the euain network 
accessibility on demand

Contents 

Introduction 2
Information Anchors 3 
Design for Convergence 4 
Moving from accessible to adaptive environments 4 
Practical advantages of this approach 6 
Accessibility on Demand 11 
Summary 16 
References 17


The most common reaction to discussions about ÔaccessibilityÕ is a loud groan. For many people involved in authoring, producing or distributing content, introducing accessibility-related issues means the consideration and partial digestion of several standards and guidelines which are sometimes inter-connected but more often fragmentary and even contradictory. For people whose primary interest, role or occupation is not related to accessibility, this is often felt to stifle rather than enhance creative information design. The author or information designer may have many complex layers of meaning to convey to the information consumer. 
And yet there are many others who are coming to realise that an understanding of fundamental accessibility can actually be the key to unlocking the take-up of new technologies and platforms. This involves paying greater attention to each part of the information processing chain (from creation or composition, through processing or transformation to presentation and delivery). It also requires us to consider in more depth key aspects of information granularity and addressability. The euain network seeks to test and develop a number of underlying enabling technologies to support these areas and to support transversal media applications and services within appropriate business models and SOA environments. 

Introduction 
The most common reaction to discussions about accessibility is a loud groan. For many people involved in authoring, producing or distributing content, introducing accessibility-related issues means the consideration and partial digestion of several standards and guidelines which are sometimes interconnected but more often fragmentary and even contradictory. For people whose primary interest, role or occupation is not related to accessibility, this is often felt to stifle rather than enhance creative information design. The author and/or information designer may have many complex layers of meaning to convey to the information consumer and somewhat rigid standards developed for a different purpose can easily be perceived as introducing hindrance rather than providing support. 
For many years the accessibility field has been poorly served by the widespread perception that engaging with accessibility issues is both costly and time-consuming. Though it is rarely acknowledged, this perception is well-earned and while there are many sets of guidelines and standards, there are almost no tools of immediate and practical use which can be easily adopted by mainstream content providers. Given this absence, non-experts are required to implement guidelines and standards with little or no practical support. 
With key people in the information processing chain working in semi-isolation, it is hardly surprising that progress is both slow and unremarkable. And yet there are many others who are coming to realise that an understanding of fundamental accessibility can actually be the key to unlocking the take-up of new technologies and devices. Seen only as a subset of usability, accessibility can help when tackling the ease-of-use issues which are often cited as critical for the acceptance of new technologies. One only has to consider text-tospeech technologies or audiobooks, both of which were originally developed for print impaired communities. If we take this idea a little further, and for example consider blindness as an extreme communication problem, we are required to tackle many different issues whose solution can provide practical outputs which are of value to everyone. 
In order to ensure that universal access is a pre-requisite for future software, it is necessary to approach adaptive system design issues at a fundamental level. Unfortunately many solutions within mainstream environments exist as afterthoughts which are ÒpiggybackedÓ onto the original design. It may seem obvious, but an adaptive framework which does not interact in any way with the core system architecture cannot use the design goals of the original system and therefore does not have the necessary integration in order to meet stringent sets of user requirements. 
Looking forward, we can see a clear trend towards information convergence. As noted recently: ÒMedia formats have converged due to digitisation and media consumers have turned into users and producers of media content. As a result, technological approaches have to be integrated with user-oriented perspectives and both, in turn, need to be seen in the context of their social consequences and cultural implicationsÓ1. 
This short report provides a contextual overview of the work being undertaken by the euain network. This covers key issues and concepts around design for convergence, describing the practical advantages of moving from ideas of accessible to adaptive environments. 

Information Anchors 
The communication of digital content is predicated upon the assumption that participants in the information chain are generally able to interact with that content in a manner with which they are comfortable and where their specific preferences regarding comprehension, usability and applicability are coherent and sustainable. Naturally these preferences may become requirements over time, for whatever reasons, and the changes in the demands of participants must be reflected in easy to use and easy to re-use information processing technologies. These shifts will be reflected in the marketplace as businesses strive for accessible repositories of processing resources. Without access to such resources, however, the cost of incorporating accessibility notions into products, services and research goals will remain prohibitively high and the fundamental connection with accessibility will be lost, just as populations grow older and encounter information consumption difficulties. 
Communication can be conceived as Òorganised information". Just as music provides intrinsic freedom of interpretation for the listener, an organisation of information should provide freedom of appreciation to the beholder and this would exhibit fundamental accessibility. Accessibility is a core requirement for any technology, product or concept and is a requirement for any form of communication to be able to develop. In this respect, there is a clear need to develop practical and usable products. 
Many processes unfold at the same time, and we largely cope with this in an intuitive manner. It is not, however, always easy to establish just how these processes unfold and how they are related to one another. When designing and building information and communication systems and platforms, there is often very little attention to what could be termed intuitive system design: that is, trying to build systems which can map onto our natural ability to deal with complex perceptual processes. 
As a participant in a research or design process, we are usually required to observe the process as a whole from our own perspective. Naturally the very act of focusing helps to remove a lot of the complexities that are inherent in the process as a whole. However, we are not usually able to observe that process from someone else's perspective and we may therefore be filtering out relevant information as we cannot oversee vast amounts of complexity by ourselves. So when building our systems, we can try to cope with these multiple perspectives by drafting new meta-models, that in turn allow adaptation of the level of complexity based on a preferred observation profile. This means that we can model the amount and nature of complexity of information presentation from a meta-position. And we can then coherently examine the different ways in which we navigate through these information spaces. 
This is not so different from how we navigate in the physical environment. For example, if you are driving through the mountains, one approach is to use a roadmap and gradually calculate the most efficient or quickest route by trial and error. You might then share that information with fellow travelers by exchanging maps, routes and your experiences on the roads. But if no maps are available, you need an alternative strategy. Instead, you could drive up the highest mountain and observe the different roads and how people are traveling along them. Having done this, you can descend from the mountain with your own route and governing overview. We cannot spend all our time on top of the mountain but we do need to be confident that the route we have created and chosen to follow will lead us to the right destination. Within information spaces, this can only be guaranteed if we can access that overview when it is needed. 
When we navigate through complex information spaces, we need to take an approach that combines the presentation of knowledge and practical information with the experience of taking a meta-perspective on the practical or conceptual context at hand. So, knowing about a certain route -a certain information space -and understanding the experience of traveling through that information space are not the same. But if you can compare your experience with that of others and contextualise these different perspectives according to your needs, then you will have access to valuable anchor points for choosing which choices to make and which routes to take. 

