No Barriers to Fun!

We met our friend Giddeon at the AbleGamers Accessibility Arcade in Atlantic City, New Jersey. When he first sat down with the AbleGamers crew, Giddeon didn't want to play any games. He told us that with his disability gaming was difficult. Giddeon has a rare disease that caused the growth of his arms .. Read More
A Window to the World

Shepherd University invited the AbleGamers Foundation to come on campus and do one of our Accessibility Arcades for the students and local disabled community. The event was a roaring success with hundreds of children and adults coming out to see the technology and in some cases experience gaming the first time. Read More

About the AbleGamers Foundation

Since 2004, the AbleGamers Foundation, a 501(c)(3) public charity, has served more than 56 million members of the disabled community by advocating greater access in video games. Today, AbleGamers is a leader in the development of equipment, programs and services to those living with disabilities, hardships, and quality-of-life issues that are a result of chronic illness or trauma. It is our goal to ensure that all people, regardless of their disability, can use gaming as a tool to have enriched social experiences with friends, family, and the world at large.

A Change in Strategy by the RIAA, Let Your ISP go after You

Written by Mark C. Barlet

Published on 21 December 2008

Are you stealing music? You know who you are. Well all over the United States the Recording Industry Association of America has been suing college students, single moms, and unaware grandma's because the computer equipment in their custody has been used to possibly download a copy of Hannah Montana's latest hit, "If I were a Movie", or other less awesome recording artists. Well those days of "no violation is to small" mentality looks to be largely over. What is the RIAA's new move? Try to force you ISP to do their dirty work for them by "reduce the service" given to your music stealing butt. The reason for the strategy change is simple; the RIAA has had a public relationship nightmare on its hands from the start. Nothing says "buy our music" like trying to force 90 year old widows onto the street to pay a judgment from the RIAA because of something a grandchild did last Christmas. This new plan is not without its critics.

From cnet.com

"This is very troubling," said Cindy Cohn, legal director for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a group that advocates for Internet rights. "Creating lists of people who can't get Internet access based on allegations of breaking a law that hasn't been evaluated in a court of law. It's good that that the (RIAA) wants to stop suing individuals but they should haven't done it in the first place. I'd be especially concerned if the music labels can get you kicked off one ISP and then arrange to get you kicked off others, or the creation of blacklists. That's certainly what our fears have been about private legal enforcement regimen."

The other real issue with this is; why would the ISP really care? They are selling you bandwidth, and for the most part as long as you are not thrashing the system, they do not care. Further, there is no financial reason to comply with the RIAA, because the ISP wants my $49 a month more than they want the RIAA to stop you from downloading music.

Now a word of caution, this is not saying that the RIAA is stopping all lawsuits, it still plans on going after the mega-offenders, the ones that have downloaded the whole Hannah Montana collection! You have been warned!