small broadcasters because they can't change the head inside, even though they want to provide sign language interpretation but they don't want to change the whole thing. So especially in Japan, there are many small broadcasters would cannot provide closed captioning or closed signing. They are very happy to work with this standard and they have been doing this for? I mean, a test bed has been going on in Japan, and Mongolian government is also interested and also Ecuador and many other countries are now currently looking into this standard. In December, the united day for disabilities people? I forget the name. We had an opportunity to demonstrate this and it was well received and there is a very strong interest in this sort of standard because that would provide a very good opportunity for persons with disabilities to get access to information, multimedia information. Not only for Deaf people but also for blind people.And that's for IPTV. Another thing, we have been working with an organization called Wayfinder, with the Royal Society for the Blind in the UK, and we have approved new recommendation for guiding blind people, indoor guiding. Outdoor guiding is possible, because you can use GPS but within indoor, it's quite difficult. So we have centerized it and it's been tested in London underground, and it is also my report that it has been awarded by Zero Project Conference in Vienna. And I think this is the first time that ITU has ever been awarded for accessibility standard. So this is a very good opportunity.And also in Macau, we had an opportunity to meet with the local Deaf community, the World Federation for the Deaf and we are expanding our collaboration with the Deaf community, as well as the blind community, and this way we can enhance our work in a way? in such a way that the persons with disabilities will find it useful and helpful.So that's my report.Thank you, Madam Chair.>> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you, Mr.?Kawamori. We will put the part about WHO back in the agenda where it was, and we'll continue with that presentation of yours a bit later.Thank you very much.Are there any questions or comments regarding? Christopher Jones, please.>> CHRISTOPHER JONES: I'm very pleased to hear about the manufacturing agreement that they have agreed to accept the IPTV, and that's because with HBB TV, manufacturing, they were worried about the costs of PIP. And so that was removed from the TV sets which was stupid, because by doing that, it meant that you couldn't have closed signing.So thank you for encouraging manufacturers to take that back on board and accept PIP TV.>> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you. They are two different systems, Christopher. It doesn't mean that it's going to be unilateral everywhere. It's still very much an issue.What I was going to re-ask Ilham. Can we have access publicly to that report? You may go and ask where it can be posted with the JCA so the Deaf community can actually review it and perhaps contribute. And can we find out the status of Q3IC T's application. We had a positive email last year that we would be included as we have a membership ITUD and ITUT to bring our Deaf community to that particular meeting if possible.Thank you.>> ILHAM GHAZI: Thank you, Madam Chairman. For the report, no problem. I will send the link and you can go there and see. It is attached to the chairman report from 6B and built on that report, you can have a look and also prepare for the contribution.However, for your second question concerning contribution, I? I prefer to? to ask or we exchange by emails but normally, we have academia and we have also joint group. We have also? I mean, you are all from administrations. So we can exchange on that, and then I prefer to give you an official answer, but thank you.>> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you, Ilham. There's a formal application in process. Thank you very much. I will keep the Deaf community informed as to the matters of that.Are there any additional comments regarding this subject moving on. And I would like to welcome Lidia Best, who has just entered the room from the UK. She is the chairman of the national association of deaf and people and also vice chairman of the international? I'm going to do a data drop here, sorry. The international? where is this federation of hard of hearing people.So she will be presenting a little bit later.Thank you, by the way, Simon, that you have allowed us to jump over to another subject to continue the thought. I would like to present you, Simon de Nicola is the head of publications and production services in the ITU, and he is a known figure to us. He has been making? helping us make publications accessible to persons with disabilities.Would you like to take the floor, please? Thank you.>> SIMON DE NICOLA: Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm very pleased to be here in front of you. In fact, it's? I'm actually more comfortable behind my desk because my role in ITU is specifically to create and? or rather to manage the production of publication. And as you know in ITU, we publish in six languages which is a particular challenge as far as accessibility is concerned.I am, I believe, the only service in ITU which actually has a Deaf Mute person. So I have been working with my Deaf Mute colleague for the past 15 years. She has been very helpful in the early goings as far as publications are concerned, but as you know, this is more to do with visual impairments than hearing.Can you? I'm sorry.Okay. Oops.Right. So it all started basically with resolution 175, which was then followed by the ITU accessibility policy for persons with disabilities, developed by council in 2013.Now the early stage of the consultation, in fact, we had some series of meetings with Ms.?Saks and Mr.?Olaf. Sorry, I forgot your name here.The question was? well, my question was: What level of functionality do we want? A book is a book. A book is, of course, accessible to most people, apart, of course, to people with visual impairments. So the first question was to try to find a solution to this, and are in parlay, of course, we wanted to keep with new technologies. We wanted to access the new medias and be able to disseminate basically our information, our important information on whatever media we could find.You know, you? there's a gentlemen earlier that was talking about neutrality of technology. Well, that's basically what we were looking at. The idea is to find the common denominator for the technology we were going to use in order to make our publication accessible.We also started researching how do people access our and, you know, we questioned the fact that is a book sufficient? I mean, a book is a fixed format. So for this audience, I guess this is not an issue, but, of course for people with visual impairments which represents, you know, hundreds of millions of people on this planet, this is basically becoming an issue.We also researched? in fact, there's actually quite an interesting report that came out very recently, I believe it was in January, and it's research by Deloitte, who is predicting that by the end of 2023, the penetration of SmartPhone amongst adults in developed countries will surpass 90%. So these little items will be the common denominator. This is where most people will access the information, even though this particular one is quite small. But anyway.And they also predict that basically, the sales? the combined shipment of devices will reach an estimated 2.5?billion units. So we are talking about huge, huge numbers. Mill motivation was in addition to accessibility, to add a layer of usability into our publications.This is basically just a brief summary of the project timeline. So it started early on in 2011, of course request by BDT, on how to create accessible reports. The idea was fairly simply to create an accessible PDF, but that's low level accessibility.And then we had inputs from DAISY and Andrea Saks. We tried to understand what was accessibility about and what was accessible in. Us. Making a presentation in Arabic has many, many challenges, because the language is from right to left, because the? the way the? the language is structured is completely different to our original language.We then started producing or integrating the concept of accessibility in the first reports, making television accessible. It was a low level of accessibility, what I call a low level of accessibility. Then we started researching and, of course, I studied researching, you know, finances because if you want to change a production method which has been established for, you know, hundreds of years, even though we have? with local? I mean, with? even though we have been using computers and, you know, we modernize. Of course in ITU, we are still not typing books. We are still using computers but the idea was to modernize the way that books were constructed in order to add the root level this accessibility, rather than as a superficial level.I managed to find some money through the ICT funds and then we started the process and we started installing training staff because, of course, there was quite a strong aspect of change management in ITU and then 2015 we started posting the first reports and distributing templates to? to some authors and editors because the? there is, in fact, an additional layer of accessibility which is, again, for visual impairments which is basically the? the? you know when you add a drawing, when you add the technical charts, something which is not, of course, read visually by some people, you, of course, need an explanation. And the authors, we found that there was a lot of resistance from authors to add these extra explanation, simply because it was additional time.So I'm just going to show you where we are now. In fact, we officially launched the accessible publication platform on the 3rd?of December, 2017 for the international day of persons with disabilities. There was an interesting article in ITU news, but I'm just going to show you? or to take you briefly through this platform, if? if the network allows. And then if you allow me as well, I will just do a quick demo just to show you what it looks like on? on a different media. Well, I don't know if it works. Can we go to the website maybe? >> ANDREA SAKS: It's coming.