Design for Information Convergence 
Looking forward, we can see a clear trend towards information convergence. As noted recently: ÒMedia formats have converged due to digitisation and media consumers have turned into users and producers of media content. As a result, technological approaches have to be integrated with user-oriented perspectives and both, in turn, need to be seen in the context of their social consequences and cultural implicationsÓ2. 

Moving from accessible to adaptive environments 
If we follow the tenets of Universal Design and we are to address fundamental accessibility, we must make a transition from accessible to adaptive environments. We must further make a transition from theory to practice: from detailed guidelines to simple services which can be made available on demand. For example, in circumstances where it might be expected that accessible information provision meets the necessary standards, this is rarely the case. In the learning sector for example, around 90% of documents requested by print-impaired students are in analogue printed formats and many libraries try to offer a digitisation-on-demand facility. A key aspect in this respect is the speed of delivery as agreements are often negotiated on a case-by-case basis. Publishers are often hesitant to provide materials in digital formats as there are few document delivery systems incorporating issues of rights management through secure gateways. For most students, libraries are a key point of access to information but access is limited and problematic, particularly where alternative formats are required. There are few structural agreements between content and service providers. Those providing a service are often unaware of what information is available and how it can be accessed. 
The Design For All approach3 is now familiar to most software designers but in many instances this approach is only followed at a relatively superficial level. There remains a need to communicate information to designers and innovators to enable them further to think about an inclusive world4 , with recent initiatives such as EDeAN5 pointing the way forward. Naturally, this activity cannot be performed in isolation, as there is a parallel need to educate system users to make their demands more explicit6 7. 
Following research into accessibility solutions for print impaired people8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17, we have invest igated many complex communication problems following the pr inciples of Universal Design18. The consideration of (meta)adaptivity19  20(and the concomitant movement toward intuitive system design) allows us to consider accessibility in its widest sense. The easiest way to understand this is to consider the requirements for accessible solutions as being the same as the requirements for extreme communication solutions21. 
A generic communication network can be described by the common process model shown below. Modelling information can be separated into three phases; information retrieval, information representation and information reproduction. Retrieval concerns the perception of the information: once perceived, this perception is represented in some manner and can then be reproduced for the consumer. This continuous loop is the same for any producer/consumer relationship, where all consumers are also producers and vice versa. 
Different users of the same content necessarily have different perspectives on that content. For example, to academics a book (even a work of fiction) is a reference source for their field. To a layman, reading a book is a leisure activity. To an author, the same book represents a means to communicate concepts. To a publisher, this versatile object is a unit of production in a wider supply chain. Given these multiple perspectives on something as familiar as a book, it is clear that one personÕs output medium is anotherÕs input medium. 
When considering physical entity interfaces (tactile, aural or visual), how can we understand the ways in which someone uses sensory information to monitor the external world? How can we understand the techniques used to construct a strategy to achieve their desired goals? If we were able to represent this behaviour (or at least build in some of these notions in Òreal worldÓ applications), would this then provide sufficient flexibility to enable different groups of usersÕ groups to use the same piece of software? When considering software user interfaces, we must consider both fixed characteristics (for example a button which cannot be changed, moved or linked to a different action target) and dynamic ones (for example the size, colours, location or semantics of GUI entities). In the latter case, the manifestation of a controller hints at its meaning but how do we parameterise these software controller entities to tie them into the software consistency? 
In short, if the design of an information system is well-balanced, it should provide an architecture with built-in accessibility features. By separating the information processing domains we can achieve greater unification by focusing on the points of interaction; that is, the interfaces between the common interface layers. 

