Equal access to information for all: making the world of electronic information more accessible to the handicapped in our society

On March 27th, 1995, the World Wide Web and the information super highway took a big step on the road to becoming the new window into the world of information. On that date MCI began its InternetMCI service. The net surfer can now shop, get critical information and news, get investment advice and much more. And this is only the first step. By a series of simple mouse clicks, the user has almost instant access to services and products almost anywhere in the world.The use of modern computers and software by the visually handicapped has become more difficult over the past few years. In earlier systems the user interface was a simple character based environment. In those systems, simple devices like screen readers, braille output and speech synthesizers were effective. Current systems now run Graphical User Interfaces (GUIs) which have rendered these simple aids almost useless. In no area has this problem become more important than in technologies for the handicapped. What has become enabling technology for the sighted has become disabling technology for the visually impaired.