>> SIMON DE NICOLA: Oh. Okay. I'm just going to? this is basically the direct platform for accessing the publications. So we have put all the titles we have done in there so far. You can see that, of course, it spans all sectors of ITU, because, again, I'm here as a service provider, you know, to actually do the ITU publications. It's available in six languages, and when you click on? well, let's take the first one. What's more important to me is that accessibility level is, of course? so? is proposed in several formats. So we have, of course, an accessible? fully accessible PDF that in this case is free of charge. And then we have MOBI and epub. This is a MOBI format can go on kindle versions and then we have an epub, that can go on any? on any either tablet or SmartPhone or any actual device that can use assistive technologies.So if I can just show you what? what I mean by this kind of assistive technology. Can I just plug it? By the books. This is my library on the iPhone. And the book that we saw earlier was produced in paper format, in accessible PDF, in ebooks and kindle format and this is it.The difference between the PDF format and this epub format. Of course, epub is fully reflowable. It has added functionality. Of course you have a direct access to a live table of content. You have access to footnotes and, of course access to external reference should you want to access those. In fact, it's almost like a mini computer.Another interesting feature of? these are assistive technologies and epub, in particular, is the fact that it could be read by machines. So I'm sorry for people that cannot hear probably. (Off microphone comments).Okay. And, of course, you have an access to the full library of books from your mobile device. Okay? Here we have an example, we see an example in Chinese.(speaking nonEnglish).Okay. So this is it. For moment, we have about 60 plus publications in this library. Many in several languages. Of course, it's quite a bit of an effort to? to produce them, but I think the staff in the publication services is? has been very motivated and very happy to go through this change and they have seen the advantage and disseminating further our work and, of course, providing added functionality to people with visual impairments in particular.Okay?I think that's it for me. Thank you.>> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you, Simon. That's really good. We have been talking a long time. I think we would maybe like to make something available? which I will work with you on, on the JCA website so people can access us directly. Am I doing the wrong thing?Oh, gosh! Sorry. Too many things! I can't keep myself straight here.So we can have a direct link on some of your presentation as well. So people can go straight there. I think that would be helpful. Thank you. That's great.Now, we have a? wanted to have one comment from DAISY. Olaf, would you like to? and it has to be quick. Because we're going to do a coffee break and we are always running behind! Thank you.DAISY, I would like to introduce Mr.?Olaf Mittelstaedt, who is from the DAISY consortium who has asked to just briefly speak.>> OLAF MITTELSTAEDT: Yes, this is Olaf. I have been associated with the DAISY Consortium and I have been volunteering my time for them to be here since 2009. The DAISY Consortium decided for several reasons, one of them costwise to resign from their membership in ITU. One of the reasons for that is that some of the coactivities of DAISY Consortium have outsourced themselves. One is to the international digital publishing forum, which are the maintenance agency for the epub standard, and the epub standard is now the packaging format for the DAISY standards.And in consequence and logically following the international digital public forum, dissolved itself into the W3C, which is now the? the maintenance agency for the DAISY standards and for the epub standards. Epub is the packaging format for everything DAISY. Packaging simply means that with any kind of an ending be it PDF or DOC or anything like, that the machine then realizes what it has to do with the contents of that and the contents we have just seen in Simon's presentation, which is actually a book which is fully navigable in those devices.>> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you, Olaf. And we are sorry they disbanded your membership but I want you to know from the accessibility point of view, we are very happy to have you come as a guest and we will make arrangements for that so you can continue to give valuable information to. Accessibility JCA and other accessibility questions. >> OLAF MITTELSTAEDT: Thank you, kindly, Andrea.>> ANDREA SAKS: It wouldn't be a JCA meeting without you. You are still in, as far as I'm concerned. Now I have also noticed that we now have another guest here. I'm going to probably butcher your name. Mr.?Kodjo Tchioffo.We are due for a coffee break. Would it be possible for us to take the coffee break? And then we come back? And it has to be really quick, because as usual, I like everybody to be able to say what they want to say, including myself.So can we come back at 5 to 11? What time is it now? Is it 10:45? Anyway, we are going to come back at? so we just say 11:00?then? 11:00? Could you please be back and be on time because we want? we have several presentations that we would like you to see, and thank you very much for our previous presenters. Thank you.(Coffee break)>> ANDREA SAKS: Welcome back. Everybody has gotten back on time, even me. And we have a new person who has arrived, who I'm going to introduce. Wait a minute. Okay. Is it not working? Use the mic. There we go. Okay. Nelly, would you like to introduce yourself? >> Yes, my name is Nelly Nelly. Last name is Francey, Francey.>> ANDREA SAKS: And would you like to say a few words about your work?>> NELLY FRANCEY: I'm? I use international sign. So I will try to get this across as clearly as I can. I have worked here since 2000. I work mainly with graphic design, and all things on the web, on the Internet. >> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you. In other words, Nelly works for the ITU. So I have known Nelly a long time. I'm really happy to see her here. Thank you for coming.Okay. We are going to get back to business. We now have another presenter who is going to talk about accessible features for ITU plenipotentiary? I always hate that thing? and it's a device I'm not familiar with, it's Readspeaker. His name is Kodjo Tchioffo.Would you like to start, please? Thank you.>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: Yes, so I'm Kodjo Tchioffo, I work for the information department for the ITU. And so I'm in charge of the ITU PP website. The PP is a plenipotentiary conference. It's, in fact, the top policy making body of the ITU that decides four years roadmap for the organizations and also elects the officials.So to organize this conversation, accessibility is a key aspect to make sure that people with any type of disabilities are taking into account in the way the conference is organized, the venue as well as the online presence.If I want to mention the venues, just to reassure you that in the venue, there will be the dedicated lens for persons with disabilities and a lot of signals to make sure that people with disabilities are really well taken care of during the conference. Now, I will come back to the subject of my presentation, which is to talk about the accessibility on the platform that is online, which is the PP18 website. So I will come back here.All right. So what I will talk about, the general principles that we use to design the website, the approach, our accessibility approach and a few tools and techniques that we used to make the website, including which speaking, obviously. So our guiding principle is that the PP18 website, must be accessible for all and on all devices based on W3C WCAG 2.0 level AA guidelines.What do we mean for all? For all, we mean for persons with disabilities whether it's visual, hearing, speech, cognitive, neurological, agingrelated condition, et?cetera. And for all means also in all ITU official languages. So the system is internationalized and localized, meaning that the pages are served to you in the language you understand the most. And also, on all devices means that the website is responsive, accessible, as well on mobile devices as well as browsers and on PC and desktops.So our approach for accessibility. What we? how do we approach accessibility on the PP18 website. For us, accessibility is not to have a separate textonly version of the website. Accessibility is also not to create a separate accessible version for contents. On the website, accessibility is not also overcrowding or overloading the page with widgets and a lot of multimedia content. This is not what we mean by accessibility.For us, accessibility is about making content on the website presentable, making sure that it's presented in a user friendly way and all items have