Exceptional experiences for everyone

Often accessibility is an afterthought or sticking plaster to fix the holes in an experience that was designed with a central audience in mind: maybe middle-aged, fully able, well educated. Ideally, we would have user experiences designed specifically for different kinds of modalities and in different styles, not just because of the wide diversity of users, but also because any one user has varying needs and varying abilities at different times. In the context of a large museum or cultural institution this is already challenging, but appears impossible for smaller archives, or local community heritage. Yet if heritage and history is to be accessible this also applies to production: democratising digitisation and empowering marginalised groups. We need appropriate architectures, tools, technology, infrastructure and platforms, so that this is not just possible, but simple. In this talk I offer some insights, some examples and many research challenges towards the goal of enabling exceptional experiences for everyone.