AccessWorld Podcast, Episode 41: Hanging Out in Silicon Holler

Episode Notes

Aaron and Tony welcome Haley Linville, AFB's new MGR for Outreach and Community Engagement

In this episode, Aaron and Tony welcome AFB's new manager for outreach and community engagement, Haley Linville.

This fall, AFB marks 25 years in West Virginia, which served for many years as the home for AFB Tech and continues to be the home of AccessWorld Magazine. They reflect on how Huntington continues to punch above its weight for a small city along the Ohio River, and discuss the rise of tech in the region anchored out of Marshall University. Tony learns the expression "Silicon Holler," which AFB is proud to have supported over the past 25 years.

They share details on the upcoming season for both internship opportunities through the Digital Accessibility Bootcamp and the AFB Scholars Program. Applications for the bootcamp opened up on Oct. 5th, and you can visit www.afb.org/internships to learn more on how to apply.

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AccessWorld Podcast, Episode 41 Transcript:

Intro: AFB. You're listening to AccessWorld, a podcast on digital inclusion and accessibility. AccessWorld is a production of AFB Studios at the American Foundation for the Blind. To learn more about AccessWorld, visit us online at afb.org/aw.

Aaron Preece: Hello, everyone. Welcome to another episode of the AccessWorld podcast. I'm here with my co-host, Tony Stevens, as well as a special guest today, Haley Linville, who is the new manager of outreach and community engagement here in West Virginia. Hey, Haley and Tony, how are you all doing?

Tony Stephens: Good, Aaron. Yay!

Haley Linville: Thanks for having me.

Tony Stephens: Yeah, we're excited. New— the new kid on the block.

Haley Linville: Yeah, I guess so.

Aaron Preece: Kind of. Yeah.

Tony Stephens: Yeah. No. Yeah, Haley just joined our team, and, uh, but she's been around AFB for a while. Uh, folks from West Virginia— we're gonna be talking a lot about West Virginia today, but folks from West Virginia probably know Haley already.

Aaron Preece: Yeah, I was thinking, um, with Haley coming into the new role and then all the stuff we do in West Virginia lately, especially— we've, we've done a lot even over the last week. Um, I thought it'd be good to kind of let people know what's, what's going on here.

Tony Stephens: Yeah, you guys even went on a road trip last week.

Haley Linville: Yep.

Tony Stephens: Across the, across the, the state of, uh, of, um, the— did you go by the Shenandoah Valley at all? I've been singing the song ever since we talked about this podcast. Almost heaven, West Virginia, Blue Ridge Mountains. Shenandoah Valley.

Haley Linville: We were all through the mountains. Yeah, we were all over the mountains. We were all over West by God last week. We started at a career fair at Marshall and then the next day headed up to Morgantown to WVU. And we left real early. We had to leave at 5:30 in the morning to get there on time. So there was, you know, some beautiful fog over the mountains and we, you know, saw sunrise on our way coming in. So it was nice.

Tony Stephens: Definitely early. But, but yeah, it's, it's— you guys have been making the road trip. We'll have to get t-shirts made. But welcome aboard to the communications team, Haley. Share with folks a little bit about, you know, what you've been doing at AFB, but now what you're going to be doing, like what your new role sort of is. And, uh, but a little bit about like where from, from where, from west you hail, Haley.

Haley Linville: Yeah. So, uh, I am, um, previously I was the, in the business administration department here at AFB. Our business and finance office is here stationed in Huntington where I live. And, um, and now in my new role as manager of outreach and community engagement, um, I've kind of been doing a little bit of that already. I've been managing some— a grant we have that helps fund a lot of the West Virginia work. And so, you know, I ended up really loving it. And so I'm really happy to be in this new role and to kind of be the connector, you know, here in West Virginia. We've been able to connect AFBs research and our programs here. And so, I'm looking to do that nationally going forward in this new role. So, I'm really excited.

Tony Stephens: It fits like a glove. I mean, you were a Marshall grad. You went to Marshall. You grew up in Huntington, right?