Practical advantages of this approach 
1. Enhancing user interaction with content 
Interfacing can be described as defining and specifying ÔconnectionÕ points for communication. By providing inter-active means of relating flows between these connection points, we can achieve a dialogue. A dialogue becomes a Dialog if a sufficient level of understanding both ways is achieved. 
We consider this to represent the level of accessibility an environment, whether virtual or real, requires. A well balanced design in any information system provides an architecture with built-in accessibility features. To this end, a high level of flexibility and accessibility can be achieved by separating the various entities that are of importance in the communication process. 
By addressing the issue of opening up content and its structure for any user, we introduce a fundamental question. How does one connect a computer application (which is a dynamic set of concepts with dynamic inter-relations) to the experience of an end user? If we are to design interfaces between the external world and the mental picture of that world which the end user handles to achieve his or her objectives, we go beyond the level of providing buttons and windows to a computing model. The same pattern of interactions22 that occur between the end-userÕs goals and the means of achieving these goals through a computer application, also occur between the software components of the computer application itself. 
If we were able to specify an interfacing paradigm which could be aggregated throughout all of the system design, the opportunity would arise to grant the end-user an intuitive level of interaction between themselves and the computer application at a fundamental level. In order to formulate the basics of such a design, and for us as developers, content providers and distributors to learn from such a design, we must build the notion of multiple perspectives into the design. This implies that all interactions between the individual software components, as well as the messages to the end user, should facilitate personalisation. This very much resembles localisation of software, where important user interface terms are available in various languages and where the preferred language can be selected Òon the fly". 
In order to manage such a design and convey the generic thoughts behind it, we need a metaphorical way of expressing these concepts. Whereas the interaction between an end user and a software application does not (yet) resemble the level of communication between humans, human communication provides the fulcrum for software design processes, the people involved in these processes and the end users. Both groups of users Ð and many more -can then relate to this set of symbols and concepts. If we build into the design an expression of the processes that can occur (actions, reactions, events and so forth) which mimics communication, we provide a shared framework of concepts. This shared framework could mean more or less the same things to the different groups of participants. We would be able to explicate the communicated entities and, to a certain point, represent the communication process. As we would be able to represent communication, we could control and modify the configuration of this process from both sides of the communication line. We could build in consumer preferences alongside producer, distributor and provider preferences, all the time ensuring that all participants ÔtalkÕ by using the same fundamental building blocks. Real communication Ð as in a dialogue between the various interest groups -could manifest itself as emergent behaviour. Emergent behaviour, however, within a frame of reference. 
Naturally, there are numerous advantages to such an approach. The software would be able to rely on a framework of classes that include entities which represent Users, User behaviours and Providers actions, as well as entities that represent production processes and so forth. As these backbone classes exist, the opportunity would arise to personalise the behaviour of these classes. In this way the end user, as well as the producer, would be able to set up the software as preferred. The social impact Ð for instance -could be the sense of respect that the end-user experiences because the producers have facilitated insight into the content and content provision procedures. For those user groups dependent on accessibility features, this would provide a very definite sense of inclusion, one which might invite many other types of users to participate in the market segment. 
A high level of flexibility and accessibility can be achieved by separating the various entities that are of importance in the communication process. Various groups of users and entities are involved in the dialog between an application and an application user. An application ideally should be seen as a communication partner. Categorising the constituent parts in such a communication process, can be based on three abstract levels of processing as discussed above: Information Retrieval, Information Representation and Information Production. Each processing phase can be represented by its own processing model. Explicating relations between these models enables communication. Rendering the explication of the relations between the three models dynamic facilitates a high level of flexibility in controlling, administrating and personalising this communication. Ideally a well-balanced configuration of such a processing architecture provides accessibility from scratch23. 
2. Accessibility from scratch 
The approach we are describing can be called accessibility from scratch. By building on recognised Design For All methodologies, systems should be built in such a way that the mainstream solution should be easily adaptable and extensible to add functionality for niche markets. As a result of the comprehensive lack of understanding of this concept at the fundamental design level, and strict deadlines to complete software projects, most accessible solutions become appended onto an ill-suited system as an afterthought: the accessible solution is then itself ill-conceived and unlikely to meet the needs of the end-user. This often raises the question (though rarely explicitly) of whether the specialised needs of the niche market merit the effort involved in providing an accessible solution. 
Requirements never stay the same over time: requirements change for all users of any service. The end-user"s sight or other senses might deteriorate over time, their needs being met with appropriate features in accessible media. The differentiation of user requirements in general might grow, forcing the system to deal with a broader variety of processing possibilities with which it cannot cope. The processing system itself might in due time signal changes in memory requirements. The consumer base might be expanded to cater not only for visually impaired users, but also for dyslexic users. How can we anticipate fundamental changes like this? On the other hand, there exists a dynamic group of accessible information producers who are pressed to keep up with the new media technology possibilities. The changing nature of requirements-and with that the potential design of any system- is a fundamental issue in the design of an inclusive world. 
The various MPEG family members operate at different abstraction levels with some communication between these abstraction levels. The process of contriving a procedure to interface the various processing levels should be based on use. The difficulty lies in achieving a level of description of the user requirements that allows re-description in technological terms. This re-description ideally leads to specifications and ultimately implementations. These implementations ÔproveÕ the viability of the concept: it is the proof of the hypothesis. The process of standardisation that runs in parallel with this ensures extraction of higher level descriptions and these are aggregated down to the earlier family members. Using this built-in feature to provide ÔslotsÕ for common and specialised accessibility requirements would create what we refer to as accessibility from scratch (see above). So the representation of the interplay between the various user groups should always remain accessible. If all relevant entities in a representation system remain accessible, creating meaningful mappings is a matter of connecting the appropriate entities. For this reason, accessibility from scratch is of fundamental importance. 
The transition towards adaptivity allows us to consider accessibility from a wider angle. Being able to see content in whatever modality; perceive its context; and attach a useful meaning to it requires that the user be able to access this content, its context and relevant software application in a way that meets that particular user's consumption preferences. These preferences may become requirements over time -we all get older. Being able to attach useful meanings to content is what lies at the very basis of the preservation and education of thought. Attaching useful meanings to content underpins the basis of culture, commerce and civilisation. Being able to access software, content and the potential for understanding it unleashes, requires us to be able to gain access to software and not be hindered by huge costs, complexity, lack of support and additional barriers. 
Given the differences between the traditional approach to accessibility and the wider view outlined above, we are in something of a transitional phase at this time. From the software producer24, business community and the Open Source System community25 we see a move towards the inclusion of accessibility features into systems, tools and the programming languages themselves as system wide core functionalities (examples being KDE, GNOME, and Java Accessibility). From the accessibility community we see a move towards more advanced and abstract descriptions of the procedures involved in moving from 'common' content towards content that is processed to be granted accessible certification. A good example of such a move is the Web Content Authoring Guidelines 1.0 and 2.0, which provide detailed guidelines on how to (re)structure and enhance content to ensure a sufficient level of accessibility. 
This transitional stage involves relatively slow change when compared with general exhilarating technological developments. However, this relatively slow pace also creates an opportunity to take a step back and observe all the individual processes that touch upon the notion of accessibility. This allows us to explicate similarities and possible complementarities, a process of convergent gradualism. The opportunity then arises to synchronise various efforts in the accessibility arena and offer them to end-users and business as a Òpackage". Such a package contains scientific knowledge about accessibility, as well as technological knowledge about how to implement such notions. This package also contains detailed descriptions of the requirements of the end-users, producers and distributors of content, as well as tools aiming towards market segments that rely on these requirements. Such an approach that aims to unify 'common' content, system, service and tool provision and the more 'specialised' content, system, service and tool provision, can be called Adaptive Content Processing (ACP) and this lies at the core of the EUAIN Network activities. 
So, and as noted in the introduction, the easiest way to approach complex accessibility problems may be to consider the requirements for accessible solutions as being the same as the requirements for extreme communication solutions. By considering user-centred interaction paradigms and describing these in a set of design patterns, it is possible to extrapolate notions of accessibility to the level of data structures. 
3. Making it personal 
The third practical advantage in this approach is that of !personalised non-destructive filtering"26, enabling multiple viewpoint content selection and presentation introducing a layer of processing that could align these individual interpretations of content, each of which are meaningful to the individual observers. 
Presentation of content signifies the stages where content or an object enters or leaves a cognitive model. These are the stages that allow personalisation to occur. A different set of presentation rules can be chosen to match the needs or preferences of the particular observer (in either consumer, producer or any role). The representation of content typically lies at more fundamental stage. Of course one could argue that the descriptions of the presentation rules mentioned before are representations of their own and this, of course, is correct. The difference is that these representations that are active when entering or leaving a system are personalised models. They filter and restructure content in such a way that the perceived content is more accessible to that particular observer. This inevitably means that after this personalised filtering process, other observers with different sets of requirements are prevented to consume the content in the way that is most appropriate to them. The personalisation filtering is destructive and intuitive handling of metaphors for one group thinking in terms of physical objects for instance-that to them is vital for building an understanding of what the information means is impossible, whereas the second group Ð thinking in terms of non-physical objects- may thrive. Communication between both groups is seriously hampered since after the destructive filtering the system can only represent one language. 
Allowing systems to exhibit non-destructive filtering as a supporting system for communication would introduce a layer of processing that could align these individual interpretations of content, each of which are meaningful to the individual observers. Personalisation rules on various abstraction and complexity levels, such as information complexity, colourfulness, media type, contrast and language that are meaningful to a specific user group, can then be grouped into processing packages. These processing packages can then be associated with research, development and support activities that focus on this particular group of users and their information processes. Furthermore the opportunity exists to take full advantage of imminent international standards that support delivery of learning matched to individual needs and preferences in context such as the internationalisation of the IMS AccessForAll approach in ISO Ð the Individualised Adaptability and Accessibility in e-Learning, Education and Training Standard. Context here means many things, including language, culture, delivery environment, place, and individual access requirements. 
An integrative framework developed by the EUAIN Network (see below) introduces the bundling of content to semantics to ensure accessibility in a technology and domain independent manner. It aims to develop a controlled vocabulary of terms that could offer the required value to the content to make it Òself-descriptiveÓ so that it can be adapted to any user's context of use. Context of use is a key here and it embraces a wide variety of different usage scenarios, whether it is a disabled user (e.g. a poor-sighted person) or a disabling situation (e.g. access from a poor lighted environment). Different people have different capabilities, needs and / or preferences regarding modalities, and that requirement is more intense for people with disabilities. In order to tackle this complex problem the content provider system needs to provide adaptable ways for interacting with the user and presenting content. In the past this has been studied in the area of adaptive hypermedia27 28, using several methods and techniques including user modelling. 
However the afore-mentioned attempts have some common weaknesses, the most obvious of which is that they are characterised by a lack of a holistic approach to the complex problem of designing accessibility of interaction and content and they fail to look at the process of authoring, managing and delivering the content as highly interweaved. Also, the majority of these approaches either look at accessibility, personalisation or context of use problems; they do not deal with the more complex issue of user interaction and content presentation as a whole. 
Concentrating on the accessible interaction and presentation component of the framework, it is required that we take into account issues such user profiles, accessibility and usability guidelines and technology specifications. The knowledge accumulated by such modules would constitute the input of an interaction and content adaptation system, which will be able to adapt the semantically enriched content to a specific user interface that would fit to the user's needs and context of use. 
Within the eLearning Standards community a number of technical developments facilitating adaptation of content and interface to meet contextual requirements are appearing. These are appearing in different technological contexts and there is a great need for demonstrations of the effectiveness of the technologies in an integrated fashion with large communities. At the centre of eLearning personalisation approaches is the IMS AccLIP and its internationalisation as an ISO standard29. This standard defines within a framework Metadata for the description of functional requirements of an individual for accessibility (of content, interface and delivery). Individuals can have profiles that give their requirements. Corresponding Metadata can be associated with content so that it can be matched to a learner's profile. Under development Is Metadata for tagging tools to describe their accessibility/usability aspects. This imminent standard is described in more detail below. 
Our aim is to trial the technical effectiveness of learning profiles such as this with individuals and groups in large-scale communities within the learning (and wider) domains and to give the standards some exercise in an integrated knowledge delivery service-oriented framework. We will see how the approaches measure up to the task and feed back appropriately to the communities developing them and at the same time start to establish them on a wide scale European basis.  