identity and descriptions. So that everybody can understand.And then we also make sure that the website is adaptable, meaning that it can be presented in different formats and layouts. So the website, whether you use your PC, whether you use your mobile phone, you should have the same experience.Also, our accessibility approach, what we mean is that we want it to be operable, meaning that the user interface, and the navigation must be functional. So the side map must be very clear on on this. You should be able to browse using the keyboard and the website is responsible.Also we mean that our website must be understandable, meaning that the user interface is readable and logically organized. You have pages in all languages. You have a consistent abbreviations and error notifications when you are going out of the scope of the website. And then we also mean that the website is robust in the sense that the website must be compatible with the wide variety of user agents including assistive technologies. This is what we mean by robust website.So the tools and techniques that we have used to make this happen, we used semantic markup in the website. Meaning that our HTML elements are used according to their intended purpose. We use them the way they were designed for, and then we are using bootstrap 3 to make sure that content and presentation are separate.Also the PP18 website is UAAG 2.0 and Section?508 compliant which means that the website is full keyboard navigable. And it follows the UAAG guidelines.We are in the process of to have Readspeaker. So it will be read out automatically or on the press of a keyboard key. So this will allow people who cannot see very well or some people who have disabilities to have the content read for them by the system and they would not need to download anything for that.So as soon as they display the website, they might press on the keyboard and then the website will read the content by itself. So there's a small model that I will show you right now. So basically on you press? on touch, the website will start to read itself.(computer reading)>> Invitations have been sent to the following categories titled to participate, Ref CV/ART 23.>> Member States, CV/268. Cl17/41, invitation on behalf of the United Arab Emirates.Cl17/41, invitation from the ITU Secretary General. Observers which participate in an advisory capacity, annex 2, res145, antalya2006.The United Nations, CV/269A.Regional telecommunications organizations, CV/269B.Intragovernmental organizations operating satellite systems, CV/269C.Specialized agencies of the United Nations and the international atomic energy agency, CV/269D.DM17/1004, invitation from the ITU Secretary General.Observers which do not participate in an advisory capacity, annex 3 to Res145, Antalya, 2006.Sector members referred to CV/229, Recognized Operating Agencies, scientific or industrial organizations and financial or development institutions, and CV/231, regional and other international telecommunication, standardization, financial or development organizations.>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: So any time you can pause or resume, and you can even download the content. Because at the end, when it finishes reading the content, it creates an MP5 that you can listen and download later on. This is one of the interesting aspects of Readspeaker. In addition to that, it provides also a set of tools here that allows you to really have a broader use of accessibility on the website.You can? you can even do basic translation for you. But it's true that the website is already available in the six official languages and Readspeaker reads the content in all the six languages as they would go.So this is the system we are planning to put in place, and we are almost finalizing the procurement with the finance department at this moment, to have it up and running on the PP18 website.So I will stop here and I thank you very much. (Applause).>> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you very much. I'm a dyslexic. This is wonderful for me. I had no idea what to expect on this. And can we post this on our JCA website? Thank you very much.Now, do you work for the ITU? Okay. And you are our man to ask questions to? Any questions? There's one coming. I'm going to? okay. I'm going to introduce Roxana Widmer who is also going to present for the ITUD. Go ahead and ask your question.>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: So thank you for this presentation. I will just have some quick questions. So you mentioned that this website, the ITU website PP is in line with the standards. You mentioned 2.0, what about 2.1 that is already taken into consideration? So in short, is this also available through mobile? Because that is the difference between 2.0 and 2.1. So this? and then I also saw that you mentioned it is in accordance with 508. What does it have that's 508 here because 508 relies more to procurement and I would also like to know about EU standard on this. So it's only compliant with 508 or it's?More than this, I very much appreciate that you envisage this texttospeech for persons with visual impairment? What about the Deaf people. Did you also ensure for the videos that will be there have the appropriate subtitle? Because this was not mentioned at all.And last but not least, you mentioned about the content and in order to be able to do the demo that you had, the content should be accessible, and this refers to the web, to the PowerPoint presentation, to the PDF, to everything. Did you envisage that all the content for this is digital accessibility, did you envision having appropriate training for the people who are providing the information in this website to know how to do it, because currently that's not the case.Thank you.>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: All right. Thank you very much for the comments. I will start with the last one. I would say that everybody is well trained to ensure that the website is compliant with the W3C standards of accessibility and the W3C standard of accessibility. And all the content online is already accessible, like if I take, for example, this website, as it is now, online, if you resize it, it will adjust to your screen and it will give you the version in a very responsive and accessible format.And as well as the PDF, the PDF that is uploaded in the system, we are working currently with the document management system and we are trying to make sure that everything that comes here? because the website, we are not handling directly PDFs but we are working with the management system to make sure that everything that comes NHK the system is accessible.If I now come back to the issue of standards here, you mentioned about the Section?508, Section?508 is a standard that is used mostly in the US, but we also make sure that it's not just Section?508. We mentioned that in the presentation, if you look at the presentation, we mentioned it clearly that this is first? UAAG 2.0 compliant and section 508 compliant. Meaning that the W3C standards which is UAAG is taken into being which covers almost everything here.Did I forget something? >> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: Excuse me. You didn't respond to my question. My question is one by one: If you consider in your presentation here, you put we have 2.0. You know that now 2.0 will become obsolete, because we go to 2.1.>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: Yes.>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: It means people can access this from mobile and my first question was: Are you considering this accessible only from tablets and normal computers or also you are envisaging the mobile accessibility on this?>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: All right. Let me answer this.>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: One by one.>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: Yes. So very simple, the website is mobile first. Meaning that from?>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: So it's not 2.0, it's 2.1?>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: Yes, we? we say 2.0, because that's the one that is still widely used at the moment to define web accessibility but the website is mobile first, meaning that it's designed to take into account the mobile technology, and then the classic browsers as well. So you shouldn't worry, 2.1, which is upcoming will be?>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: Okay. The second is with regard to the Deaf people because you mentioned a certain feature, which we very much appreciate, and that's already placed but what about do you envisage also that accessibility, it's also considered for features which are absolutely needed in order to enable Deaf people to also follow your videos and presentations?>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: Yes, absolutely. So if you take all the content that is available on the website, all the image, all the multimedia, they have action and everything.>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: Thank you.>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: If you want to look at Readspeaker, we are looking at the ways to see that Deaf people are fully taken about. We know that it does something, but we want it do better.>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: But the Deaf people don't need the Readspeaker. They need a feature to have the speechtotext.>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: Mmhmm.