If you don't have use of your hands.

See also this video:

It's basically a giant optical mouse usable with one foot.

The ADA is hailed as a historic civil rights milestone. For the first time, it formally recognized disabled people as a protected class, banned discrimination, and mandated reasonable accommodations in public life. It reshaped the built environment—adding curb cuts, closed captioning, ramps — and created a legal vocabulary to describe exclusion.

But the ADA was limited from the start. Enforcement depends on individuals filing lawsuits. Many private entities are exempt. Digital accessibility remains poorly regulated. And deeper systems — healthcare, housing, benefits — were never meaningfully addressed. As a disabled adult, I’ve had to fight to access basic services, find jobs, and navigate public life, all while watching the federal agencies tasked with protecting my rights slowly fall apart.

…just as a well-designed visual interface guides your eye and confirms your actions with subtle animations or color changes, sound can be an equally powerful tool. For us visually impaired folks, it’s not just a nice-to-have; it can be the only way we know what in the digital darnation is going on!

The words "building spaces for autistic people" over a castle background. There are bookshelves in the corners and candles on the floor and a window in the middle. In the top right there is an autistic pride flag of 5 different colors.

This clever gizmo turns any USB input devices - or combination of input devices - into any other HID device. Different versions also accept individual switches as inputs.

This means if you have trouble using a mouse, you can turn a joystick or a gamepad into a mouse.

Or if you can use a mouse but you can't click, you can remap the button to some other switch, like a foot pedal.

The possibilities seem endless, but it is a bit on the geeky side. If you're not the technical type, you might want to get some help from a computer or electronics engineer to put together your ideal setup with that one.

Check out the manual's section on accessibility:

https://www.remapper.org/manual/#accessibility-applications

Toymaker Mattel worked with Breakthrough T1D to create a Barbie doll who visibly lives with type 1 diabetes and carries an insulin pump.

Upcoming webinar from the Great Lakes ADA Center:

35th Anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA): Celebrating the ADA Through the Decades

Event Date/Time:

Tuesday, July 15th, 2025

2:00 PM EDT - 3:30 PM EDT

Location:

Virtual

Description:

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was signed on July 26, 1990 by former U.S. President, George H.W. Bush. This year, we celebrate three and a half decades of protections under this comprehensive disability civil rights law and the many milestones that have been reached by the disability community thanks to this important piece of legislation. Join us as we take a journey through the decades to look at:

• 1990s – Major Supreme Court decisions and how they have shaped the ADA’s enforcement;
• 2000s – The efforts that led to the ADA Amendments Act of 2008;
• 2010s – Revisions to the Title II and III regulations and the Accessibility Standards which shaped how service animals and other power-driven mobility devices are addressed as well as added architectural accessibility requirements for playgrounds, swimming pools, recreation facilities, children’s facilities, and more;
• 2020s – The impact of COVID-19 on remote work and the increased focus on technology which contributed to the push by DOJ to release new regulations for web content and mobile apps used by Title II entities. In addition, the renewed effort to abolish an outdated regulation that allows for people with disabilities to be paid sub-minimum wage.

During this session, our panel of speakers will lead us in honoring the sacrifices and hard-won battles of the past as we move forward and continue our fight for a more accessible future.

Max will debut Sinners in the U.S. on Friday, July 4, when viewers will be able to watch it two ways: by 1) streaming the exact theatrically released version, and 2) choosing Sinners in Black American Sign Language (BASL). It’s the first time a streaming service has interpreted a film into BASL, Warner Bros. says.

BASL is “a distinct dialect of American Sign Language (ASL) with its own dynamic history and unique grammar, signing space, rhythm, facial expressions and cultural nuances,” reads an announcement released Monday. Max says the release of Sinners in BASL marks “a major step forward in accessibility, representation and visibility in streaming.

“For the first time, the Black Deaf community will have streaming access to a more immersive experience in their language,” the press release continues. The written announcement also encourages Max subscribers who sign in ASL but are unfamiliar with BASL to “follow along with this interpretation.”

Sinners with BASL is interpreted by Nakia Smith, “an influential voice in the Black Deaf community, who delivers a powerful interpretation with cultural depth and linguistic richness that aligns with the film’s themes and historical timeline,” Max said. Smith performs the BASL as directed by Rosa Lee Timm.

Among the prominent leaders in the history of Blind education in Japan are Konishi Nobuhachi (1854-1938) and Ishikawa Kuraji (1859-1944), two sighted educators who contributed greatly to the early development of Japanese Braille in the 1880s and 1890s. Kunmōain, the school where Konishi and Ishikawa taught, opened its doors to blind and deaf students in 1880, and was renamed in 1887 as the Tokyo School for the Blind and Deaf (in short, the Tokyo School; the school was reorganized into a school for blind students in 1909, and a school for deaf students in 1910).

