OpenAccess intro video transcript

Visual: Callum McMenamin sits on grass in a park, with trees behind him. He wears a black OpenAccess shirt and a lapel microphone. A purple name label reads: “Callum McMenamin, Accessibility Consultant.”

Callum McMenamin: Kia ora, I’m Callum McMenamin and I run a consultancy called OpenAccess.

OpenAccess works with clients across Australia and New Zealand to help make their websites, apps, documents, and digital systems more accessible for disabled people.

Accessibility is about ensuring that systems work for disabled people. Accessibility can be quite technical and that’s why you need an expert to help assess a system.

Often accessibility issues are quite difficult to notice, so that’s why you need someone with the right expertise to help detect those issues and provide adequate solutions for them. That’s where my accessibility assessments can help.

When I audit a system, I find all of the problems that no one’s noticed before, and I provide practical solutions for them.

I also provide training, so if you have designers and developers for instance, I can help to teach them how to create accessible systems from the start.

Visual: A sample website for Northstar Health appears. It has a logo, navigation links, and a booking form.

Many blind people use screen readers which read web pages aloud. If your website is not accessible, this is what it can sound like. Notice how the links, images and inputs are not described correctly.

Screen reader: Link IMG minus 1493 JPG. Link Index HTML. Link Index HTML. Link Index HTML. Edit text blank, edit text blank, edit text blank, button.

Callum: Someone who is blind and uses a screen reader would not be able to use this website. I see this kind of problem frequently. Artificial intelligence currently does not produce accessible web pages and apps. It needs human expert review. But here’s the same website with all the issues fixed.

Visual: The same Northstar Health sample website is shown after accessibility fixes.

Screen reader: Link, image, Northstar Health. Navigation. Link, book. Link, services. Link, contact. End of navigation. End of banner. Main. Heading level 1, Care that works. Heading level 2, Book a visit. Your name, edit text. Email address, edit text. Phone number, edit text. Request time, button.

Visual: Callum is shown outdoors again.

Accessibility is so important. Stats NZ data shows that one in six New Zealanders are disabled. If your website or app is not accessible, you could be excluding these people unintentionally.

I’m disabled myself. I have vision impairment, so I know what it’s like to experience these accessibility problems in daily life.

That’s why I’m on a mission, to help make Aotearoa and Australia more accessible for everyone. That means that I want to ensure that no one gets left behind.

As services become increasingly digital, we need to ensure that everyone can use those systems, including disabled people.

I provide accessibility assessments and audits, and also team training. So if you’ve got developers and designers that need training on accessibility, I can help.

If you’d like to find out more, head to openaccess.nz.

Visual: The OpenAccess logo appears.

Sound: A New Zealand pedestrian crossing button beeps.

Visual: Short outtake. Callum is still outdoors.

Callum: I myself have vision impairment. If I go to a restaurant and I can’t see the menu…

Visual: The camera falls over and points up at a tree.

Callum: f**k.