>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: And the last which is not very clear. You ensure me that the people working in this are trying to put everything on the website, means you are trained to remediate the digital content existing, which currently is not accessible or my question, it was if you will provide training to all the person, peoples, staff would will post this information in the PP to ensure that in the moment they send you to be posted this document, they will be already accessible or they will be? let's say, staff willing to remediate the nonaccessible document that you receive. And if so, who will provide this training, when and how? >> KODJO TCHIOFFO: All right. So to make it simple again, I will say that the project team for the PP18 is a very small team which is very functional and the team has been trained, I trained them all on how to use the system.>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: But you are a technical? because we are talking for two different things. One is website, the structure of the website which is accessible, which we all understand. And secondly the content. The content that will be in this accessible website structure. Okay? Me, I'm now asking about the content.>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: You are asking about the content.>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: Yes.>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: The content is accessible all. Perhaps I'm not getting you.>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: Obviously perhaps you don't know. So in addition to your work, to make the structure of the website accessible, it's a complete different story on developing digital content accessible. So that means write PDF? do a PDF or write a Word or do a PowerPoint presentation in an accessible format, which is not the same as a normal one. You have to. I'm asking about this kind of knowledge. Are you already having this? Will this be provided to all the staff involved in the document that will be delivered in this PP website or it's yet an issue that we all have to look at? So sorry for it, but it's quite important.>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: It's really important because content is the key aspect of the website. It's about information.So to the content providers, for the PP18 website are coming from the SP? what we call the SP Secretariat, and I'm? I'm quite sure? I will not speak for them, but I'm quite sure they are trained to provide content in the? in an accessible format, but at our level. At a technical level, the website is developed in a way that takes content and turns it into something accessible and?>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: So are you also knowledgeable to content remediation?>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: Absolutely, yes.>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: Do you know how to remediate?>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: About presenting a content to? to make it accessible? Yes.>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: To do a normal PowerPoint presentation in an accessible format?>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: We don't do PowerPoint presentation on the website.>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: You will receive PowerPoint presentations to be posted on the website. Will these be turned or remediated into accessible format. Why I'm highlighting this because I think we have to highlight a need on training at all levels because you guys? you are developing the structure to be accessible, but if you will receive a content, which is not accessible, the structure will not be useful, because yet the person with certain disabilities will be unable to read this document, to listen, or to go through a PowerPoint presentation if this is not accessible.Thank you.>> ANDREA SAKS: As usual, Roxana, you are spot on!Now, this is a very important topic and we have some interest from the room. Lidia was first and then Olaf, and then Masahito Kawamori. That's how I saw the hands go up. So Lidia, I will make you be short. Go ahead.>> LIDIA BEST: Thank you, Lidia speaking. I'm a bit confused in all the exchange now. Could you please tell me, the videos are all to be captioned on the website? >> KODJO TCHIOFFO: The videos are captioned? I mean, the ones that are on the website or captioned and the images are captioned already. It's not to be captioned, already captioned. You can check on the website. You have the link. You can check it. Let me give you the link. So ITU.int/web/pp18. You can open it yourself, and make sure that the image is captioned.>> LIDIA BEST: It's not just images, it's the spoken content, the audio. That's what I'm asking nor the Deaf people.>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: Yeah. For now, there's no audio content on the website, but when there will be, all multimedia, we will caption. There's no PowerPoint. What you are getting now is a brochure. You are getting a candidate brochure. If you are a candidate to a post, what you will do is send us your CV, your vision statement and your brochure and that's what we handle. >> ANDREA SAKS: I think the thing? I think if I can say this and correct me if I'm gone, if it isn't captioned when it gets there, like a PowerPoint or like a video, it will be; is that correct?>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: Absolutely. Yes.>> ANDREA SAKS: Now Olaf had his hand up. You want to do Masahito first. He's being kind to you.>> MASAHITO KAWAMORI: Thank you, Madam Chair. Since I have been working? I used to work at W3C on a team and I had an opportunity to work with them. I would like to congratulate this work. This is very good, and I thank?>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: Thank you.>> MASAHITO KAWAMORI: And also to dispel any concern, WCAG 2.1 is based on 2.0. So it inherits everything. So in a way, it's already mobile compliant and also as for the content creation side, content itself is? probably Olaf will talk a little bit more about it. It will be based on? as far as W3C is concerned, everything will be put on to the web and then transferred or transposed into PowerPoint format or word format or PDF format. It's also possible.So in that way, by creating content on the web in an accessible way, you can create content that way. And also since the technology, for example, Word Microsoft Word is based on XML already. That means it can be converted into the web format as well.(Off microphone comment).>> MASAHITO KAWAMORI: It's very easy. It's not? no. No. No. It's not something you learn. It's are you there. Then you can do it.So it's not like something you just convert by hand or something like that. It's more a question of a little software. Maybe you can ask some of the IS people how they do it. Anyway, I will let?>> ANDREA SAKS: We need Olaf and then we have this. You perked my interest. And it's ITU staff that needs to learn. I'm with you on that and he's with you on that but I want to get moving on to some of the other. Olaf, you add to this and then we'll move on.>> OLAF MITTELSTAEDT: Just to build on the questions that Masahito. There's a tool to convert to. I think what we are discussing here is the perennial problem of a publisher and I'm calling you a publisher now that has to deal the same with as Simon de Nicola, the outside content providers who are not as versant as we are, as we are expert on accessibilities are how to convert this and these people do have to be trained. Otherwise the work for the publisher to take all of that content and convert it is straight amount of headaches. Simon provided them with templates which they have to format their books in a way or their contributions in a way that can be easily converted with a DAISY converter. And on a side note, the DAISY converter has created Ace. Ace allows them to certify? to check? it's a checker. It's a checker that checks any content if it is conformance to the W3C guidelines for accessibility that you mentioned that your website has. I would suggest you take your website through the ACE website, and you may find interesting results. Or you may be perfectly fine.>> ANDREA SAKS: Would you like a response?>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: He said it all. I think he was?>> ANDREA SAKS: I think this is a good move forward? because we have taken a bit of time, we all want to talk to you some more. You are not leaving me without giving me a card.>> KODJO TCHIOFFO: I didn't bring a card. My name is Kodjo.>> ANDREA SAKS: What was surprising to me. Gent. Raise your hand. Gent didn't know anything about it. I would like you to work with him directly because he lets me know what is going on. I'm also in the T and I work with the D and I'm invading R very soon. So I want everybody to know what is going on. The more people who know, then the better that we are trained and I thank you very much for bringing this exciting piece of tech to us. It's great. I'm going to support you as well. Thank you. Thank you, very, very much. >> KODJO TCHIOFFO: Thank you.>> ANDREA SAKS: And Roxana is a pit bull. Watch out! (Laughter).Thank you very much. We are going to move on. You are taking over my title of pit bull. I'm very pleased! We are now going to move back to? I'm going to do another jump, Masahito, if you don't mind because Roxana has time commitments also and she's down just after you. And then I will put you back on for WHO. Is that okay? Thank you.Roxanne, would you like to present, please?>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: Thank you so much.>> ANDREA SAKS: And Roy yourself.