Haley Linville: I grew up just about half an hour down the road in Putnam County. But Huntington is where you go to do everything. There's all the things to do here or in Charleston.

Tony Stephens: So you did— what was it, history and political science? What did you major in in college?

Haley Linville: Yeah. So I graduated from Marshall with a double major in history and political science in 2010. And I've, you know, I was a server at a restaurant here at the Huntington Mall for a long time. And I worked for the West Virginia government, the state auditor's office. And then later, um, in, uh, the Bureau for Child Support office before landing here at AFB. So I feel like, um—

Tony Stephens: It's fitting. Yeah. With the history and political science, I mean, you have a passion for history. What folks don't know— oh my goodness. I don't know if you guys can hear this, but they're now jackhammering on my street. Can you hear that?

Aaron Preece: That noise cancellation is really doing double work today. It's working. We don't hear it.

Tony Stephens: Thank you, Zoom. Yeah, there's literally a jackhammer out in front of my building. Like a vault. Anyways, so yeah, I mean, the idea of, of history and, and that passion, because another thing you've been doing in the business services, in addition to leading the stuff with, you know, the Tuber support that we get and all the West Virginia programs, is also sort of being the administrator for our Helen Keller Archive and played a huge role. What folks don't know about, like, you know, all the materials that went into our Possibilities film, you were working behind the scenes to get all that stuff sourced. And with our archivist Justin, who's at American Printing House. where our physical archives is held. You know, you've played a really key role in just the AFB history by helping with Justin shepherd the legacy of Helen Keller. That's a huge part of AFB's history.

Haley Linville: Yeah, you know, it's one of the proudest things that I've done in my life is the work with the Helen Keller Archive. And I've really got a chance to dive into her life a lot. Just, you know, as I've been working in the archive and in, you know, in the new role when it comes to community engagement, a lot of what Helen did was meet people where they were at, you know, she traveled a lot and I try— I'm trying to take that into this new role. I think we've done that a lot here in West Virginia, of course it's easy when you live here.

Aaron Preece: Mm-hmm.

Haley Linville: But looking to do that elsewhere, kind of meeting people where they're at is, I don't know, it's kind of what I'm trying— it's my mantra as I start the new role.

Tony Stephens: No, for sure. And like, you've been doing such fantastic work in Charleston and Morgantown and Huntington, just throughout the state of West Virginia and working with Justin out of Louisville that we're excited you're— I'm excited you're on the team and really bringing that sense of You know, that, that sense of just relationships, because that's, that's something that you've been really, really doing well, not to inflate your ego at all. But as they're jackhammering, I'm so glad y'all can't hear this. But West Virginia, I get people sometimes asking me, you know, why is AFBN, you know, have our presence in West Virginia? And it's actually interesting to focus in on that, Aaron, when you were talking about, let's share with people on the podcast what's been going on in West Virginia. It is a microcosm in a sense of what's going on in the, throughout the country. I mean, West Virginia's unique. Couple quick facts for listeners. It has the highest prevalence and incidence of, of vision loss in the country. Uh, issues like diabetes, uh, are major concerns throughout West Virginia. Issues that deal with, uh, you know, the rural, uh, sort of nature of the state.

Aaron Preece: Mm-hmm.

Tony Stephens: Um, folks that had a chance to check out our Unseen Horizons documentary that we produced where Aaron was featured in that, You know, Aaron, you shared a lot about, you know, places like Huntington sort of being like beacons and icons. It's places where people can go to because it's such a rural state.

Aaron Preece: Yeah.

Tony Stephens: Why else is West Virginia important, you think? But go ahead.

