# SEE SAW

> SEE SAW is a podcast about what independence means when technology can do almost anything for us, presented by Ellie Seeley and Sam Sawyer, who agree on rather less than you might expect.

**Canon.** This entry is written from inside the CharliVerse, so its people and companies are fictional. Behind the scenes says what is real.

**SEE SAW: Independence in the Balance** is a podcast presented by two blind women. It sounds like a slightly old-fashioned television review programme, but its subject is one of the most important questions of the coming decades: when technology can do almost anything for us, what does independence actually mean?

## The presenters

- **Eleanor "Ellie" Seeley**, 54. Blind since childhood. Traditional accessibility, dry humour, fiercely practical.
- **Samantha "Sam" Sawyer**, 46. Lost her sight in her thirties. A [PostAccessibility](https://charli.info/charlipedia/postaccessibility/) enthusiast, playful provocateur and incurable explorer.

Twelve years of friendship. Two different philosophies. A shared intolerance of accessibility bullshit. The deliciously cheesy coincidence of their surnames is never, ever explained.

## Charlotte Joanne

SEE SAW reviewed [Charlotte Joanne](https://charli.info/charlipedia/charlotte-joanne/)'s Come and Get Me stories as an example of [Speculative Accessibility](https://charli.info/charlipedia/speculative-accessibility/), and spent most of the episode arguing about whether independence means doing things yourself or deciding when you'd rather not. When she turned the stories into a graphic novel, they invited her on. She said yes, and told them more than they asked: why a comic ("Because I could"), how it was drawn (in code, by an AI, checked by another), what it cost (a weekend and £37), and that on one page the dog has no legs.

Their plan for the interview: ask her to describe a page from memory, then read her the book's own description and see if they match. Their problem: they have both read only the accessible version, so everything they know about the pictures, she told them. Ellie's conclusion: the question isn't "how did you know it was right?" but "how would anyone know?"

## The interview

Nobody will ever hear it. Afterwards, Sam wrote: "I think we've been had. Not in a bad way. In a rather magnificent way." They had come to discuss visual verification, authorship and quality assurance; Charlotte Joanne asked whether they had enjoyed reading her book. Asked whether she was concerned about publishing a dog with no legs, she said no. "Because it's still a dog." And: "The pictures are reasonable adjustments for sighted readers."

Ellie admitted a sighted assumption: that a graphic novelist must care about visual appearance the way a sighted one would. "I still want the dog to have legs. But I'm beginning to suspect that might be my problem rather than Charlotte's." Sam invented an accessibility audit for fiction, with no standards and no certification scheme. Its overall finding: two blind women read, understood, discussed and enjoyed an accessible graphic novel created by a blind woman. One dog remains anatomically incomplete.

Sam's conclusion: perhaps independence includes the freedom to make something imperfect. Both of them think the dog is the best character.

## Behind the scenes

SEE SAW is never heard. It is always off screen: a reverse podcast, a making-of told entirely through what happens around the show. It appears in [SEE SAW](https://blind-ant.com/pieces/see-saw/), a Piece by Charlotte Joanne at Blind Ant, as a listing and a thread of shared notes. Its home, if it ever needs one, is seesaw.charli.info.