>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: I'm Roxana Widmer. And I'm in the ITU development. I'm the focal point in ITU accessibility. I will make a brief presentation on what has been done. I have to report since q2 in 2017 up to date.So, in fact, I was not trying to make problem to our colleague. I was just trying to say that we also here in house, we have all the necessary tools to help them.So I'm pleased to let you know that we develop a national training program in web accessibility called Internet for all which includes a political buyin and trainings and digital content, as well as development of accessible website. These training courses are currently available in Arabic, English, French and Spanish and ITU is ready to implement this program in interested countries but of course also inhouse.Then in October, as you know, it was our world telecommunication development conference 17, and here we developed a preevent to this conference entitled together for an accessible world on 8 October. This preevent on ICT accessibility brought to ITU members and related stakeholders from all regions of the world to share their views, challenges and success stories to jointly pave the way forward towards a global implementation process for an inclusive society. As a result, the members agreed on the importance of this topic globally and approved the continuation of the work of Study Group Question 7 to support their countries in their process of implementing ICT accessibility.Also, I'm pleased to let you know that from 21 to 23 November, 2017, we developed the original event accessible Americas 4 for information and technologies for all. We had 235 participants from this region, they even provides a platform to the stakeholders to share their experience and good practices but also the solution that identified to overcome related challenges.In addition, we and Ability, we took the opportunity to also build capacity in ICT accessibility to these 235 participants, and enable them to become knowledgeable advocate and promote this topic in their respective countries.The topic of ICT accessibility is now recognized as an enabler for achieving inclusive societies. Therefore, this annual series of accessible Americas events also incorporated since last year, other groups with specific needs, such as women and girls, youth, the elderly, as well as indigenous people.We recognize that being in these specific groups, in addition to be a person with disability is a double challenge. So that's why we definitely wanted to include all. BDT also gives particular attention to implementation of ICT accessibility in Africa region therefore, forums to advice countries in developing relevant policies and strategies in ICT accessibilities were developed in both west and East Africa. We had a draft policy from 27 to 29 November in Burkina Faso for French speaking ECOWAS countries and in December, the same type of accessibility which was held 4 to 5 December in Gambia for English speaking countries.During the celebration? so now I'm back here in Geneva, where we have the celebration of the international day for persons with disabilities the day after. Excuse me for this.(Off microphone comments).>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: Should I repeat something or is it okay up until now? So the international day for persons with disabilities as you remember was a on a Sunday. So Monday 4 of December, BDT focal point raised awareness on the role that ICT can play in implementing ICT accessibility globally and try to position ITU as a key player in this area. We also presented outcomes of our regional events, the events from the Americas and Africa, and we also presented our available resources to develop? to help countries in implementing ICT accessibility.Last but not least, also on 5th?of December, we also developed an executive training role of ICT in development of inclusive society for persons with disabilities. In Bosnia and Herzegovina and, it was united by UN house and UNDP. We have to recognize that this type of forum were very much appreciated and it was already a request to develop similar forums in future.So now in 2018, I have the pleasure to let you know that in addition to 9 national program that we developed with concrete facetoface training, it's a traintotrainers training that we developed for digital content as well as for accessible websites.We will work to develop some video tutorials, as well as the remediation of documents Word, PDF and PP. And this is available in Spanish in Q1, English in Q2, and French in Q3. So until the end of the summertime, we do hope to have all of. This.We also developed our ongoing development of three southbased eLearning training courses on ICT accessibility, as well as public procurement. And with regard to the events, I have the pleasure to let you know that I have already participated in the lunchtime seminar basic on ages on the international? that the international longevity center global alliance representative to the UN organized with WHO and ILO on Tuesday 30 January. And the objective of the seminar was to gain common terminology and clarity on the phenomenon of ageism and explore ways to combat it.The role that ICT plays in ensuring full participation of elderly in the active life, as well as ensuring their social inclusion were strongly highlighted.Therefore, BDT already manifested our willingness to be involved in this process.I was invited on the next 14th?February by the committee of UNCRPD to make a presentation on the 19th?session on the key activities, events, resources and achievements. The same, is again, to position ITU as a key player in helping persons with disabilities through the accessibility of ICT, of course to achieve economic development and social inclusion.Also, on 23rd?February, we'll organize a forum, ICT accessibility, towards an inclusive society, during a several country process that will take place in Geneva. We will focus on the concrete resources to support countries in the implementation process.Accessibility, process and services are of course a key area that we look at. And considering the partnership with EU, that we? it is envisages for the forthcoming original even in ICT accessibility, accessible Europe, because, yes, indeed, we'll have a first event in accessible Europe at the end of 2018. The forum will include an interactive session moderated by both BDT and EU, targeting to identify jointly with all stakeholders the topics to be considered in this regional event as a key to EU implementation in this area.From 30 April to 4th?May, we invite you all to participate in the Study Group Question 7, Question 7 in BDT and already announced that it is confirmed the fifth accessible Americas ICT for all which will be held in November?2018 this time in Jamaica to ensure that also the Caribbean country from this region will be strongly involved in the implementation of ICT accessibility in the region. Thank you, Andrea.>> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you. I won't open this up for question because we are running out of time. So what I want to do is if you have any questions you can direct it to the JCA and we will put you directly in touch with Roxana, thank you for that comprehensive presentation and for coming on short notice.We will move on? we will move swiftly on, Masahito, do you want to give a brief overview about WHO and ITU and our work with safe listening, please?>> MASAHITO KAWAMORI: Thank you, Madam Chair. I will give a brief report on what we did with WHO during the WHO/ITU consultation on making listening safe initiative. We have been doing this for over two years now, and we discussed many issues but primarily, as far as ITU is concerned, we are? we talked about standards.And one of the things we agreed upon is that we will have two tier approach to the accumulated sound pressure to the ear, and by doing this, we will make public as well as manufacturers aware that listening to music for very, very long time at the very high level of volume is very dangerous. And so we decided on a way to calculate, as well as how to promote and what sort of contact points to be introduced so that this message can be disseminated in appropriate? in an appropriate manner globally. And we're? we also had a followup editing session on the 9th?and the result will be discussed again and we are hoping that the standard will be published in July this year. Thank you, Madam Chair. >> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you very much, Dr.?Kawamori. I was there too and it's very? I'm even learning that maybe I lost a bit of my hearing because I was listening too long too loud. It's very important that children get this message from their parents.I'm going to move on. Does anybody have any questions about that?Ah, Roxana, go ahead, but please make it brief.>> ROXANA WIDMER-ILIESCU: Very short because BDT is very much promoting this between ITU and WHO. My question is, from my knowledge, it seemed like it was quite a difference between the US standard wish and EU standard wish. Did you manage to have common standard on this position or it will be two different standards?Thank you.>> ANDREA SAKS: Go ahead, Masahito.