Aaron Preece: Yeah, well, the main reason— so West Virginia as a whole is incredibly rural, incredibly difficult to traverse a little bit. So like, it's not just rural, it's like You're way off at a hauler somewhere in between mountains. You might not have good internet access. There might not, you know, we have a pretty sparse population, I would say. Huntington's great because it's like you kind of get a microcosm of like a big city in a— it's a smaller city, a pretty small city, you know, second largest in the state or maybe the largest now, I don't know, close to it, but still pretty small. But you get that, all the things you would need from a city. Also, though, in Huntington specifically, we have the Tubert Foundation. There was a postal worker who was amazing at trading stocks and made a fortune and left it all ambiguously to the blind. And there was a lot of litigation about what that exactly meant. Yeah. They set up a trust here. And so there is a lot of services and just things being funded by the Tubert Foundation here in Huntington and the surrounding area that makes this, I would say, even a bit of an anomaly nationwide.

I remember whenever I would work with the Information and Referral Department where we'd answer questions, you know, really worldwide, but really focused on the US as a whole, When people would ask me about like what services are available in my area, and I'd look it up and I'd think, man, there's not really a lot here. And for, you know, 50,000-person Huntington, West Virginia to have way more services than a city with 200,000 people or more was always kind of crazy to me. So we really are a bit of a blindness, like you said, kind of a beacon or an anomaly here with the amount of support and advocacy and that sort of thing you get in the Huntington, Wayne, County, this general area.

Tony Stephens: Having visited there, it definitely punches above its weight, which is one of the things I love about Huntington. It feels— I mean, I've lived in Chicago, I've lived in Detroit and New York City a lot, and now Baltimore and Washington, but it definitely feels much more like a Midwest big city. But like you said, Haley, you're 30 minutes out of town in Putnam and it's can get rural really quick. And—

Aaron Preece: Oh yeah. So we got a, I guess it was like, I don't know the full details, but somehow we got the revenue from a coal mine or the mineral rights or something like that were given to us as a gift from a donor. But we had to have some sort of presence in West Virginia to be given that gift. And so when they were shopping around in the late '90s, early 2000s, it might've even just been in 2000.

Tony Stephens: It was 2001, I remember. When we had a chance to interview our former CEO and he talked about, I think it was right around 9/11 even, that we got word of the opportunity. But go ahead, you're telling the story, I'm breaking in.

Aaron Preece: Yeah, and you might know more about the specifics than I do. I was here, but I was not, you know, I was young. I was like, I was 11 at the time whenever they came to Huntington actually. But they, so they were looking around the state for we need to put an office in West Virginia, and we'll get access to these funds. Where in West Virginia do we want to go? And they discovered the Tubert Foundation. So they were talking to Jamelle Bowen, the director of the Tubert Foundation, and determining whether, like, will we get the— could we get a grant for work here in the Huntington area? And I think there's a pretty intense story about when they, like, got the call that they got the Huntington, funding. But I remember in 2001, I was going— I was like, I said, I was 11 years old, going to a movie here downtown with my family. And when I walked out of the movie, Jamel Bowen pops out of the piano bar next door and goes, oh my gosh, Aaron, you have to come in here and meet these guys. We've got these guys from the American Foundation for the Blind. I knew nothing about AFB at the time. But she took me into the, into the piano, Hank's Piano Bar here in Huntington. And they were in there smoking cigars, Paul, Paul Schrader and and Carl Augusto were here in town kind of checking out Huntington, and she brought me in there to talk to them. And so we ended up, apparently, I don't remember the full details, but I think we were like talking technology. I talked about, you know, the screen reader I was using and chatted with them, but it was kind of funny. But they were here then going, you know, checking out Huntington, connecting with Jamel, and that's why we had an office here. And I know personally, I've said before, either on here or in AccessWorld, some places that like, That's been, that was massive for me personally. Just, I felt so thankful that AFB was here because I got to work as an intern in high school, intern in college, you know, apply for a job out of college. And I've been here literally off and on since 2006, 20 years now.

Tony Stephens: Yeah. And that, I mean, that would have been around 25 years ago when you met. Would you have had any idea?

Aaron Preece: Yeah, exactly 25, nearly.

