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> It's really not hard to make your websites accessible at a basic level. Follow the standards. Do you follow the standards? If you show me a web site that you

> It's really not hard to make your websites accessible at a basic level. Follow the standards. Do you follow the standards? If you show me a web site that you've developed I'll show you a site with multiple violations of WCAG 2.0. Hell, JAWS' own site is littered with WCAG violations! Yes, "accessibility at the basic level" is easy but WCAG 2.0 is not "accessibility at the basic level". It's a huge set of rules that are often unclear and ambiguous. And that's fine because WCAG 2.0 is just something that you should aspire to. But if you start defining accessibility by whether a site conforms to WCAG 2.0 or not, then I can guarantee you that every single popular site is non-accessible. We got sued and believe me it has nothing to do with blind people. Our site is of zero interest to them. Companies are sued by scumbag lawyers, who have made a nice little racket out of this thing. It's really unfortunate that the HN crowd is siding with them, as if they are championing the rights of disabled people. It's all about money.

Mvandenbergh 7y ago
That is a natural consequence of the way in which the United States chooses to enforce rules like this. In some other countries, there are regulators who do this kind of thing and issue relatively small fines and compliance notices. Since the regulator itself is publically funded, it does not need to live off the fine income. In the US, the choice was made instead to create a private right of action and to allow legal fees to be recovered. That means that lawyers who make this their business have to aim high to cover their costs (including from cases they lose) and are no incentivised to let a company off with a compliance notice and a deadline to improve. As a result, there are a certain percentage of ADA cases which are not brought in good faith but that is the system the people have decided they want.
- wallace_f 7y ago
  It's interesting, at least. Usually I would actually say separations of powers are good, as are powers to the judiciary; but you are correct that we do have a problem here with this in the States with frivolous lawsuits and bloodsucking lawyers. On the other hand, regulators pouring bleach on food for the homeless and secret homeless rescue operations to avoid regulators are a real thing. As are hairdressers being shut down, fined and even jailed for things like not having a license to braid hair, or giving free haircuts to the homeless. Excessive regulations also kill jobs and productivity from overzealous and power-tripping regulators. There are horrors on both sides. Honestly, I'd bet that after you calculate the fixed costs + variable costs + opportunity costs + economic deadweight loss of all of these solutions, it'd be better to just take the total costs--what is likely 10s to 100s of thousands per person per year--and actually just give it directly to the disabled in the form of a check, and be done with this circus.
- pakitan 7y ago
  > but that is the system the people have decided they want The people haven't decided anything. As usual, someone comes up with an absurd law, or an absurd interpretation of the law and there are not enough people affected to bother challenging it. But that doesn't mean "the people have decided".
  - diffeomorphism 7y ago
    "The people have decided not to bother to do anything about it" sounds like the same thing to me.
    - pakitan 7y ago
      On the contrary, the power dynamics is completely different. It's one thing to come up with a ridiculous policy (which is easy for a politician to do) and put the onus on minority of affected people to fight it, while the majority is neutral. And it's another thing to ask everyone to vote on the policy before it's enacted. Fighting the status quo is immensely more difficult than keeping it, even if the effect of that status quo is provably harmful.
      - diffeomorphism 7y ago
        The politician is not some random person removed from reality. He/she represents the people, is accountable to them and campaigned on how they want to represent them. The majority is not neutral but assumed to be in favor of their representative's (!) proposals. Of course, politicians can and do deviate from this, in particular where legal bribery (lobbying) is involved, but that is the base assumption of representative democracy.
CathedralBorrow 7y ago
> Our site is of zero interest to them. How do you know? It's not like blind people are all the same. They're just people with the same wide range of interests as everyone else.
- Hitton 7y ago
  Is stargazing popular among blind people?
  - robin_reala 7y ago
    No, but buying a telescope for a sighted friend or relative as a present could be.
  - skywhopper 7y ago
    I'm going to bet a nontrivial number of visually impaired folks are very interested in tools that provide better views of the night sky and in sites with details about how to find and view celestial objects. You seem to be very lacking in imagination here. Anyway, it's not up to you to decide what they can or should be interested in, just because they experience the world differently than you do.
- pakitan 7y ago
  Would a blind person be interested in a painting or car insurance? Another reason I'm sure about it is if there was genuine interest, there would be calls from blind people - "Hey, I'm interested in your products but I'm blind, can you help me with figuring out some things on your site?" or "Hey I'm blind and I have problem accessing certain features on your site, can you please fix those issues?". We haven't got one single call like that. Ever. The people who sued us were never customers, neither before nor after the adjustments we made to the site. The fact they went straight to threats and offers of settlement clearly indicates that it's a racket, not someone genuinely interested in the products offered.
  - foldr 7y ago
    >Would a blind person be interested in a painting or car insurance? Sure, why not? But I'm confused here. Does your website somehow feature both paintings and car insurance?
DoreenMichele 7y ago
It's really unfortunate that the HN crowd is siding with them, as if they are championing the rights of disabled people. It's all about money. I'm sorry you got burned, but this is not the best way to make your point.