>> MASAHITO KAWAMORI: Well, the differences are actually in the workplace noise, in the? not in the? it's a workplace environment. So there are two standards in the United States, as well as in Europe and they have different thresholds, but ours? our initiative is primarily targeted at listening to music. And so as far as we are concerned, there's not much difference between these two bodies. And we have audiologists from the United States making proposals. We work with the European standards bodies and we all are in agreement. So we don't have that kind of discrepancy in the workplace situation.Thank you, Madam Chair. >> ANDREA SAKS: Roxana, what I would do is maybe get you involved in this group. Thank you very much. I know you are leaving at this point.Thank you. And thank you Dr.?Kawamori.Okay. We are going to? it's all right. We are going to move on. Now, we have Dr.?Christian Vogler of Gallaudet University who is going to present two presentations and after that, we have the European Federation of the Hard of Hearing, Lidia Best who is the vice president or the vice chair of the EFHOH and then Christopher Jones and then we have Daniel Battu. Because that's four people and we have? I'm going to limit you to 7 minutes each, if that's possible. So would you like to start, Christian, please? Thank you.>> CHRISTIAN VOGLER: This is Christian speaking. I will make it as quick as possible. Two years ago in America, the Federal Communications Commission passed a new law and that was in regards to the mobile TTY transferring into realtime text. The first part of the rule has officially become effective as of December?31st. I'm sorry it's not supposed to be January. I know my PowerPoint says January, but it's actually December.So a quick review right now of what's going on. Three phone companies have started to support realtime text, AT&T on most phones is available through downloading an app. And then we have Verizon, which has it available and built into the iPhones. Third, we have TMobile. TMobile has theirs built into the LG phones, with the LG G6. Android phone.I would like to think that it will eventually show up as well on the iPhone 11.3 ios, but that's not confirmed.Sprint so far has decided to stay with the TTY. It seems they will have considered it once Sprint has started to establish their VoLTE.So all of this requires a voice plan to use realtime text compatibility and to be able to navigate between the two. We have already verified that AT&T can call Verizon with realtime text and communicate with each other. Are.We have also verified that if you have a phone with realtime text, you can call and connect to a TTY. That includes a relay service as well with the TTY. That also includes 911.I recorded a short video. I would like to demo to you all what it looks like from an AT&T perspective. Would you mind clicking on the link to show that?>> Realtime text making a call AT&T to AT&T. Receiving the call, AT&T to AT&T. Longer conversation, unicode, emoji and recovery from pocket loss. RTT interoperability, AT&T to Verizon.Produced by Christian Vogler Gallaudet University, technology access program.>> CHRISTIAN VOGLER: Thank you. I just had a document handed out. We will not have time to read over the entirety of it, but the detail goes into? the paper goes into detail why realtime text is very important for us. So if we could please move on to the next slide. Okay. So moving on to a new topic. I want to discuss the potential and current ongoing projects related to the Internet of Things, in short IoT. So a lot of you are already familiar with IoT and how great it is for the blind community, for example, through voice assistive technologies like Amazon's Alexa.So the IoT has a lot of potential for the Deaf population as well. Right now we haven't been able to take advantage of that. My research group at Gallaudet is currently working on the project to make it more friendly those who are Deaf and hard of hearing. We are working with home alert systems. So far there's been a lost things missed whether it's the knock on the door or the phone ringing or an emergency alert. A lot of those have been overlooked throughout this process.We have been working on visual alertive technologies such as flashing lights, that have the ability to change color, that have the ability to change flash rate in order to match the event occurring.As far as we know, this is the first time that we have been able to integrate offofshelf IoT technologies that you can buy at any store. We have always had to go and purchase expensive systems that were customized, but now we are focused on having it technology available.I have a second video I would like to show you now, that shows just a bit of what that could look like. I'm not going to be able to show you a full length but this would be related to what I would like you all to look at right now.>> This is the smart things demo of super flasher technology and lights.>> CHRISTIAN VOGLER: The first thing you see is the alerting system with door knocking.So you can see the lights flashing green, and that directs your attention to be aware that someone is knocking on the door. Green relating to someone knocking on the door.The next example is what would happen if the door bell was rung. So it looks like the video quality is not up to par. I'm not quite sure what's happening. Well, if you take a moment to look at the website, the video will appear better.(Doorbell).Regardless, you can see what kind of different flashes some are more quicker than others but that would be a? that would enable the Deaf and hardofhearing community to be aware of what events were happening with the different speeds and lights.So the last is in regards to fire alarms. [?Fire alarm?]So we have two different flashings here. You have your regular flashing and then the other one would be used when a person would be sleeping. This is a light that would work even if the Internet was not working and even if the electricity was to go out, but in respect to time, I will not show that video at the moment. You can go ahead and stop the video, Andrea. I apologize for the video quality. I don't know what happened. If you would go on to the website and watch it, it would be a lot better. That's the conclusion my presentation today. We have been in contact with several vendors. We are trying to work with those vendors to be able to improve the support for visual alerts.We're talking with Apple right now. So everyone keep your fingers crossed. That's all. Thank you.>> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you very much, Christian. I don't know if I should share this with you or not, but my dad wired our whole house when I was a baby. I had a big silver mic, like Elvis Presley by my bed and they could tell whether I was laughing or crying at every place above the doorjamb had a light built into it.And on Halloween, everyone thought we were the spooky house because we kept pushing the doorbell so it would flash. So it's not a new concept, but it has been forgotten, and I think it's extremely important that we have visual signals for the protection of persons who are Deaf and hardofhearing.Thank you for that presentation.I brought with me a TTY that is on realtime text. If you all want to look at it later, this is an old compact, and it still works and I use it in the States. So everybody can have a look at that. All right. We're going to move now to European federation of the hard of hearing, which Lidia Best, who is vice president or vice chairman of this group will give a presentation on telecoils.Okay. We'll get it up in just one second. We are doing okay on time. >> LIDIA BEST: Thank you, Madam Chair. I would like to quickly introduce European federation of hard of hearing. Can I ask for the next slide? Thank you.It's simple vision and objectives from Europe, where hard of hearing people can live without barriers, as we all who are working here and we have the opportunity to participate in all levels of society.We are currently covering 21 countries, with three more countries coming up as individual memberships. Next slide.So just a snapshot of what we really mean by improving quality of life for hard of hearing people in Europe. What we do is we do awareness rising in the European parliament, and the world hearing day around March. Again this year we will have a chapter from WHO coming and presenting in the parliament.The direct consultations with the European Commission as well, because we have consultive status as an NGO and also we have been consulting on the European Accessibility Act and which I will be touching on a little bit later. And lastly, the grass root working, we are members of a European accessibility group.We encouraged tech logical innovations, and the compatibility of hearing aids. We have the proven technology of the telecoil be included and activated in the hearing aid and cochlear implant processors. Mobile phones and other sources of sound should be compatibility with the telecoils.So new wireless technologies should work parallel to telecoil.Last year in October, International Federation of Hard of Hearing People and our federation of European one has held a conference which was called future loops. So we had actually at the end come to a conference. We had a declaration read out and this is what the future loops is about. Many hearing aids and cochlear implants include the proven telecoil technology that works with hearing loops in large venues but hearing loops are recommended in any large venue to provide accessibility for hardofhearing persons and the telecoil has to be included and activated in every hearing aid and working in parallel to any technology.The future loops we called this conference, is also about the development of improved accessibility systems in large venues. Important characteristics for us are: Several audio stereo channels, high quality, high immunity to interferences, low audio latency is and several text channels for the captions in the future.What is happening right now? Right now we have a lot of future discussions of wireless listening and I'm just? this shows a representation