Tony Stephens: Then that it wasn't like Carl, you know, handed you over a cigar and said, "Here, kid, you're gonna go far." Yeah, that'd be swell. But I do think that's the lesson here.

Haley Linville: I think Aaron is an excellent example, though, of when someone has a whole community supporting them. I know I've heard Aaron talk a lot about. His story, and it really does coincide with our history here and the Tubert Foundation here and just, um, you know, the community as a whole.

Tony Stephens: Well, what's interesting about this history is— and folks are listening to this going, what does this have to do with access technology and digital inclusion and accessibility? AccessWorld, a podcast from the American Foundation for the Blind. Um, it does a lot because—

Aaron Preece: Yeah, it was our hub.

Tony Stephens: That's what moved you to Huntington. AFB Tech, was that, it was, it was called AFB Tech from, from the, when it moved to that.

Aaron Preece: From the start. Yep.

Tony Stephens: Yeah.

Aaron Preece: And then we did all kinds of research. Um, AccessWorld, we did like serious research in AccessWorld on, um, like blood glucose monitors back then. We ended up in the late, uh, late 2000s, early 2010s. We did a project. This is back in the day when you had these like old cell phones that had like no, barely any backlight and like you could hardly see the screen. So we got this very like high-tech equipment where we could really test the quality of screens and like kind of help design guidelines about what's good screen quality for low vision and for accessibility and that sort of thing, determining brightness and reflection and all these like very scientifically. So we did a ton of, this was our tech hub for a long time, probably until like 2017, whenever we went mostly remote.

Tony Stephens: Was Lee Huffman here for a lot of that time? When did Lee come on board?

Aaron Preece: 2005, I think. He was here by 2006 for sure, because I remember meeting him as part of the internship program.

Tony Stephens: Yeah, well, and then we've interviewed Lee here. Folks might go back and listen. I think probably trying to think when the last time we interviewed Lee.

Aaron Preece: April.

Tony Stephens: American Printing House now. Yeah, yeah, at American Printing House now. And, uh, just a fantastic dude down in Charleston. So he would have made that commute then.

Aaron Preece: He actually lived where I'm living right now. Um, he lived in this condo. I actually bought it from him.

Tony Stephens: So he's actually under the bed as we speak. Please be quiet. Stop talking so loud.

Aaron Preece: Yeah, so he did live here across from the Chase office. I mean, within blocks of both of our offices while the— while we had offices. I mean, I'm still blocks from the office actually.

Tony Stephens: Yeah, no, nice. Yeah, city living, man.

Haley Linville: Well, and people might not immediately think like tech when they think West Virginia, but Huntington specifically, you know, the president, Brad Smith of Marshall University, is a tech guy, and they're having, you know, the Institute for Cybersecurity is moving in. And then when Aaron and I were at WVU last week, that, you know, that's considered a tech corridor. So we might not be your first thought, But I've heard a nickname, kind of an informal nickname I've heard people throw around talking about kind of as the tech industry moves into West Virginia, Silicon Holler. So we might not be your first thought with tech, but there's a big presence here actually.

Tony Stephens: Brad Zinke started into it, didn't he? Yeah.

Haley Linville: Yeah, sure did.

Tony Stephens: He was the founder of it. And it's interesting 'cause the people I've met working here in Washington, DC, there's actually a lot of people in Washington, DC that live in West Virginia and take the MARC train in. from West Virginia.

Yeah.

Tony Stephens: From like Harpers Ferry or Morgantown, you know, West Virginia on, on that part of the state where the Potomac runs between Maryland and West Virginia. And it's, it, it's, uh, it's interesting 'cause there's a lot of, a lot of the ironically and probably learned through its own challenges of having to reinvent itself, even though, you know, it's still very much like coal mine state. I mean, there's still the, the trains that come all the way into Washington from West Virginia, but it's not like it used to be. It's not like the 1940s. I mean, when you take the train in through like Hinton and, and, you know, from, from like coming in through Charlottesville and then you come into West Virginia and then come up to Charleston, the, it'll go through these old towns that would've been in the heyday, just these massive operations of industry that are now shuttered.

