Accessibility and the law

http://joeclark.org/book/sashay/serialization/AppendixA.html

What a load of crap!


****
Want o know if your site is really "accessible"?

Try to "access" it with a mainstream browser like Internet Explorer!!!

"Oh, but, wait, I'm using this esoteric device and I can't read your text"

Well, it might be time to return it for a refund...


--
Irvin
------------------------
http://www.pixel69.com

Want to know if your restaurant is really "accessible"?
Try to go through the door.
"Oh, but wait, I'm paraplegic/ got M.S./ am recovering from an accident/ am
a senior, and can't walk get up the stairs in my wheelchair."

Well, it's time to return your wheelchair for a refund. Meantime, get out of
my restaurant; I don't need your money, don't care about negative publicity,
have no moral problem with banning you because of a disability and have no
problem about flouting the disability legislation.

Nice one.


"irvin" <noone (AT) none (DOT) com> wrote

http://joeclark.org/book/sashay/serialization/AppendixA.html

What a load of crap!


****
Want o know if your site is really "accessible"?

Try to "access" it with a mainstream browser like Internet Explorer!!!

"Oh, but, wait, I'm using this esoteric device and I can't read your text"

Well, it might be time to return it for a refund...


--
Irvin
------------------------
http://www.pixel69.com

"irvin" <noone (AT) none (DOT) com> wrote

http://joeclark.org/book/sashay/serialization/AppendixA.html

What a load of crap!

Why? because you may need to put forth a little more effort to make your
sites accessible? Despite what you may think, or heard, it's really not that
hard to do....

--
SamMan
Rip it to reply

Not quite like that.

It's more like:

"Oh, but wait, I'm paraplegic/ got M.S./ am recovering from an
accident/ am a senior, and can't GO UP THE RAMP WITH THIS DEFECTIVE
WHEELCHAIR"

--
Irvin
------------------------
http://www.pixel69.com




Bruce Lawson wrote:

Want to know if your restaurant is really "accessible"?
Try to go through the door.
"Oh, but wait, I'm paraplegic/ got M.S./ am recovering from an
accident/ am a senior, and can't walk get up the stairs in my
wheelchair."

Well, it's time to return your wheelchair for a refund. Meantime, get
out of my restaurant; I don't need your money, don't care about
negative publicity, have no moral problem with banning you because of
a disability and have no problem about flouting the disability
legislation.

Nice one.


"irvin" <noone (AT) none (DOT) com> wrote in message
news:btu3m4$mf$1 (AT) forums (DOT) macromedia.com...
http://joeclark.org/book/sashay/serialization/AppendixA.html

What a load of crap!


****
Want o know if your site is really "accessible"?

Try to "access" it with a mainstream browser like Internet
Explorer!!!

"Oh, but, wait, I'm using this esoteric device and I can't read your
text"

Well, it might be time to return it for a refund...


--
Irvin
------------------------
http://www.pixel69.com

Sam,

my sites are fully accessible already. It wasn't hard at all.

--
Irvin
------------------------
http://www.pixel69.com




SamMan wrote:

"irvin" <noone (AT) none (DOT) com> wrote in message
news:btu3m4$mf$1 (AT) forums (DOT) macromedia.com...
http://joeclark.org/book/sashay/serialization/AppendixA.html

What a load of crap!



Why? because you may need to put forth a little more effort to make
your sites accessible? Despite what you may think, or heard, it's
really not that hard to do....

irvin wrote:

http://joeclark.org/book/sashay/serialization/AppendixA.html

What a load of crap!

Want o know if your site is really "accessible"?
Try to "access" it with a mainstream browser like Internet Explorer!!!
"Oh, but, wait, I'm using this esoteric device and I can't read your text"
Well, it might be time to return it for a refund...

[ ] You've read and understood the text
[ ] You know the meaning of 'accessibility'
[ ] You know what the WWW really is
[x] You think MS IE = Internet

It might be interesting for your that the most disabled 'persons' trying
to access your websites are not human people, but search engine's bots.
Telling such a bot "Fuck off" is not the best thing to do, but it's your
website. If you don't wanna be found then it's your problem, not ours.

Micha

irvin wrote:

http://joeclark.org/book/sashay/serialization/AppendixA.html

What a load of crap!

This accessibility issue is becoming a major joke!

Its up to the web owner who they personally welcome onto their site,
just as it is if they owned a shop, at least here in the UK it is.

If they dont like someone because they have big ears, a big nose or a
zit on their forehead they have have every right to exclude them from
the premises.

These minority sections of society seem to be carrying around a big chip
on their shoulders, I guess they have nothing more important in life to
do but whinge all the time.

Bruce Lawson wrote:

Well, it's time to return your wheelchair for a refund. Meantime, get
out of my restaurant; I don't need your money, don't care about
negative publicity, have no moral problem with banning you because of
a disability and have no problem about flouting the disability
legislation.

