Australian Story on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation has well and truly established itself as the voice of everyday Australians leading extraordinary lives.
One such Australian who was featured on the award-winning television series earlier this year was Mr James Teh (NCOB 1997-01). The interview was titled “The Blind Leading the Blind” and told the story of Jamie and his longtime friend, Mick Curran, and the screen reader they created together to ensure free accessibility to the online world for vision-impaired people. They themselves are vision-impaired and were well aware of the expense of the screen readers available at the time, which put them out of reach for some of the people who needed them most. Their free software, NonVisual Desktop Access (NVDA), has now been translated into 50 languages and is accessible in 175 countries and used by around 250,000 people, a legacy Jamie is rightfully very proud of. 
Jamie recalled it felt “amazing and a sign of how far they have come” to be asked to appear on Australian Story.
Jamie has since left his day job at NV Access, the company he co-founded with Mick in 2006, but has retained his position as a director. He is now the Firefox Accessibility Tech Lead at Mozilla and has been since 2017. This relationship with Mozilla began when it was one of the first companies that helped sponsor and propel NVDA in its infancy. Jamie lamented on the incredible nostalgia the Australian Story interview evoked and how the software they created and tended to for so long has grown beyond what they themselves thought it would. He said it was always meant to be a community project and he was humbled by how many people rallied around the project. NVDA has received coding and translation contributions from more than 200 people all over the world. The outcome of this NVDA technology has directly changed the lives of vision-impaired people by increasing employment opportunities and aiding in access to knowledge and education.
The community aspect of this project is what is perhaps the most compelling. Jamie uses the term “force multiplier” where one user contributes a “fix”, and that helps a number of other users.
Then someone else contributes another fix and that helps another group of users and it multiplies outwards. “I think the fascinating thing about software, and particularly open source software, with a really solid community around it, is that it’s not just one company doing all the work and then they’re the bottleneck, the sky is really the limit,” Jamie said. “If people want to dive in there and do something, they can take the power into their own hands and this project was a vehicle for that.”
Jamie explained that it is a really powerful story, to inspire others to take things into their own hands. If you want to achieve something, you don’t necessarily have to wait until someone else can do it. You can always find some way to empower yourself. “And I think that’s really important because I think as a group that’s a minority, it is really easy to believe that you don’t have any power,” he said.
One of the privileges of working at a school is seeing (to quote Principal Peter Fullagar) “fine young boys grow and develop into outstanding young gentlemen”. Jamie has come a long way since he started his journey at Nudgee College in 1997 when he commenced high school in Year 8. He is the only totally blind student to attend the College and has left a lasting impact such as braille signage doors that exist across the campus, more railings and tactile indicators. Being the first to walk that path must have been a daunting undertaking for any young person. Jamie strikes me as someone who has always had a quiet strong resolve.
He always had a love of music and technology, and that affinity started early. He recalls his fondest memory of Nudgee College was performing in the Music Tours to regional areas and how that made him feel a part of something. He found his community at Nudgee College through music. Music is also how he found his friendship with Mick, as they met at a music camp together. They now live in the same semi-rural leafy town in the City of Moreton Bay, South East Queensland, and have children who attend the same primary school. Jamie creates his own music which can be found on Spotify, Apple Music and YouTube, under the name Electronight Alchemy. Jamie is continuing, to push the boundaries with both technology and music.
In his day job with Mozilla, he is able to influence the accessibility of their services and truly understands the impact of technology in levelling the playing field for people with disabilities. However, the advancement in technology also brings more barriers for minority groups, particularly the rise in the popularity of touchscreen devices. There is oftentimes a lack of thought about the impact of new technologies on people with disabilities. Jamie acknowledges there is more awareness but we still have a long way to go. Perhaps the world needs more people like Jamie and Mick, who are empowering themselves to break down any new barriers as they are presented.
Source: St Joseph’s Nudgee College Magazine I Edition 13