Accessibility on Demand 
There are many different motivations for wanting to create accessible content: be they legislative requirements30, good practice31, conformity with national guidelines32, commercial imperatives33 etc. The motivation in itself is a secondary consideration: what is required is a suitably flexible infrastructure to enable on-demand services to thrive. The goal of accessibility on demand is to provide fast and efficient services that allow converting inaccessible content into accessible and adaptable content: both for people having a need for accessible content (e.g. people with disabilities) and those who are under pressure to provide accessible content (e.g. publishers, public administrations). The euain network undertakes research to put this requirement within the system architecture by analysing and implementing prototypes of a highly flexible middleware layer offering component based services predicated on coherent SOA architectures34. If we are to mainstream access to information, we must provide service infrastructures that can offer accessibility on demand. 
On a European level, and indeed often on a national level, much of the existing expertise on creating accessible adaptations of digital content is of a highly distributed nature. Within specialist organisations supporting print impaired people; or within university research laboratories; or indeed within publishing houses, many automated tools have been designed and implemented at least partially to execute the necessary adaptation procedures. However, each automated tool has its own, highly specific, field of application. Furthermore, the knowledge required to build these very specific tools is equally distributed, so that there is currently very little re-use of either tools or knowledge. Indeed, the approach taken by the euain network was acknowledged in the recent World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) report35: "Built in access for visually impaired people right from the start does, nevertheless, seem to be a highly desirable way forward, but stakeholders need to be aware of the problems due to lack of standards, ever-changing technology, use of DRMs and so on, as well as possible solutions, in order to ensure built in accessibility is not just a theoretical solution. In this respect, the work of EUAIN which, as already mentioned, is described in case study 13 of Chapter 5, brings together a range of stakeholders to explore issues such as these. This is perhaps an example of a way forward more generally and work of this nature should perhaps be promoted more widely by governments and international agencies. It seems to be in everyone!s interests that a desire to build in access from the start is both encouraged and facilitated by ensuring that what this requires in practice is widely understood and adopted". 
The euain network brings together the different actors in the content creation and publishing industries around a common set of objectives relating to the provision of adaptive content. The euain network takes the broadest definition of content creators and provides the support, tools and expertise to enable them to provide accessible information within adaptive environments. In short, the euain network Òaims to encourage and support the move from accessibility to wider notions of adaptivity. As such, we aim to provide a coherent basis for the research and development of key strategic areas and to offer services and training for industry stakeholdersÓ. 
The euain network addresses Adaptive Content Processing (ACP)36 and attempts to cover several key areas, such as: modelling accessible content processing; structuring information; creating workflows for content creation/production/consumption; and integrating accessible processing within mainstream environments. Accessible content processing is a wide subject and work undertaken in this area explicitly crosses the divide between academia and industry as the necessary focus on processes requires testing and implementing solutions for real-life workflows. This includes issues relating to: 
* production techniques 
* conversion tools 
* document formats 
* navigational mechanisms 
* protection techniques 
* workflow models 
* collaborative networks 
* distribution mechanisms 

