In October, 2005, a world congress was convened at the National Federation of the Blind Jernigan Institute in Baltimore, Maryland, USA. The purpose of the congress was to discuss sophisticated wayfinding technologies, those in existence, inventions emerging from the lab, and speculative developments. At the conclusion of the congress, delegates created the Virtual Wayfinding Coalition, wrote a mission statement for the coalition, and mandated five task forces to advance developments in promising technologies.
The VWC will primarily exist in cyberspace and will use the full power of the web for communication, database development, and content management.
The Congress established five virtual task force teams with a chairperson to lead each. The chairpersons responsibility at the beginning is to assemble a virtual team of experts and do the following:
1. VWC Leadership will be dynamic, depending on the problems being addressed (virtual teams will come and go as issues come and go)
The Virtual Wayfinding Coalition is a dynamic process, flowing with the energy, attention, and determination of individuals. It is a cyberspace organization designed to take issue with laws, funding, policy, philosophy, training, and product development.
2. The VWC will identify important target initiatives and will work together until these issues are resolved.
3. Individuals will speak and act for themselves and not for their organizations. Agency support for initiatives will occur only when officially sanctioned.
4. It is understood that when agencies ARE able to lend their good names to initiatives, the power of collective action will increase considerably.
1. Determine how communication will occur among members
Short term goals are also referred to as "challenge projects".
2. Write a brief mission statement (what, who, why)
3. Set long term goals (beyond 10 years) and short term goals (within two years)
4. Keep proposals articulated at the World Congress on the table until decisions can be made about them
5. Report the mission, and the long and short term goals to the coalition
6. Determine how progress will be reported to coalition members
7. Receive and consider (debate, discuss, edit) coalition feedback/help
The first three task force teams are concerned with smart spaces. Here are draft notes from the congress proceedings:
Pedestrian Data Base Task Force
Chair - Francois
Members: Mike, Janet, Jim, John, Richard, Steven, Vladimir, Dave, Francois and others who wish to join
Indoor Navigation Task Force
Chair: Vladimir
Members: Bill, Ed, Jeff, and others who wish to join
Training Task Force
Chair: Laurel
Members: Derrick, Teri, Brunhilde, Kathy, Doug, Dan and others who wish to join
Alternative Perception Task Force
Chair: Dan
Members: Doug, Nick, Suzanne, Laurel, Brunhilde and others who wish to join
Smart Vehicles Task Force
Chair: Doug
Members: Jeff Witt, Walter Adam; Dan, Vladimir, Jim, Bill and others who wish to join
World Congress delegates set up a committee to write the mission statement of the VWC. Members include Betsy, Kathleen, Dan, and Brunhilde. This committee will set a deadline for completion of the document and share final drafts with the membership (for comment).
1. Committed to inter and intra organizational research efforts on Wayfinding
2. Committed to researching the human perceptual system as it relates to Wayfinding
3. Committed to identifying primary Wayfinding research needs
4. Committed to disseminating through a central web-based tool- clearinghouse- information on current Wayfinding research making sure that all the information is accessible
5. Committed to an active communications model; e.g. teleconference, blackboard, etc.
6. Committed to developing research related to Wayfinding that is relevant to the global community.
7. Committed to commercialization and dissemination of technology that currently works and that fulfills identified needs of consumers.
8. Committed to encouraging the development of effective manuals and curriculum related to the Wayfinding devices
9. Committed to identifying and facilitating networking of those committed and dedicated to Wayfinding technology, low and high.
10. Committed to putting all relevant information, texts, etc., on the web.
11. Committed to producing World Congress Wayfinding materials and making them copyright free, accessible, and available electronically on global databases
12. Committed to locating interdisciplinary content, writing a synopsis of the information, providing links to accessible global materials, and posting it on the World Congress Wayfinding website.
13. Committed to developing Wayfinding technology that is relevant for all individuals who are blind including those who have additional disabilities.
14. Committed to studying and improving the infrastructure related to assessment, intervention and evaluation of students/clients who are blind regarding Wayfinding technology.
15. Committed to increasing awareness of need, research, and developments of Wayfinding Technology to consumers
16. Committed to reaching out to other researchers, engineers, assistive technology developers, and other expert communities as wayfinding technology is developed.
17. Committed to include the needs of the blind at early stages of technology development, rather than engage in post development retrofitting.
1. Clarify and define the demographics of the field. Identify tasks that are unique to each demographic profile.
2. Make better use of available wayfinding technology. Improve training for technologies that are known to be affective now.
3. Access to technology by mobility specialists is mostly from vendors. Also, not a lot is known in the field about alternative perceptual modes
4. We have a huge infrastructure problem. O&M is not part of allied health fields as are OT and PT
5. Wherever possible use off the shelf technologies
6. Do task analysis and identification of performance gaps; consider human factors psychology and ergonomics.
7. List on websites links to resources for statistical data