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Universal multimedia information access

  • Special issue on multimodality: a step towards universal access
  • Published:
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Abstract

Efficient, effective and intuitive access to multimedia information is essential for business, education, government and leisure. Unfortunately, interface design typically does not account for users with disabilities, estimated at 40 million in America alone. Given broad societal needs, our community has a social responsibility to provide universal designs that ensure efficient and effective access for all to heterogeneous and increasingly growing repositories of global information. This article describes information access functions, discusses associated grand challenges, and outlines potential benefits of technologies that promise to increase overall accessibility and success of interaction with multimedia. The article concludes by projecting the future of multimodal technology via a roadmap of multimodal resources, methods, and systems from 2003 through 2006.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Information Technology Division, The MITRE Corporation, 202 Burlington Road, 01730, Bedford, MA, USA

    Mark T. Maybury

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  1. Mark T. Maybury
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Correspondence to Mark T. Maybury.

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Maybury, M. Universal multimedia information access. UAIS 2, 96–104 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10209-002-0043-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10209-002-0043-5

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