Aaron Preece: Yeah.

Tony Stephens: But there's a lot of green energy technology That I've met people that, that work out of West Virginia, um, that, that have focused in that sort of like rein— having to reinvent yourself, right? The same way Pittsburgh— I remember when I moved to Pittsburgh in 1999 when I was joining seminary, you know, Pittsburgh was like that classic— and it's, it's not West Virginia, it's Pennsylvania, but it's real close to Wheeling. You can be in West Virginia in an hour or so. But it was one of those towns that, that fueled itself off the, the literally the fuel that was brought up from West Virginia into the steel mills.

Haley Linville: Mm-hmm.

Tony Stephens: And it completely has reinvented itself as a, as a major American city that was that sort of, you know, hard times 1980s when, when steel prices crashed and had to reinvent itself. And I feel like in some sense Huntington is, is sort of This opportunity is there for technology. Like you said, I love that Silicon Holler, Haley, that, you know, it's great to see where places like Morgantown and Huntington are sort of thinking of future opportunities and technology and things that can be done. So what was it you all were doing at West Virginia and Marshall? Let's plug that a little because those applications are opening up any day now that this podcast drops.

Yep.

Tony Stephens: In fact, they probably already are open. I think October 5th, is that when one of them opens up?

Aaron Preece: Yep. That's when boot camp opens.

Tony Stephens: Yeah. So that's already open. Folks, go to our website. But what— well, talk a little bit about the Accessibility Boot Camp, because, Aaron, you help out with that. And I know, Hayley, you'll be helping to promote it. That was one of the things you all were in Morgantown and Marshall at.

Aaron Preece: So our Accessibility Boot Camp is part of our Digital Accessibility Internship, and it is open to college students. If you're a recent grad— if you're graduating in May, you can also apply for the boot camp. Basically, you learn the basics of digital accessibility. There is a stipend involved that you get along with a welcome kit, including an iPad. But basically, what you will learn, the basics of digital accessibility, things like color contrast, how to make things accessible for screen readers across web and apps and the whole kind of digital ecosystem. And as we were getting— so we went to these, uh, Haley, you could, uh, jump into anytime if you want to.

Tony Stephens: Yeah.

Aaron Preece: For the, the, what we were— I was thinking we got all kinds of very code-related questions. So I'm kind of thinking about like, you, it's kind of code agnostic to start with, then you move into the work study and into the potentially into the residency if you're still in school. Um, where you might do more programming, working on, uh, consulting projects that we've like kind of test cases of, of consulting projects we've done before during the work study to kind of give you more of a real, a feel for real-world accessibility QA and consulting. And then you'll get to, if you're part of the residency, you get to straight up work with our consulting team with some of the pretty big, I mean, probably there's NDAs involved, but I could say they're pretty massive companies that we work with on accessibility a lot of. a lot of the time, but we were getting a lot of really detailed technical questions at WVU this week with regards to the internship.

Haley Linville: I was very happy that Erin was with me because the students came prepared. So, you know, I'm there to promote our program and to try to, you know, let our West Virginia kids know about it. And they came with some really great questions that if Erin was there, It's all been over my head as far as the tech side of things. But the boot camp itself is, it's a 3-month program. Like Aaron said, it's the first tier of our digital accessibility internship. And, you know, you get a, you get a kind of an overview like Aaron was saying, but you also get, there's a $3,000 incentive. You know, you get a $1,000 midpoint award. And then $2,000 scholarship award upon completion of the program. It is a fully remote program and a virtual experience from anywhere in the United States. And you also get a toolkit, a personal welcome kit, which includes an iPad for, you know, you use that a lot during the bootcamp itself.

Tony Stephens: And you also get a cool t-shirt.

Haley Linville: And a very cool exclusive t-shirt, which they are very cool.

Tony Stephens: I think it's one of my people designed it.