in 2014 during the hearing across the life span global conference in Italy. Some of the manufacturers are feeling that the wireless, which means Bluetooth is the way to go, and we presented if you look at for the special wireless logo, you know that if you have your cochlear implant processor or hearing aid fitted with Bluetooth or you have a streamer, you will be able to hear streamed audio. And just use it and everything will be fine. So you can easily send the music or ceremony wirelessly.However, that's not without problems.Next one.Last year we already mentioned and we are repeating again that hearing devices and spectrum interference is a real issue for us. So we have supported the European Union, as well as at ITU, and the basic thing is that when we are considering very large numbers of assistive listening devices, the testing which has been done last year, cannot reproduce every situation where 2.3 gigahertz mobile phone equipment will interact with ALD users and only exposure to the networks and mobile phones when they are in operation will really tell. So we don't know if we are safe or not from this.And the next one. And the situation can be further complicated by the increasing congestion in the 2.4, and the 2.483 band. Because we have many various short range devices and the congestion is the IoT devices.And when we have a new threat. Just recently it comes to our attention and we are working with Graham Copse who also comes and meets with the group but apparently the new directive in the European Commission has been introduced and coming to us last year? or 2016, sorry.And during the review of the directive, for some reason we have seen the telecoils equipment is requiring a license. What is happening? Prior to this new directive and if we are going above 9 gigahertz, we are regarded as radio equipment and regulated. And the uses below the 9 spectrum includes telecoils implemented in hearing aids, and cochlear implants sound processors for hard of hearing people.What has happened now? In all Member States of the European Union, all telecoil type devices are illegal, officially, as tipped by radio equipment directive.And that means what? Transmitters and receivers. There's no legislation permitting their use and there's no legislation that we must either license exempt or requiring a license. So it's a mess.Currently the UK is seeking an interim solution and published a statement to this effect, but it's actually not going anywhere either for the manufacturers or the hardofhearing people.Other European countries, nonex U members, such as here in Switzerland have changed their local laws, exempting from license the use of devices operating on frequencies below 9 gigahertz.And this is really what we need now. So what we are doing, we have made an attempt to discuss with the European Commission and with the radio directive as well and commissioners to urgently seek solutions of this, because what we are trying to find out is if there's testing going on and we can have some clear parameters. Apparently it's not happening and it doesn't exist and we need clear legislation as soon as possible, otherwise the manufacturers will be in the difficult situation, replacing products on the market.And additionally, the European accessibility act, the latest update relates again to telecoils. The parliament under stipulations from the European federation of hardofhearing people had explicitly demanded connectivity to hearing devices and spelled out the hearing technologies to be considered by both manufacturers and product design and service providers.When relevant, such as hearing aids, telecoils, cochlear implants and assistive listening devices. It was related to telecoils themselves but what the European council position is, after the actual position of the European parliament is to omit any reference to auditory devices. Instead, we have just created a new annex which provides mere examples of how to enhance use for hardofhearing persons and how to reduce audio signal interference.I am not yet in the position to tell you what this annex exactly shows and what it says, but I am actually digging to try to get access to it.Thank you for your attention.>> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you, Lidia.>> LIDIA BEST: Apologies for speaking fast.>> ANDREA SAKS: You're all right. You're okay.I think this is also something we need to direct to the R sector a little bit and I know that Ilham has taken it in. She was concentrating. So perhaps you and Ilham can talk. I'm being signaled. What is the matter Masahito.>> MASAHITO KAWAMORI: Can you turn off the microphone and then turn it on again?>> ANDREA SAKS: Sure. Thank you very much for pointing out the interference.Does anybody have any questions for Lidia? Okay. Now I'm going to move to Christopher Jones. It's your turn and he's going to introduce something called DeafKidz which is an international organization with Nwise and tell us what is going on with that and I will ask you to keep it short because we are nearly at the end. Okay. Thank you.>> CHRISTOPHER JONES: Yes, I will do that. It's Christopher here. It will certainly be short. Don't worry.As chair of deaf access to communications under the UK council on Deafness, I was invited to the House of Lord, by Lord Bruce of Bennachie. And this was to the launch of DeafKidz International.And this was regarding VRS for Deaf children with regards to situations of abuse. Physical, mental, sexual abuse. Funding was received via comic relief and this work is being done in conjunction with Child Line International, with technical support provided by Nwise who provided the platform. This project was begun? South Africa and Deaf children in South Africa have keenly taken up this technology. They had never previously had access to video telephony by a sign language interpreter and they have said that they found it extremely helpful. And this is relevant to ITU since Nwise have provided the MMX platform with total conversation, which is our standard. So that's it. >> ANDREA SAKS: Well, that was pretty fast. Thank you. I didn't mean to push that you far. Does anyone have any questions about Deafkidz. Now Deaf children can have access is rather a new innovation. I don't think there is anything else in the world that is doing this, that I'm aware of and if there's more information out there, I think we would like to know about it. Okay. Yes, go ahead, Christopher.>> CHRISTOPHER JONES: Yes, Christopher again. Sign video provides VRS in order that children in the UK can make contact with Childline and furthermore, I have concerns about sign language interpreters who could potentially experience vicarious trauma when mediating these kind of conversations between a Deaf child victim, shall we say and the representative from Childline. So I think we need to ensure that there are services such as counseling services available to interpreters after a call if required. So that should be listed within the KPI document that we hope to produce later on. >> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you. We'll do Christian first and then Beat. Go ahead, Christian.>> CHRISTIAN VOGLER: This is Christian Vogler speaking. Christopher, I agree completely with your point. I'm wondering if you and Nwise are considering setting up a sign language communicator, meaning with the child signing, to the person working with Child Helpline.I'm sorry. Let me rephrase.Are you potentially looking at having a conversation happening between the Deaf child and a counselor who would be proficient in sign language without the use of an interpreter? Is that possible? >> CHRISTOPHER JONES: I'm actually not involved with the Nwise project. So I think that question, you would need to put to Nwise or the representative of Nwise. >> ANDREA SAKS: Would you like the JCA to send a liaison to them to ask them that question? We can arrange for that to happen. Okay. Then you can help me write it. Thank you.Is that agreeable to the group? Okay. Lidia has spoken. Okay. Beat, would you like to make your comment, please?>> BEAT KLEEB: Hi. This is Beat speaking here. I have no coordination with the project? I'm sorry, I have no connection with this project. I have no knowledge of this beforehand.I don't like the access to the problem. I believe we should work with the organization for the Deaf. I don't think a child helpline? I believe that doesn't? that's been designed for hearing children. I don't think they would be capable of solving the problems with Deaf children. This leads me to believe that there has to be a coordination with a Deaf organization to develop services designed specifically and that would ensure services to a Deaf child without the help of an interpreter. Thank you.>> ANDREA SAKS: Christopher, do you want to respond to that?>> CHRISTOPHER JONES: Christopher. I mean, I attended this event as a guest, just to clarify. So I attended the launch as a guest. I'm not involved in the development or the concept or the charity, Deafkidz International. I was there as an observer, just to see what was happening and what the project goals were. And my concern was that we don't have VRS free nationwide. So this is a project that was being set up separately.So I was just there to see how it was being developed and it was not the case that I was expecting it to be.>> ANDREA SAKS: Again, I will put this out there. If? I think that a liaison written maybe to this group, with some of the questions and thoughts that Beat has expressed, that Christian has expressed and perhaps something that you have thought, and Lidia also wants to make a comment, which I will let her do in one second that we write something so that they respond to us and that way we can get some information.Lidia, go ahead.