A parallel project, PRO-ACCESS37, is currently tackling several of these issues and it is anticipated that a set of ISO 9001 compliant guidelines will be made available in 2009. The work of the euain network sponsored CEN Workshop on Document Processing for Accessibility (CEN WS/DPA)38 has also provided the first pre-standardisation steps in this direction. An implicit outcome from the euain network has been the transparent integration of consumer and producer models for digital content. This integrated model will enable the inclusion of accessibility from the ground up, a key aspect of e-Accessibility and e-Inclusion. An additional key feature is the conformance of the pre-standardisation process to well-known standardisation processes. 
Over the last five years the euain network has brought together the different stakeholders in accessible content processing and sought to find new ways to mainstream the provision of accessible content. By radically advancing the state of the art today and through deliberate dissemination and exploitation plans, the impact of the euain network should be high in putting Europe forward in the provision of accessible content. We believe that the euain network has created some of the building blocks by establishing a network of stakeholders who have jointly prepared: 
¥ Systematic overviews of relevant issues covering standards, protection, production and distribution of accessible content 
¥ Themed Workshops and seminars 
¥ Training materials and guidelines 
¥ CEN/ISSS Workshop on Document Processing for Accessibility 
¥ Self-supporting foundation (the euain network) 
¥ Roadmap for future work including research, tools and concepts 
¥ Recommendations to the EC on article 6.4.1 of the Copyright Directive 
This has involved looking closely at production processes, supporting technologies, distribution and value-chain issues and new ways of meeting the core needs of print impaired people. It is becoming clear that a far deeper examination of fundamental accessibility is required if we are to mirror mainstream content provision. The euain network continues to act as a focal point to pursue these activities and to ensure that all European countries have access to appropriate training and expertise. 
In parallel, the CEN WS/DPA Workshop brought together some of the key players working in the fields of publishing and accessibility. The topics addressed ranged from generic document and knowledge structures, through all aspects of accessible document processing, to Digital Rights Management and copyright issues. Perhaps the most striking aspect was the level of convergence between the needs of accessibility communities and those of content creators and providers. Indeed, with the introduction of accessibility from scratch, the information needs of all consumers are better served, particularly as content providers seek innovative solutions for re-aggregating their content for new marketplaces. 

