It is difficult for me to assess the value of this online software as I can see.

WebAnywhere is a web-based screen reader for the web. It requires no special software to be installed on the client machine and, therefore, enables blind people to access the web from any computer they happen to have access to that has a sound card.

The huge plus is WebAnywhere...

  • will run on any machine,
  • will run on heavily locked-down public terminals,
  • will run regardless of what operating system the machine is running
  • will run regardless of what browsers are installed.
  • does not seek to replace existing screen readers

It also has some big limitations, namely that it will not provide access to desktop applications like word processors or spreadsheets.

Visit http://webanywhere.cs.washington.edu/ to find out more or go to http://wa.cs.washington.edu/ to try it out.

The following video, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wfjD06aOxts, will provide an overview of WebAnywhere in use.