Telecommunications Titans and Those COAT People

I nearly fell over with surprise at an event this past Tuesday when Rep. Ed Markey of Massachusetts included me in a list of five people that he named and said we were "telecommunications titans." Interestingly, a co-worker snapped a shot of the live captioning behind him as he said it. So here it is, immortalized on the screen behind his head, at the celebratory event in the very grand Caucus Room of the U.S. House Cannon building. The five of us have been called several things along the way as we have lobbied for disability accessible technology policy over the last five years, but this one is the most interesting moniker! I consider it a great honor to have been called out like this in a public venue where there were almost 200 people, including a senator, the chairman of the FCC, several administration appointees and no end of other highly influential Washington DC people! At another event we were referred to as "the COAT People" as our coalition's acronym is COAT. That one made us all laugh, particularly as it was said in a very matter-of-fact tone by a private sector attorney -- that we all loved to work with -- at another public event. Our legislation was signed by the President in October. Learn more about COAT here.

Related articles

• Rep. Ed Markey: Building Online Ramps to Equal Access (huffingtonpost.com)
• Bill to make Web, mobile more accessible to disabled clears Congress (zdnet.com)

Inside the Eisenhower Executive Office Building

There's something about being inside the Eisenhower Executive Office Building that makes me think that I've stepped into the story of American history being made. After all, such meetings are not every day occurrences and I don't get invited that often. But it's the high ceilings, painted walls and columns, mouldings and lighting fixtures that are so elegant and ornate and old and I always get the sense that I'm walking where other really important people have  walked before. I like the highly polished waxed marble floor of diagonal black and white squares that you think are going to be slippery but they're not. Shoes always clickety-clack when you walk to the room where you are to meet the President's staff and there's been more than one occasion when I've got lost on the wrong floor or down the wrong corridor before finding out from a passing friendly staffer where I am supposed to be. I've probably been in this building a couple of dozen times over the past 20 years, but each time I am impressed with its grandeur. I don't always remember what the meetings are about or what happened, but I do remember the place. Is that mysterious or what?