Practical recommendations 
TPMs such as Digital Rights Management (DRM) solutions prevent content from being accessed by any person that has not been authorised to do so. This protection can happen at different levels, ranging from opening and reading the document to copying and transforming it. Agencies producing materials in alternative for-mats to serve persons with disabilities need to access content in order to transform it into for-mats that are suitable for those who cannot read it in the way it has been originally produced. Naturally these considerations also apply within mainstream publishing workflows where accessibilty can also be incorporated. 
The European Directive on Copyright (2001/29/EC) expresses the right to access content with-out any technological protection measures when the exemption for persons with disabilities has been adopted by the national legislation but at the time of writing this EC Directive has been implemented in a variety of different ways. WIPO has also recently included similar exemptions as a recommendation to those countries in the process of setting up copyright legislation. A further problem related with copyright and intellectual property rights has to do with transnational interchange of materials. Some copyright legislations allow only for the use and trans-formation of documents within the boundaries of the country it has been originally produced, which automatically eliminates the possibility of making it available to persons with the same needs, sharing sometimes the same language, in a different part of the world. The World Blind Union (WBU), IFLA Libraries for the Blind Section and WIPO have recently completed a survey39 to examine the barriers to international transfer of accessible materials in order to draw conclusions and to make recommendations on any need for changes to national laws or international treaties received the support of many countries. 
A key task was to examine the extent to which the provisions of Article 6.4.1 of Directive 29/2001/EC have been effective. Article 6.4.1 reads: ÒNotwithstanding the legal protection provided for in paragraph 1, in the absence of voluntary measures taken by rightholders, including agreements between rightholders and other parties concerned, Member States shall take appropriate measures to ensure that rightholders make available to the beneficiary of an exception or limitation provided for in national law in accordance with (É) (3)(b) (É) the means of benefiting from that exception or limitation, to the extent necessary to benefit from that exception or limitation and where that beneficiary has legal access to the protected work or subject-matter concerned.Ó 
The aim of that Article is to ensure that the rights granted by copyright exceptions to (inter alia) people with reading related disabilities are not negated by technological protection measures. To this end, the intended goal of the Directive is best described in recital (43): ÒIt is in any case important for the Member States to adopt all necessary measures to facilitate access to works by persons suffering from a disability which constitutes an obstacle to the use of the works themselves, and to pay particular attention to accessible formatsÓ. This is to be completed by the limitation itself (Article 5.2.(b)): Ò...uses, for the benefit of people with a disability, which are directly related to the disability and of a noncommercial nature, to the extent required by the specific disabilityÓ. 
The euain network report concludes that access problems undoubtedly exist, but that it is too early to draw firm conclusions on the effectiveness of Article 6.4.1. No relevant case law has been identified, and indeed the provisions made by most Member States in transposing of the Article are not well known even to those who might benefit from them. Furthermore, the effect of the Article 6.4.1 is likewise untested. Based on the final outcome of the deliverable, the following recommendations are made to the European Commission and to other stakeholders. 
The chief goal is to make the majority of books published accessible/adaptable from the outset so that reading disabled persons have access to virtually all books when they are published. They will no longer need to access them through institutions serving reading disabled persons but will directly acquire them through online retailers or high street booksellers. It is foreseen that libraries will retain an important role in the digital world and that as recommended in the Directive 29/2001/ EC in recital 40: ÒTherefore, specific contracts or licences should be promoted which, without creating imbalances, favour such establishments and the disseminative purposes they serveÓ. 
The recent EC Green Paper on Copyright in the Knowledge Economy40 is also likely to be relevant in this area. How can the EU practically support such a goal? The euain network offered the following suggestions: 
1. Encourage publishers and expert bodies to pursue their fruitful dialogue. 
2. Support the work of the EUAIN Network to be established as an autonomous, not-for-profit foundation that can build upon this solid dialogue. 
3. Involve the software developers in the dialogue encouraging to propose the development of publishing software better adapted to the needs of reading disabled persons and delivering high performance workflows for the publishing industry. 
4. Work on common European standards for conversion software that could then be used by publishers, whether or not in connection with TPMs or rather Digital Rights Management (which will allow an indefinite number of business models inclusive of all users). 
5. Encourage the publishing industry to work closely with expert bodies to ensure that all accessibility guidelines in the design of digital material are followed as a matter of course. 
6. Encourage the Member States to designate one trusted third party, when not yet in existence, to which the publishers could provide their books or, even better, electronic files upon request, to be adapted/made accessible for reading disabled persons. In agreements between parties, we recommend that priority be given to developing technical solutions such as; provision of an encryption key to the trusted third party; developing watermarking and fingerprinting techniques; creating extranets such as web sites accessible only to authorised people, where access could be tailored to individual users' needs. 
7. In addition, these trusted third parties could serve as partners in drawing comprehensive and straightforward voluntary agreements at national level (eventually with some input of the EU) to facilitate the prompt resolution of any TPM-related access difficulties that may from time to time arise. 
8. Develop services such as Publisher LookUp, developed by the Association of American Publishers. This facility designates an individual in each publishing company who can deal with requests for access from people unable to access the standard version of a work. This must be done bearing in mind the size of publishing companies in Europe. 
9. In the absence of accessible/adaptable version and in preventing use of labelling schemes with DRM should labelling scheme indicate clearly the case of TPMs conversion software, for products endowed be developed. Any should be used to how the bona fide beneficiary of an exception can gain ready access to the material in question, whether that is through the publisher or through technological means. 
10. Keep monitoring the issue to eventually review the situation also in view of the development of the digital market place. This will need to be backed up by further research, including not only surveys but also activities such as workshops with all stakeholders. The Commission should consider series of workshops around Europe to increase awareness and understanding and promote best practice. 
11. Develop legislation on taxation issues to provide an incentive to publish an increasing number of books accessible to reading disabled persons (such as the possible technical adaptation of Annex 3 of the 6th VAT Directive. 