Mvandenbergh 7y ago

That is a natural consequence of the way in which the United States chooses to enforce rules like this. In some other countries, there are regulators who do this kind of thing and issue relatively small fines and compliance notices. Since the regulator itself is publically funded, it does not need to live off the fine income. In the US, the choice was made instead to create a private right of action and to allow legal fees to be recovered. That means that lawyers who make this their business have to aim high to cover their costs (including from cases they lose) and are no incentivised to let a company off with a compliance notice and a deadline to improve. As a result, there are a certain percentage of ADA cases which are not brought in good faith but that is the system the people have decided they want.

wallace_f 7y ago
It's interesting, at least. Usually I would actually say separations of powers are good, as are powers to the judiciary; but you are correct that we do have a problem here with this in the States with frivolous lawsuits and bloodsucking lawyers. On the other hand, regulators pouring bleach on food for the homeless and secret homeless rescue operations to avoid regulators are a real thing. As are hairdressers being shut down, fined and even jailed for things like not having a license to braid hair, or giving free haircuts to the homeless. Excessive regulations also kill jobs and productivity from overzealous and power-tripping regulators. There are horrors on both sides. Honestly, I'd bet that after you calculate the fixed costs + variable costs + opportunity costs + economic deadweight loss of all of these solutions, it'd be better to just take the total costs--what is likely 10s to 100s of thousands per person per year--and actually just give it directly to the disabled in the form of a check, and be done with this circus.
pakitan 7y ago
> but that is the system the people have decided they want The people haven't decided anything. As usual, someone comes up with an absurd law, or an absurd interpretation of the law and there are not enough people affected to bother challenging it. But that doesn't mean "the people have decided".
- diffeomorphism 7y ago
  "The people have decided not to bother to do anything about it" sounds like the same thing to me.
  - pakitan 7y ago
    On the contrary, the power dynamics is completely different. It's one thing to come up with a ridiculous policy (which is easy for a politician to do) and put the onus on minority of affected people to fight it, while the majority is neutral. And it's another thing to ask everyone to vote on the policy before it's enacted. Fighting the status quo is immensely more difficult than keeping it, even if the effect of that status quo is provably harmful.
    - diffeomorphism 7y ago
      The politician is not some random person removed from reality. He/she represents the people, is accountable to them and campaigned on how they want to represent them. The majority is not neutral but assumed to be in favor of their representative's (!) proposals. Of course, politicians can and do deviate from this, in particular where legal bribery (lobbying) is involved, but that is the base assumption of representative democracy.

CathedralBorrow 7y ago

> Our site is of zero interest to them. How do you know? It's not like blind people are all the same. They're just people with the same wide range of interests as everyone else.

Hitton 7y ago
Is stargazing popular among blind people?
- robin_reala 7y ago
  No, but buying a telescope for a sighted friend or relative as a present could be.
- skywhopper 7y ago
  I'm going to bet a nontrivial number of visually impaired folks are very interested in tools that provide better views of the night sky and in sites with details about how to find and view celestial objects. You seem to be very lacking in imagination here. Anyway, it's not up to you to decide what they can or should be interested in, just because they experience the world differently than you do.
pakitan 7y ago
Would a blind person be interested in a painting or car insurance? Another reason I'm sure about it is if there was genuine interest, there would be calls from blind people - "Hey, I'm interested in your products but I'm blind, can you help me with figuring out some things on your site?" or "Hey I'm blind and I have problem accessing certain features on your site, can you please fix those issues?". We haven't got one single call like that. Ever. The people who sued us were never customers, neither before nor after the adjustments we made to the site. The fact they went straight to threats and offers of settlement clearly indicates that it's a racket, not someone genuinely interested in the products offered.
- foldr 7y ago
  >Would a blind person be interested in a painting or car insurance? Sure, why not? But I'm confused here. Does your website somehow feature both paintings and car insurance?

DoreenMichele 7y ago

It's really unfortunate that the HN crowd is siding with them, as if they are championing the rights of disabled people. It's all about money. I'm sorry you got burned, but this is not the best way to make your point.