[oats-sig] Mulberry Symbol Set

Just thought I'd give an overview of the objectives of our symbol set
project. Might help everyone to see where we're coming from. 

Mulberry Symbol set project objectives

Our key customers are Speech and Language Therapists (SaLTs) plus other
carers, teaching staff, etc, who are seeking symbol based solutions for
their client's speech and communication problems. 

Understanding that market: This group's main use of symbols and symbol
software is in .wmf format (such as PCS, Widget/Rebus, Maketon, etc).  But,
a lack of funds within the NHS means that the end-client (perhaps an adult
stroke victim or child with cerebral palsy) often does not have access to
symbols or symbol-software to enable their communication.  A notable
exception to this is for the under-19's still in education, who do attract
some local government funding.  For others it often depends whether family
members are willing to provide funds, or grants from charities, etc.

Consequently, many of the commercially available software products, hardware
solutions and symbol sets are simply not accessible by a large part of the
disabled community. For example, the model for SaLTs in Essex and Suffolk is
typically to photocopy black and white symbols from commercial symbol sets
that they have purchased and create hardcopy printed charts for each clients
- higher forms of AAC are rarely available, except in the schools context.

In this captive market, there is no need for fast response and little
competition by symbol developers.  So SaLTs struggle to find modern symbols
such as iPod, Wii, etc.  When new addendums or additional symbols are
released by commercial suppliers, clients often don't know about them, plus
these are not free - the addendums have to be purchased.  Even worse, where
the symbols are bundled in with the software, you often have to re-purchase
the symbols each time a new software product is purchased that incorporates
symbols, even for the same client PC!     

Licensing: Commercial license agreements quite rightly protect the
investment of symbol designers organisations, providing their revenue
stream.  However, we have found this a limit to innovation.  For example,
our earlier intent to design a symbol-based internet chat program foundered
because existing commercial symbol set suppliers were not willing to allow
their symbols to be transmitted across the internet, for obvious commercial
reasons.  The only solution that was acceptable was a program that required
each client to purchase their own local copy of a symbol set.      

Our response: 

-        To create a free symbol set designed for use by anyone with speech
problems who requires symbols to support their communication needs.  

-        A license as close to "public domain" as possible will be selected
(Creative Commons SA-BY), but which protects the significant effort and
funding that is being invested from undesired exploitation.  Our preference
is to deliver the symbols free of cost at the point of delivery, but
commercial gain is permitted, as is the modification and free
re-distribution of our symbols.  The license ensures our aims continue in
perpetuity, including all derivative works.

-          We are not in the business of competing with existing symbol
sets, but we do wish to provide a symbol set that 

o        is at least of equivalent, if not higher quality than those that
already exist,

o        contains modern symbols and is constantly growing in content, but
at zero cost to the client.

o        is designed to appeal to adults (who often find existing symbols
somewhat "juvenile" in design)

o        is a compatible format (eg, .wmf), to allow ours to be incorporated
into the existing software and hardware products to complement existing
symbol sets

o        is available in additional formats such as .svg as a resource to
support new  initiatives in symbol-based developments, at zero cost to
developers.               

These were the drivers that inspired us to fire up the project a couple of
years ago. I'd certainly be interested to hear from anyone who feels the
above scenario has improved (or worsened), as these issues are the lie
behind the project justification.  

Many thanks

Garry Paxton

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