Research areas 
Achieving innovative and flexible modelling techniques for learning, exploring, providing, and accessing information requires a high level of structural flexibility. To allow the emergence of understandable and therefore useful structures and structural processing logic, we need to enable the users to associate themselves with these structures. To re-use these insights, we need to provide entities that represent the components involved in this association process explicitly and through this representation they can be directly addressed. The modelling layer on top of these entities allows a high level of adaptation, personalisation and specialisation that can be described separately from the lower executive levels of the information representation architecture. The meaning of the information is something that should be detached from the representation architecture. Multiple definitions of meaning should be permitted to co-exist within the same framework. The entity that distinguishes the meanings is the entity that represents a particular user: in other words, the eye of the beholder. 

The euain network examines: 
* new types of content 
* emerging information spaces 
* models for content and knowledge representation 
* tools and instruments for creating and manipulating content 
* relationships between content and context, information contextivity 
* adaptive architectures and adaptive system design 
* perceptual and cognitive issues within adaptive environments 
* frameworks and platforms for advanced information delivery 
* persona modelling and adaptive interfaces 
* proximity and location-based services 
This is done on a local, regional, national and European basis with a view to specific funding opportunities from industry and research programmes. 

Summary 
The euain network will continue to focus on accessibility related issues but with a broader scope to encompass the adaptability of all types of content where enhanced interaction between user and content is required, for whatever reasons. The network brings together technological knowledge in the domain of accessibility in the broadest sense with fundamental scientific knowledge in the domain of accessibility. In this way the network is intended to meet wider imperatives and is therefore industry-facing. 
The primary focus will be on adaptive content processing and the arguments for accessibility from scratch remain relevant. The incorporation of accessibility within private and public sector workflows requires a service based association to provide the necessary strategic research in this field. Adaptive content processing covers all aspects and types of content across networks and platforms, with an emphasis on providing sustainable open architectures for such provision. This can be seen in four phases: access, archive, aggregate and adapt. 
There is an increasing demand for adaptive content in the business world due to improved costumer service, new legislation and a long-overdue recognition of the potential of adaptive environments. 
The euain network welcomes input and collaboration all those interested in participating in these ambitious activities. Further information is available from info@euain.org. 

