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 Interview with Mr Tingely - 31.03.00:
Tutor: Mr Tingley, how did you first hear about WAACIS?
Mr. Tingley: Through my son, who works for the Press Association? He writes the information to go onto their web site.
Tutor: As a disabled person, what are you looking for, from your computer and the internet? What do you want it to do for you?
Mr. Tingley: Mostly for pleasure and to fill my day.
Tutor: What do you most enjoy doing with your computer?
Mr. Tingley: At the moment, we like the chat, and also the newsgroups, and we also get a lot of information about Muscular Dystrophy - a lot of it may not be that useful, because I had one woman tell me about her cat in America, who'd been ill, and it had had a blood test and she would let me know the results of the blood test ... It's all good, it's all good.
Tutor: So the computer and the entertainment it offers now form quite a big part of your life?
Mr. Tingley: I'd say fifty percent..it's taken over from my other hobby, watercolour painting, and pushed it to one side.
Tutor: You've now successfully completed the WAACIS course, and you're the very first person to do so. What have been the main benefits to you from completing the course? How has it improved things for you?
Mr. Tingley: It's to be able to come in here - I'm not over-keen on sitting reading books, but I'll sit and read about Beethoven's life story on the computer, because I'm involved, I've got the involvement in bringing up that information, whereas with a book all you do is turn the page, so I do get a lot of pleasure out of it. Even if I do go wrong, okay, no big deal, try again.
Tutor: But having actually completed the course, what difference has that made to your use of the computer? How has it changed things for you? What can you do now that you couldn't do before you took the course?
Mr. Tingley: Oh, I couldn't go on the chat lines, I couldn't use newsgroups, I couldn't use the search engines very well. Also the addresses ... like I was trying - this is before you came on the scene - I was trying to get information from, say, British Airways and the result I was getting was everything about British, and everything about airways, until you explained to me that you put everything within the brackets ... you enclose it, and then you only get British Airways ... things like that, which to me is a tremendous help, it saves me an enormous amount of time.
Tutor: So it's saved you time and enabled you to use your computer more effectively?
Mr. Tingley: Without a doubt.
Tutor: Did you find that the course was well structured? Did it proceed at a pace that was appropriate to you?
Mr. Tingley: Definitely, oh yes.
Tutor: If you were advising WAACIS, what would you like to tell them about their courses. Are there any ways in which you think it could be improved, is there anything else that you think WAACIS should teach people to do that it has not yet done? What would be your recommendations?
Mr. Tingley: The only thing I can immediately call to mind is creating your own web site, but then I don't really want my own web site, and I don't think many disabled people would, but I think younger people might ...
Tutor: You've explained how you came to hear about WAACIS, because obviously your son was in a position where the information came through his hands, but what do you think WAACIS could do to publicise itself better amongst disabled people?
Mr. Tingley: Mainly to get onto the disabled organisations, there's one service called DISS (Disability Information Service Surrey, Tel: 0372 746243) - any disabled person who wants any information, be it for travelling on the train or going to a theatre, to see if it's accessible, or where they can get certain kinds of education, that would be accessible. If they (WAACIS) got in touch with them, and got them to put it on their list of services available. I've used it three or four times for different things.
Tutor: Is there anything else you'd like to say about the WAACIS course?
Mr. Tingley: Just that I would never have got anywhere without it. As I've said to you, I've tried so many places. In fact, I did find one that was going to be in Epsom, that they said would be accessible to people in wheelchairs. They took my phone number, and they phoned me after about six or seven weeks to say sorry, but the course has been cancelled, we have not got enough takers. So I was then left with Sutton Library, but their course is on the fifth floor, and they've only got a little service lift, so without WAACIS I don't think I would have achieved anything. I talk to people who are on the internet, but that's no good, it's got to be a hands on thing, hasn't it, which this is, it's absolutely hands on, with your own machine. Also, when you ask anyone how you do this, how you do that, they rattle it off so fast because they know it and they think everyone else knows it.
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