>> LIDIA BEST: Just to add context to the situation, as well. The director of Deafkidz is himself a Deaf person. He's using sign language. He's also very, very, hard of hearing. I'm sure he will be happy to hear the concerns and to working with everyone as well.Thank you. >> ANDREA SAKS: I think it's important that if this is of interest to the group? because we don't know what kind of technology they are using, what kind of technology they could be using. Sign video is an English organization that aids persons would are deaf to communicate with the outside world, mainly for business and some type of translation abroad. When Deaf businessmen go abroad and need to be involved in a conversation.I invited the proprietor of that, who is also Deaf, Mr.?Jeff McWhinney to come, and he may be someone we should involve in this particular project as well.I'm going to tell us, we have ten minutes left. Does? and I'm going to do Daniel Battu's presentation very quickly. Daniel, I'm not sure if he's on or not. I have no way of telling. Is Daniel on? Daniel Battu. Daniel, Battu, I know you can type. Can you type back? Well, maybe not. But he is listening. Daniel Battu is French. He has been contributing to the JCA and to the work for accessibility for a long time. What he has prepared is bridging the digital divide for vulnerable people and he's written a very lengthy report. I won't be able to do it justice but what I want to suggest is that it is an actual bona fide study on what population is, in fact, experiencing as an overall. Now, Daniel lives in Brittany, in France. He has done a graft, an ICT users according to the socalled vulnerable segments of the population. And according to recent informative surveys on the group of people, the current usage rate of digital applications can be evaluated in the table that's in there on page 2.I think this is something that we have to spend a little more time on, and unfortunately, I wish Daniel was here because he would do this much better than I'm going to do it, but he has made a complete police of what he thinks, and from his own studies should be done, including printing administrative form in double sided A4 format. If there's any single procedures suitable for all printers and all administrative surfaces that can save paper of the printer. So he's taken even on accessibility as far as saving the planet as well.Now, I don't know if he's going to type to you or not. Is he saying anything? Not a word.It? the thing is television? he's listed television programs including subtitles, which we call captioning. He has information that research is going towards a multifunction home TV which is the beginning of IoT. He has? I'm going to go to his? to his conclusion. I will read this paragraph here. The interest of financial players is mainly focused on innovations related to OTT or? sorry, OTT, thank you, over the top is what he's put, and is particularly stimulated by the wave of mergers and acquisitions of companies in the communication sector, driven by the convergence of services, media and content, in order for consumers and businesses to benefit from this renewal of communication products and services and the terms of choice, price, quality, ecology, investment and innovation, it is important to take into account the existing volume of population that will remain outside this evolution if the adaptations, technical data and accurate employment of information are not taken into account by industry decision makers and regulators.And by the people outside, he's talking about persons with disabilities.And he mentions the web having a permanent 24hour multilingual public information service on national uses and best practices and this is quite complex.I'm going to ask if Masahito Kawamori would take a good look at this document. There may be some work on the items that may come up in it, and I think that will be a place that it would be of interest. So offline? and Lidia has a comment. Go ahead, Lidia.>> LIDIA BEST: Thank you, Madam Chair. Actually, this is a very interesting presentation. And relates a little bit to what I came across as well in the UK. Apparently the UK has presented a white paper called connecting people, improving lives, a digital future for telecoils and mostly it's about service training. I raised questions now at the outcome level but the white paper, it says nothing about accessibility whatsoever. And I'm hoping in March, that this should be discussed.So it is a concern, like Daniel is mention, but the manufacturers are not really paying attention.>> ANDREA SAKS: Thank you Lidia. Daniel, I think you have done a conclusive paper.Daniel is making a point. Would you speak for Daniel, please?>> DANIEL: He made a comment, saying thank you for this presentation of my paper. Many thanks, Daniel. >> ANDREA SAKS: Daniel, I can't do it as well as you. Next time, I hope you can come. I hope what you can do is pay attention to this and particularly everybody else in the room will too because there's much more information than I was able to convey and also my technical knowledge does not surpass yours. So I think what we'll do is have a look at it and see if there's any way that we can include it in question 26, with the permission of Dr.?Kawamori.So with that, we're kind of at the end and I think what we have done? and thank you, again, Daniel, for always participating.We have just a few things. We're not going to talk about the Dynamic Coalition on accessibility and dis? accessibility and disability, although we did present at the UN on 20th?of December. I'm going to refer you to the website because they blew it. It was really not accessible and we have raised the red flag like a bunch of bulls in a bull fight. It was terrible! And they are not paying attention, yet the countries that do IGF were brilliant! Mexico was great! They got university students to help and do lots of different things that we needed to have done for persons with disabilities and here I had to organize everybody's access and I didn't know that I was going to have to do that. The Dynamic Coalition is simply a body that advises. We don't actually physically go and take people through the procedure of registering and taking them down in cars and registering tax season. All the things that we have to do.So I'm going to refer you to the DCAD website and you can take a look and see what type of difficulty that was happening in Geneva, at the UN. It was quite shocking.And WSIS will be on the 19th?and the 23rd?of March which is a little earlier than usual, and this is the leveraging ICTs to build information and knowledge, societies for achieving the sustainable development goals.We are involved in this and anyone who wants to join the workshop that we are designing, I would most interested in hearing. From they always accepted our workshops, and I'm not quite sure how we are going to do with it or what we are going to say. It's quite open.But I would be very grateful if anybody would want to join. We have a couple of people, but we need more.And then the M enabling summit which is G3 ICT will be held in Washington December, the 11th?and 13th?of June, 2018, and that's getting to be pretty big where everybody from the globe is coming. And I think that also if people want to be interested in that, that's again on the website.Because we are at the end of our time, I will just ask the interpreters if I can have five minutes to close down and the captioner, five minutes and make a couple of announcements. Is that okay? And I will just to check to see what Tracy has said.Anyway, Tracy said yes. What I wanted to say was I want to thank everyone from coming such a distance to come and the fact that we had to change the day, unexpectedly due to the situation and I want to announce that sign language interpreters are now recognized by the regular interpretation department, which is a battle, which I believe we won. And that we feel it's important that for the Deaf community that their interpretation services are recognized as bona fide. That's happened.I want to thank Gent and his team for all the accessibility work that they do to put everything online. I do want everybody to comment on Zoom and what you thought of it, even offline or just send me an email, as compared to what we normally have, which is our captioning, which is done here.The captions come from the same source, but how they are displayed and how they are doing it. And if you notice, it's about to do its shutdown, which is Zoom, and I want you all to know that at? what is it, at 2:30, we meet again for Question 26, Study Group 16 and I welcome all of you to attend that if you have the time.And does anybody want to say anything before I sign off?All right. I think I want to also thank ITUR for coming and staying and who has said she will come every time now. And everyone who made a presentation and Kiru, thank you very much.And Tracy, our captioner who is absolutely fabulous, who didn't know we were going to do the JCA. We didn't tell her. We apologize for that. You did so well for not having advance names. If your name was misspelled in the audience, it was our fault, not Tracy's. Thank you very much for attending the Joint Coordination Activity On Accessibility and Human Factors and we will let you know when the next meeting is by email.Thank you. The meeting is adjourned. And if you want to see a TTY, realtime, text, it's up here. You can see it for yourself.Thank you byebye.(End of meeting). ................
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