FodnessMemo36

Dear Mr. F. Fox:

My name is Kevin Fodness, and I am a PhD student working on my dissertation. My dissertation is on the ways in which individuals with disabilities use cyberspace. I am examining ways in which cyberspace is both conducive and restrictive to users with disabilities. I would like to schedule an interview with you to discuss your work on the Firefox project, how it integrates with accessibility features, and standards compliance in (X)HTML code.

The interview would be used toward my dissertation, which will be published as a book shortly thereafter. As someone who works on building one of the leading browsers in the market, your input will be incredibly valuable to determine the social processes leading to Firefox as currently constructed, and the technical abilities and limitations of accessibility features moving forward. I would be especially interested to hear about what the Firefox team has in store for accessibility features in the future.

As part of this project, I am trying to get a sense of the motivations of browser makers, website programmers, legislators, corporate managers, and individuals with disabilities with respect to how cyberspace is structured and used. I would like to use direct quotes where possible to illustrate the variety of opinion and motivation that exists in these groups. An interview with you would represent a very important perspective that is needed for my work.

I would love to speak with you about my dissertation topic, both in an interview and more informally. I would be very interested to hear your perspective on what is being done in the browser industry to accomodate individuals with disabilities, what could or should be done, and what elements are done particularly well or poorly. Having the perspective of a browser manufacturer would be invaluable to my research. I will be able to meet you at a place and time of your choosing, provided I have a few weeks' lead time to arrange transportation. The interview would not take more than a few hours, and would be tape recorded and transcribed. You would have an opportunity to review the interview to ensure that I have transcribed it accurately, and to add any followup comments you would like to include. You would, of course, be entitled to a copy of my dissertation once it is complete.

I look forward to hearing from you. I sincerely hope that you will give this interview consideration, as it would be a very important component of my dissertation. I would be happy to answer any questions you have, and to give you more information about myself or the project.

Sincerely,

Kevin R. Fodness