If I read it right, I think maybe Irvin was miffed at the semi-scare
tactics employed by Mr. Clark. And while I believe in making sites
accessible, your restaurant metaphor is all wrong. A restaurant patron
is completely at the mercy of the restaurateur to make the premises
accessible. That is not entirely true of web sites. For instance, based
on the sheer number of people who bring up pixel font-sizing and IE-PC
on this forum, it must be a MAJOR issue (tongue firmly in cheek). If
that's the case, then a thinking person who happens to also be visually
impaired would no doubt encounter so many terrible sites where text
could not be resized that he would either turn off his computer and put
it in the attic or perhaps he might start using another browser. There
is also a wild chance that he might explore the accessibility options
available in every version of Windows since 98. Or he might even buy a
Mac :-)

The fact is, accessibility guidelines are in a state of flux... starting
at the W3C who, from the commentary peppered on its web site between the
WAI specifications, obvioulsy is conflicted about assistive technologies
and progress. Many of the rules are rules only because the W3C is not
sure when to rewrite them for modern assistive software.

Mr. Clark makes his living writing and consulting on accessibility and
my opinion is that his is a very valuable site for reference but one
must always take care to read between the lines.

While we haven't written about accessibility extensively, all of our
latest products and tutorials do pay heed. And we are studying the
issues deeply. But we're trying to do it in a typically practical sense
so we are using assistive software ourselves, as part of our
education... and we've retained the services of a sightless person for
added insights <no pun intended>.

It's one of those highly complex, multi-faceted, and deeply
misunderstand topics, like CSS-P, which can at times drive us to
distraction, craziness, polarization, and religious frenzy.

--
Al Sparber - PVII
http://www.projectseven.com
Dreamweaver Extensions - DesignPacks - Tutorials - Books
---------------------------------------------------------------------
The PVII Newsgroup | news://forums.projectseven.com/pviiwebdev
The CSS Newsgroup | news://forums.projectseven.com/css
---------------------------------------------------------------------

To me, the greatest danger lies in the fact that, by raising the technical
"bar" we could be excluding the majority in favor of a few.

If only people with technical expertise were allowed to create sites, then a
great damage has been done to the overwhelming majority of internet-based
publishers: the accountant publishing his family's web album on the space
provided by AOL; the small-restaurant owner using CoffeeCup's "web creation
tools" to give his dying business one last chance at making it; the young
entrepeneur designing his own site because cash flow won't allow for paying
a pro...

The list goes on and on.


How "accessible" would the internet be, then?


Accessibility is far more complex that Joe Clark's myopic scare tactics.
Accessibility is far more complex than making your site available to the
blind.


True accessibility goes WAY beyond taking care of the "alt" attribute.



--
Irvin
------------------------
http://www.pixel69.com




Al Sparber- PVII wrote:

Bruce Lawson wrote:
Well, it's time to return your wheelchair for a refund. Meantime, get
out of my restaurant; I don't need your money, don't care about
negative publicity, have no moral problem with banning you because of
a disability and have no problem about flouting the disability
legislation.

If I read it right, I think maybe Irvin was miffed at the semi-scare
tactics employed by Mr. Clark. And while I believe in making sites
accessible, your restaurant metaphor is all wrong. A restaurant patron
is completely at the mercy of the restaurateur to make the premises
accessible. That is not entirely true of web sites. For instance,
based on the sheer number of people who bring up pixel font-sizing
and IE-PC on this forum, it must be a MAJOR issue (tongue firmly in
cheek). If that's the case, then a thinking person who happens to
also be visually impaired would no doubt encounter so many terrible
sites where text could not be resized that he would either turn off
his computer and put it in the attic or perhaps he might start using
another browser. There is also a wild chance that he might explore
the accessibility options available in every version of Windows since
98. Or he might even buy a Mac :-)

The fact is, accessibility guidelines are in a state of flux...
starting at the W3C who, from the commentary peppered on its web site
between the WAI specifications, obvioulsy is conflicted about
assistive technologies and progress. Many of the rules are rules only
because the W3C is not sure when to rewrite them for modern assistive
software.

Mr. Clark makes his living writing and consulting on accessibility and
my opinion is that his is a very valuable site for reference but one
must always take care to read between the lines.

While we haven't written about accessibility extensively, all of our
latest products and tutorials do pay heed. And we are studying the
issues deeply. But we're trying to do it in a typically practical
sense so we are using assistive software ourselves, as part of our
education... and we've retained the services of a sightless person for
added insights <no pun intended>.

It's one of those highly complex, multi-faceted, and deeply
misunderstand topics, like CSS-P, which can at times drive us to
distraction, craziness, polarization, and religious frenzy.

irvin wrote:

To me, the greatest danger lies in the fact that, by raising the
technical "bar" we could be excluding the majority in favor of a few.

If only people with technical expertise were allowed to create sites,
then a great damage has been done to the overwhelming majority of
internet-based publishers: the accountant publishing his family's web
album on the space provided by AOL; the small-restaurant owner using
CoffeeCup's "web creation tools" to give his dying business one last
chance at making it; the young entrepeneur designing his own site
because cash flow won't allow for paying a pro...

The list goes on and on.


How "accessible" would the internet be, then?


Accessibility is far more complex that Joe Clark's myopic scare
tactics. Accessibility is far more complex than making your site
available to the blind.


True accessibility goes WAY beyond taking care of the "alt" attribute.

Yes. Precisely. But there is currently legislation and there will be
more, but even that is not clearcut because there is no real validation
mechanism possible for accessibility and those who do well with clients
who must address accessibility laws are the ones who can explain each of
the warnings spewed forth from the Bobby web site checker and sound
knowledgable doing so :-)