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This is very important. More and more a11y functionalities are added to HTML5 and browsers, but I yet have to see them used / put in place. I've work at smal

This is very important. More and more a11y functionalities are added to HTML5 and browsers, but I yet have to see them used / put in place. I've work at small and big companies, and this has never, _ever_, been a subject of discussion. From anyone. I think most people are not even aware of neither the need, nor the features available to them, but let's be honest: it is more work to make a website accessible, and so it will rarely be put in a budget. We need laws, just like we have a11y laws for buildings, etc.

robin_reala 8y ago
We do have laws? Numerous companies in the US have been sued over their lack of website accessibility (the biggest was Target, the most recent Beyoncé). The same goes for EU states: Norway recently had a high-profile case and Tesco in the UK was forced to amend their site. The problem is that this approach doesn’t scale.
- extra88 8y ago
  Yes, at least in North American and European countries, there are sufficient laws. In the U.S., there is already case law, like the Target case, that clearly established that the ADA's requirements for accessibility in "places of public accommodation" apply not only to brick and mortar places but websites as well. I'm not sure why this hasn't been sufficient for people to "get it," maybe because almost all cases are settled, rather than having actual rulings, and none have been been presented to the U.S. Supreme Court. That being said, there is a need for more detailed guidance on what it means to make something accessible. For instance with video captions for the hearing impaired, is it ever okay to post a video then add the captions when they're done? Is it ever okay to post videos then add captions to each upon request; what if all the videos had automated captions, generally considered not sufficient, but could be fixed by humans upon request? If a video is of a single person speaking continuously, would a transcript be an adequate text alternative?
smacktoward 8y ago
I'm generally supportive of accessibility requirements, but I'm not sure they're the only way we can get to where we want to be in this regard. GUI apps are generally much more accessible than Web apps are, but that's not because of legal requirements; it's because the vendors of GUI operating systems and widget toolkits took the time to make the parts of those things app developers used accessible out of the box. All you had to do to make your app accessible was color within the OS' lines and use the standard widgets. If you did that, you got accessibility for free. The Web platform, on the other hand, has no standard widgets; everybody invents their own, and because making those widgets accessible requires more work, nobody does that. Things like Bootstrap are a step in the right direction in this regard, but are still a long way behind the things that GUI app developers were taking for granted 20 years ago. If we want accessible Web apps, we need to make developing accessible Web apps easier than developing inaccessible ones.

robin_reala 8y ago

We do have laws? Numerous companies in the US have been sued over their lack of website accessibility (the biggest was Target, the most recent Beyoncé). The same goes for EU states: Norway recently had a high-profile case and Tesco in the UK was forced to amend their site. The problem is that this approach doesn’t scale.

extra88 8y ago
Yes, at least in North American and European countries, there are sufficient laws. In the U.S., there is already case law, like the Target case, that clearly established that the ADA's requirements for accessibility in "places of public accommodation" apply not only to brick and mortar places but websites as well. I'm not sure why this hasn't been sufficient for people to "get it," maybe because almost all cases are settled, rather than having actual rulings, and none have been been presented to the U.S. Supreme Court. That being said, there is a need for more detailed guidance on what it means to make something accessible. For instance with video captions for the hearing impaired, is it ever okay to post a video then add the captions when they're done? Is it ever okay to post videos then add captions to each upon request; what if all the videos had automated captions, generally considered not sufficient, but could be fixed by humans upon request? If a video is of a single person speaking continuously, would a transcript be an adequate text alternative?

smacktoward 8y ago

I'm generally supportive of accessibility requirements, but I'm not sure they're the only way we can get to where we want to be in this regard. GUI apps are generally much more accessible than Web apps are, but that's not because of legal requirements; it's because the vendors of GUI operating systems and widget toolkits took the time to make the parts of those things app developers used accessible out of the box. All you had to do to make your app accessible was color within the OS' lines and use the standard widgets. If you did that, you got accessibility for free. The Web platform, on the other hand, has no standard widgets; everybody invents their own, and because making those widgets accessible requires more work, nobody does that. Things like Bootstrap are a step in the right direction in this regard, but are still a long way behind the things that GUI app developers were taking for granted 20 years ago. If we want accessible Web apps, we need to make developing accessible Web apps easier than developing inaccessible ones.