Haley Linville: Yeah. Yeah. So we were there at Marshall, and then the next day we drove up into WVU. And like I said, those students really came prepared. They had resumes ready. They were there to find an internship, and they were asking some really great questions. And it ended up being a really successful use of our time because We got over 25, I think, resumes altogether, and, you know, we were really able to connect with students. We connected with students that weren't eligible for the program, but they still wanted to know what we did, and they wanted to know more about not just AFB in terms of the digital accessibility, but we got a chance to talk about the Helen Keller Archive and about AccessWorld. So it was really just great community engagement.

Tony Stephens: Yeah. Well, folks can learn more about that if they go to afb.org [afb.org/internships] and just search, or it'll be up in the top banner probably for as applications open on October 5th, and they'll be open for a little over a month, I think 6 weeks or so. And then so if you or you know someone who's a college student that's interested in software development, computer science, even graphic design, Breanna, we mentioned, who was on our team, she was a graphic design major at Temple and got real interested in accessible design, digital design, from around accessibility and came into the program. So folks can check that out and please share. So yeah, back to West Virginia. Thanks for that sidebar, by the way. I mean, that was just, you know, it's exciting that you all were able to be able to do that and get out. And it's just exciting that the students are in engaged and they're not just— I worry sometimes about our future. So I love hearing y'all say, no, they're ready. Yeah, they're ready to rock.

Haley Linville: Oh yeah, kids are all right, Tony.

Aaron Preece: Yeah, it's a— there's a lot of them that are doing real well, it seems like.

Tony Stephens: Nice. Yeah, well, that's bit and parcel for, uh, for West Virginians, I'm sure, because it's a hard— it's a community state. Haley, we've talked about this, about West Virginia just being, you know, I don't know if it's in the old roots of the old hard union the coal miner days or something, but there is a real sense of, of people that take care of people there.

Haley Linville: Oh yeah.

Tony Stephens: And that there's a real community. That's something that I felt every time I come to Huntington and really enjoy. So we need, we need more of that these days. People taking care of people, people looking out after people.

Haley Linville: Yeah, yeah, there's a real community mindset here. And, um, well, I mean, that kind of goes When we started the Marshall Task Force, that started with a conversation with President Smith at Marshall University. And, you know, he said something there, which I'm not sure if he's the first one to say it, but it stuck with me since that meeting with the Tubert Foundation and the grantees, was a coalition of the willing. And I think that that's a real West Virginia You know, trait is, um, you have to come together, um, because that's kind of the only way you can survive in these hills sometimes.

Tony Stephens: Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's a, it's a good, that's a good mindset. I mean, there's very much a, you know, that idea of mountain people, pick yourself up by your bootstraps, but too, you gotta, you gotta rely on people. We saw that during the, the hurricane that hit out into the North Carolina mountains. One of my best friends lives out in the, you know, Appalachian Mountains in western North Carolina. And it really is something about mountain people that, that, that stepped up and came out and they weren't, they weren't afraid to literally pick themselves up by their bootstraps to, to dig out of, of the mud. Uh, but then first thing they did was they went and took care of other people. And it is something about mountain life that, that really does that. It's a good, it's a good sort of, uh, good way to, a good way to sort of take on the world. When you meet challenges. So, so we are, we are celebrating 25 years, I guess, of West Virginia with what was AFB Tech that was formed shortly after 2001 when we began to set up shop there. And Aaron as well, 25 years of him learning about AFB, cigar in hand. No, no, no, no.

Haley Linville: Wrong.

Tony Stephens: I think it's funny you said that because it is funny to think of, you know, 25 years ago, people could still smoke in bars and restaurants and piano bars. So it just kind of caught my sense of humor. But anyways, you know, this is exciting about what we have in opportunities and the partnership, Haley, that you have really helped really kindle early on with Marshall Cultivated. at Marshall has been fantastic. And now, you know, Brad Smith being president there and the focus around technology and our passion for technology as well. So, you know, while we talk about hollers and mountains, AccessWorld definitely has a place in West Virginia, I think, which is nice.