References: 
1  Platform for Communication, Media, and Information (CMI) within the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW)
2 
3  ICT Standards Board Project on "Design for All and Assistive Technologies in ICT, How ICT standards can enable all people in daily livingÓ, CEN/ISSS Open Meeting on Design for All and Assistive Technology, Draft Report.
4  Stephanidis, C. (2001) User Interfaces for All: New perspectives into Human-Computer Interaction in C. Stephanidis (Ed), User Interfaces for All Ð Concepts, Methods, and Tools (pp 3-17). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates
5  European Design for All e-Accessibility Network, see www.edean.org
6  Winograd, T (2001), Interaction Spaces for 21st Century Computing, in John Carroll (ed.), Human-Computer Interaction in the New Millennium, Addison-Wesley, 2001
7  Miesenberger, K.: Best Practice in Design for All, in: Stephanidis (ed.): The Universal Access Handbook, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Inc. (LEA), 2008 (accepted; expected publication September 08)
8  Crombie, D., Dijk, E., Theunisz, M. & Verboom, M., (2002) Spoken Subtitles: making subtitled TV programmes accessible, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Vol 2398. Springer-Verlag, Berlin Heidelberg New York.
9  Horstmann, M. et al. (2004) TeDUB: Automatic Interpretation and Presentation of Technical Diagrams for Blind People, in Proceedings Conference and Workshop on Assistive Technologies for Vision and Hearing Impairment, University of Glasgow. 
10  Crombie, D., Leeman, A., Oosting, M. & Verboom, M. (2002) Opening Doors: Building an accessible online information node, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Vol 2398. Springer-Verlag, Berlin Heidelberg New York.
11  Crombie, D., Lenoir, R., and McKenzie, N., (2005) Building accessible content processing frameworks, 1st International Conference on IT Design for All (in conjunction with DEXA 2005, Copenhagen
12  Crombie, D., Lenoir, R., and McKenzie, N., (2005) Technology for accessible symbolic music representation, MPEG2005/ M11542, ISO/IEC JTC1/SC29/WG11
13  Crombie, D., Lenoir, R., and McKenzie, N., (2006) Identifying Trends in Accessible Content Processing, ELPUB2006. Digital Spectrum: Integrating Technology and Culture -Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Electronic Publishing held in Bansko, Bulgaria 14-16 June 2006 / Edited by: Bob Martens, Milena Dobreva. ISBN 978-954-16-0040-5, 2006, pp. 113-122 
14  George Ioannidis, David Crombie, Francisco Mart’nez Calvo, and Konstantina N. Geramani (2006) Document Processing for Accessibility: Standards and Initiatives, Volume 4061/2006, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Springer Berlin / Heidelberg
15  Crombie, D., (2006) People with Disabilities: Accessible Content Processing: Introduction to the Special Thematic Session, ICCHP 2006, Volume 4061/2006, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Springer Berlin / Heidelberg
16 Crombie, D., Lenoir, R., and McKenzie, N., (2005) (2005) Accessible Music Technology for People with a Print Impairment, Journal of New Music Research, Vol.34, No.2, Routledge
17  Crombie, D; Ioannidis,G; McKenzie, N (2007) Multimedia Modular Training Packages by EUAIN, ELPUB2007. Openness in Digital Publishing: Awareness, Discovery and Access Proceedings of the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing held in Vienna, Austria 13-15 June 2007
18  Darzentas, J., Miesenberger, K.: Design for All in Information Technology: a Universal Concern (Keynote), in: Andersen, K., V., Debenham, J., Wagner, R. (eds.): Database and Expert Systems Applications, 16th Internaitonal Conference, DEXA 2005, Copenhagen, Denmark, August 2005, Proceedings, Springer LCNS 3588, Berlin/Heidelberg 2005, pp. 406 Ð 420 
19  Alexandros Paramythis (2006) Can Adaptive Systems Participate in Their Design? Meta-adaptivity and the Evolution of Adaptive Behavior. in Vincent P. Wade, Helen Ashman, Barry Smyth (Eds.): Adaptive Hypermedia and Adaptive Web-Based Systems, 4th International Conference, AH 2006, Dublin, Ireland, June 21-23, 2006, Proceedings. pp 308-312, Lecture Notes in Computer Science 4018 Springer 2006, ISBN 3-540-34696-1 
20  Assis, P., Schwabe, D. & Barbosa, S. (2004). Meta-models for Adaptive Hypermedia Applications and Meta-adaptation. In L. Cantoni & C. McLoughlin (Eds.), Proceedings of World Conference on Educational Multimedia, Hypermedia and Telecommunications 2004 (pp. 1720-1727). Chesapeake, VA: AACE.
21  Crombie, D., Lenoir, R., McKenzie, N., and Miesenberger, K., (2004) Interfacing the interface: unification through separation, Proceedings European Research Council for Informatics and Mathematics: 8th User Interfaces for All Workshop, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Vol 3196. Springer-Verlag, Berlin Heidelberg New York 
22 Also known as Topic Maps, first fully described in ISO/IEC 13250:2000: various entities in any system that Ð from any user"s perspective - mean something. 
23  Crombie, D., Lenoir, R., and McKenzie, N., (2004) Accessibility from scratch : how an open focus contributes to inclusive design, Proceedings ICCHP, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Vol 3118. Springer-Verlag, Berlin Heidelberg New York 
24  See for example http://www.daisy.org/projects/save-as-daisymicrosoft/ 
or ADOBE op. cit.
25  See for example http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/tc_home.php?wg_abbrev=office-accessibility 
26  Crombie, D,, Lenoir, R,, McKenzie, N,, (2003) The Eye of the Beholder in Proceedings Electronic Arts & Visual Imaging (EVA2003), Institute of Archaeology, London, UK 
27  Peter Brusilovsky , Mark T. Maybury, From adaptive hypermedia to the adaptive web, Communications of the ACM, v.45 n.5, May 2002
28 Peter Brusilovsky, Adaptive Hypermedia, User Modeling and User-Adapted Interaction, Volume 11, Issue 1 - 2, Mar 2001, Page 87
29 ISO IEC JTC1 SC36 24751-1 Individualised Adaptability and Accessibility for Learning, Education and Training
30 European Union, Council of the European Union: Accessibility of Public Websites --Accessibility for People with Disabilities: Council Resolution, 2002 
31  Miesenberger, K.: Best Practice in Design for All, in: Stephanidis (ed.): The Universal Access Handbook, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Inc. (LEA), 2008 (accepted; expected publication September 08)
32  e.g. Behindertengleichstellungsgesetz: Regierungsvorlage (government bill): http://www.parlament.gv.at/portal/page? _pageid=908,848700&_dad=portal&_schema=PORTAL, 2007
33 Darzentas, J., Miesenberger, K.: Design for All in Information Technology: a Universal Concern (Keynote), in: Andersen, K., V., Debenham, J., Wagner, R. (eds.): Database and Expert Systems Applications, 16th Internaitonal Conference, DEXA 2005, Copenhagen, Denmark, August 2005, Proceedings, Springer LCNS 3588, Berlin/Heidelberg 2005, pp. 406 Ð 420
34  MacKenzie, C.M., et al. (2006) Reference Model for Service Oriented Architecture. [cited 2008 01-16]; Retrieved from: http:// www.oasis-open.org/committees/download.php/16587/wd-soarm-cd1ED.pdf 
35  Sullivan, J (2007) Study on Copyright Limitations and Exceptions for the Visually Impaired, WIPO SCCR/15/7
36  A conference series was established in 2007, see www.euain.org/acp08 
37  Loi, M., LiCalzi, C., van der Togt, T., and Crombie, D., (2008) The ProAccess project: Improving Accessibility of Educational Content, Panel Session, AXMEDIS 2008 Conference (forthcoming)v
38  CEN Workshop Agreement (2008) Document Processing for Accessibility, CWA 15778 
39  Sullivan, J (2007) op. cit. 
40  http://ec.europa.eu/internal_market/copyright/copyright-infso/ copyright-infso_en.htm#greenpaper