1.
Edinburgh Festivals accessibility web/mobile service – Initial Project Brief v1
Summary
Design and development of a user-centred digital service targeted at attendees of the Edinburgh
Festivals with accessibility needs. This service will enable such festival visitors to have an improved
and more personalized search experience with regards the primary navigation challenge of the
extensive festival listings and the secondary navigation challenge of the physical city. This service is
to be piloted for the summer festival period 2012.
Project origin
In summer 2012 the Edinburgh Festivals held the Edinburgh Festivals Ideas Challenge, the first ever
public competition to source ideas of how to make the festivals even more amazing. The one idea
which was voted both in the public’s top list and the judge’s top list was related to accessibility.
Together with support from the Open Innovation Project/Interreg, Festivals Edinburgh is
commissioning a project in this area to be live this summer.
Current Situation
There is a very good provision of diverse Edinburgh Festivals events year-round for people with
varying enablement or accessibility needs and while much accessibility-related information is
available to someone planning their festival trips, there is currently no means by which to use
accessibility needs as a primary basis for search and planning. And as a festival city which hosts
40,000 individual performances in more than 300 venues throughout the year, it is recognised that
by creating a service or suite of services designed specifically around the needs of users with
accessibility issues would improve the visitor experience. A secondary issue is the terrain of the city
itself especially for those visitors with physical impairment and thus there is also a need for improving
information related to the most accessible routes between venues.
Proposal
• Development of a web app (with mobile web version) whose primary functionality provides
a creative and highly usable search and discovery interface to the listings of the Edinburgh
Festivals for people with accessibility needs.
• Application to be able to exist both on a standalone URL (tbc) and as a subdomain of
edinburghfestivals.co.uk with core functionality embeddable as a widget on third party
websites.
• Secondary functionality to allow users to assess the most accessible route between two
locations in the city.
• Where possible the application should be built so as to be extensible to other specific user
groups which would benefit from a more specialized search functionality such as parents
with young children or non-English speakers.
Target Audiences
The primary audience is users with accessibility needs which include those related to eyesight,
hearing and mobility.
Goals
• Provision of a pilot service for festival visitors with accessibility needs
• Understanding of what additional data the festivals could capture to make the festival
planning experience better in future years
Requirements
• The site design to include elements of existing Edinburgh Festivals visual identity – these
will be provided to the developers.
• All elements of the service should accord with high accessibility standards, the specifics of
which will be agreed during detailed requirements capture
• Collaboration with accessibility user need experts – either a festival project partner (tbc) or
expertise within your own network
• The summer release of the site to be regarded as a public beta with feedback incorporated
into a revised release following the summer
• Code for the project to be made available via the Edinburgh Festivals Innovation Lab’s open
source github account
• Agile or Lean development methodology is preferred

2.
• Festivals Edinburgh will encourage a co-design process including festivals representative(s)
and accessibility expert(s)
• Festivals Edinburgh will help convene a user group which are to be engaged with as part of
the design/development process
• Beta version to include data for seven summer festivals but solution to be able to include all
twelve festivals in 2013
• Festivals API to be used as main data input augmented with other sources as necessary
• Access Edinburgh is the working title of the project with final name tbc
• Definition of accessibility to be as wide as practically possible within the limitations of the
project
• Appropriate credits including Open Innovation Project/Interreg IV who are a major supporter
of the project
Project Leads
This project is commissioned by Festivals Edinburgh. The day to day project contact will be Rohan
Gunatillake, Lead Producer of the Edinburgh Festivals Innovation Lab.
Stakeholders
• Festivals Edinburgh
• Cross-festival Innovation Working Group
• 7 Edinburgh Festivals held in the summer
• 5 Edinburgh Festivals held outside of the summer
• Accessibility user group
• Accessibility stakeholder organisation (tbc)
Timelines
• Interested parties to respond to this tender by 5pm Friday April 27th
• Shortlisted suppliers to be interviewed by phone on May 2nd and 3rd
• Supplier chosen by May 8th
• Project kick-off and detailed brief agreed by May 11th
• Public beta version to be live July 1st 2012
• Revisions based on beta version feedback to be completed by October 31st 2012
Project fee
• £9,000 (inclusive of expenses and exclusive of VAT)
How to respond to this tender/brief
Interested suppliers should respond to this brief by emailing Rohan on lab@festivalsedinburgh.com
with the concise responses for the following information by 5pm April 27 th .
1. Name of supplier
2. Contact details
3. URI(s) of portfolio site or relevant live sites delivered
4. Explanation of interest in the project
5. Any relevant background in accessibility-related projects
6. Any relevant background in producing accessible web & mobile sites
7. Potential solution
8. Suggested approach
9. Outline of costing
10. Client reference contact details
It is recognised that the project specification requires further outlining. This shall be done in
collaboration with the provider so that the solution best matches the successful provider’s expertise
as well as the overall project objectives.
Questions regarding the brief should also be sent to lab@festivalsedinburgh.com

3.
MORE ABOUT FESTIVALS EDINBURGH AND THE INNOVATION LAB
Festivals Edinburgh is the high-level organisation, created and driven by the directors of
Edinburgh’s 12 major festivals, to take the lead on their joint strategic development and maintain
their global competitive edge.
Its mission:
1. Act on behalf of and represent the collective strengths of the Edinburgh Festivals;
2. Develop and deliver collaborative projects and initiatives which support growth, product
development, leadership and audiences;
3. Help to sustain the Festivals and Edinburgh and Scotland’s pre-eminence as the world’s
leading festival destination.
Festivals Edinburgh works in a uniquely collaborative way with the Festivals, funding bodies and
industry experts to enable, facilitate and deliver new, significant projects in a number of key strategic
areas: joint marketing, programming, fundraising and partnership, technology and innovation,
environmental sustainability and professional development.
Festivals Edinburgh members:
Edinburgh Jazz and Blues Festival Edinburgh International Book Festival
Edinburgh Art Festival Scottish International Storytelling Festival
Edinburgh Military Tattoo Edinburgh’s Hogmanay
Edinburgh Festival Fringe Edinburgh International Film Festival
Edinburgh International Festival Edinburgh International Science Festival
Edinburgh Mela Festival Bank of Scotland Imaginate Festival
Festivals Edinburgh is a not-for-profit organisation (created in Oct 2007) and receives income from its
member festivals, and City of Edinburgh Council, Scottish Government, EventScotland, Scottish
Enterprise, Creative Scotland and VisitScotland.
The Edinburgh Festivals Innovation Lab
The Innovation Lab is a new Festivals Edinburgh initiative and experiment supported by Creative
Scotland. Working across all twelve festivals, it's mission is to realise the digital potential of the
Edinburgh Festivals. The Lab has five key outcomes areas for success: projects, networks,
processes, people and learning. Imagine what might happen if we:
• discovered and developed brilliant ideas and projects that respond to festival business
challenges and opportunities
• tapped into exciting networks so the best festival ideas and solutions can come from
anywhere and everywhere: festival staff, artists, audiences, technologists and companies
• took inspiration from some of the best innovation programmes and processes around to
test the ideas, uncover those with the most potential, stretch our thinking and engage with
new people
• created training and participation opportunities for all festival staff, so that innovative
people are at the heart of what we do
• and then shared our experience, and all that learning, back to the wider cultural sector
This is the Edinburgh Festivals Innovation Lab.
www.festivalslabedinburgh.com
www.festivalslab.com