At the time in Japanese society, Blind education in schools, as well as Deaf education, was fairly new. People with disabilities, in general, had limited opportunities and support. The Tokyo School, which earned its status as a school under the direct authority of the Ministry of Education, was one of the few places in Japan where blind and deaf students with some financial means could receive formal education. In addition to a broad curriculum of academic courses, such as language, history, and mathematics, the school offered vocational training in music, acupuncture, and massage – the traditional professions of blind people. Shortly after Konishi was appointed to the school in 1886, Ishikawa joined the teaching staff there upon Konishi’s recommendation. Ishikawa’s immediate task was to thoroughly understand the principles of Braille and transform Braille into a suitable script for the Japanese language. This was no easy feat for anyone, not least because the phonetic and semantic nature of the Japanese scripts had to be accurately codified in the much more limited template of Braille dots.

Japanese Braille took shape over a few years of trial and error. Ishikawa and his committee aimed to develop a functional Japanese-based Braille template that could be used not only at the Tokyo School but also disseminated nationwide as the new standard script for Blind education. From early on, the committee made the crucial decision of comparing Braille with the Japanese kana syllabaries, which are phonetic characters and can be used in writing to represent the sounds of a vast number of kanji characters. [...]

This font is awesome!

I'm not blind but my eyesight isn't what it used to be, like all men my age, and this font really is legible at a much smaller size even for me.

With gestures and mime rolled into one, this little-known art form, called Visual Vernacular (VV), is proudly used by the Deaf community for artistic expression. In VV, visual storytelling replaces formal signs, enabling people from both the Deaf and hearing communities to connect, understand each other and communicate without words.

In India, while Deaf artists are eager to showcase their art, there are very few welcoming, inclusive art spaces for them. A lack of familiarity among the hearing community with sign language and the access needs of d/Deaf people has resulted in inaccessibility not only in art and cultural spaces, but also in education and employment. This gap in knowledge among hearing people limits interaction between the hearing and Deaf communities and is also a barrier to current advocacy efforts to make Indian Sign Language (ISL) the 23rd official language of India.

Alim Chandani is a Deaf activist working to integrate Deaf artists into the mainstream art scene in India. As the mission leader of Hear A Million, a project by the NGO Enable India that helps the Deaf community to lead productive lives, and the founder of the social enterprise Freedom to Sign, Chandani is bringing together Deaf artists and supporting them in honing their skills in VV and other forms of art including photography, painting, filmmaking, and poetry.

VV is still an emerging art in India, but it is as old as The Beatles. It is said to date back to the 1960s in the United States, when Deaf artist Bernard Bragg began blending mime techniques with American Sign Language. Over the years, Bragg’s innovative art has spread worldwide, gaining popularity in countries like Denmark, Germany and the United Kingdom. Joel Ortiz, a VV artist and founder of Joz Studio based in Orlando, Florida, says that across the globe, VV is being used not only as an art, but also “for activism and cultural expression.”

The students are part of Deaf-in-Tech, a program designed to break barriers for Nigeria’s Deaf community in the country’s booming tech industry. Over the past decade, tech has emerged as one of Nigeria’s fastest-growing sectors, contributing at least 20 percent to the country’s GDP in the second quarter of 2024, and drawing in at least $2 billion in foreign investments. Yet, despite this growth, tech job opportunities for people with disabilities remain scarce.

Deaf-in-Tech aims to change that by providing a platform that empowers deaf individuals with the skills and resources needed to break into Nigeria’s tech industry through specialized training programs, mentorship initiatives and strategic partnerships. Unlike conventional coding boot camps, where spoken explanations dominate, here, lessons are delivered through sign language.

“All you need is their attention,” Oricha explains. “Once that is secured, you can be sure they will give you their best.”

Does anyone else live in South East Asia while collecting SSDI?

I have done this a few times and although it's legal I totally feel bad for it.

I get disability for Major Depression and Generalized Anxiety Disorder.

Without something like Lexapro I can turn into kind of a wreck. Even suicidal or suffering from panic attacks.

Does anyone ever feel like this isn't a real disability? I mean, it's not like I'm in a wheelchair. Sometimes I feel like I am cheating.

But there are others out there like myself. There has to be.

cross-posted from: https://discuss.tchncs.de/post/32040879

For gamedevs/game requests: Here's some info on how to make a game available on there

It's still a young platform, so please give them lots of feedback to help improve it!