Aaron Preece: Yeah, it's been really cool at Marshall because we've both been hitting the, like, accessibility side. They're very passionate about making sure that the the university's accessible. We've done a lot of work with them on that about digital accessibility. They've got multiple professors that are liaisons for their departments to make things more accessible for students. And then we also worked with the— there's a program called the HELP Program at Marshall that works with students with various disabilities to help them really thrive, I would say. And so we've been working with them and got some a student in, at least one student, right? They went into their, like, summer program where they, people probably are familiar with, like, the various types of, like, college readiness type programs where you go and you live on campus and you take classes and you potentially work and do all these other things. So it's cool to get, like, one, be working on the accessibility with them on, like, the digital accessibility side, but also, like, help them, like, bring more blind students in and work with them in those kind of programs.

Tony Stephens: Yeah, fantastic. Well, uh, Haley, welcome to the team. Yeah, thanks for, you know, giving me another reason to get down to West Virginia. I actually— yeah, of course, I'll probably be down there in November, December, I think. But, um, I'd like to take the train in. We just need the train every day. That's what Huntington needs right now.

Aaron Preece: It's like, yeah, right now it's kind of—

Tony Stephens: I think, yeah, and we need it every day. And maybe they will eventually. So it's, you know, it's a fun way. It's not a horrible train ride from Washington, D.C. Folks on the East Coast ever want to get out there, it's worth it. It's a nice train ride. So for AccessWorld, Aaron, where can people go to check out the print magazine that's released every quarter?

Aaron Preece: afb.org/aw. And right now we are at— we've got the fall issue up and then the winter issue will drop around Thanksgiving time.

Tony Stephens: Awesome. And Hayley, what's on your plate other than drinking from a fire hose as you learn everything? You'll be out at our AFB Leadership Summit where we focus on AI. That's October 26th in Louisville.

Haley Linville: I'm very excited. That is my main focus is connecting with people at the summit. And, and I am trying my hardest to get some people from West Virginia out there. And I think we're gonna have a big presence there as well.

Tony Stephens: Yeah, it's only 3 hours away to Louisville from Huntington, and it's great that you're rallying people there to get out. The focus will be on, you know, wrestling with the pros and the challenges and the opportunities that stand at the horizon with artificial intelligence impacting everything around our world. A reminder that folks can check out the report that AFB just released a few weeks ago on blindness and AI. I think it's, what is it, unlocked, what, oh, Aaron, help me out, the keys? Keys and locks and Yeah, keys and locks and opening doors but closing doors at the same time. It talks about the good and the bad and how, uh, from our AI Quagmire report, they, they sectioned out just all issues encompassing blindness because it was a broader report that looked at non-disabled people and larger disability community. But this report focuses just on blindness. So you can go to afb.org/ai-blindness to check that out. And you can also find out more information about the Leadership Summit if you're around Louisville. There might still be time to register. join us in person, as your voice can be at the table as we talk about all things encompassing our future with AI. And until then, Hailey, welcome aboard.

Haley Linville: Thanks, guys.

Tony Stephens: Well, good to get you on the podcast again.

Aaron Preece: Yeah.

Tony Stephens: Yep.

Haley Linville: Thanks for having me. This was fun.

Tony Stephens: Yeah, our pleasure.

Aaron Preece: Cool.

Tony Stephens: Aaron, be well, sir.

Aaron Preece: You too.

Tony Stephens: I will talk to you soon. And audience, thanks for listening. Be sure to like and subscribe and follow us wherever you get your podcasts. And we are signing out for now. Talk to you soon.

Outro: Thanks for listening to AccessWorld, a podcast on digital inclusion and accessibility, a production of AFB Studios at the American Foundation for the Blind. AccessWorld is edited at the Pickle Factory in Baltimore, Maryland, with digital media support from Kelly Gasque and Breanna Kerr. Questions or comments? Email us at communications@afb.org. AFB.