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I'm all for arguments in favor of accessibility. That being said, this article is the exact opposite of how to get many people (like me) on your side. > acces

I'm all for arguments in favor of accessibility. That being said, this article is the exact opposite of how to get many people (like me) on your side. > accessibility is literally your job. If you ignore it, you’re just a hobbyist. ah yes, of all the issues and features on the list, this is the one that defines whether or not I'm doing my job. Point being, I don't think an article like this actually makes accessibility more of a concern overall... but who knows? Maybe people are more responsive to this than would be intuitive to me.

dudul 5y ago
Agreed - the perceived tone of the post is not very convincing. The sibling post ( https://gomakethings.com/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-website-or-web-app-that-doesnt-need-to-be-accessible/ https://gomakethings.com/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-website-o... ) is also really light on facts. "In many countries around the world, accessibility is a legal requirement." Would have been nice to name a few. AFAIK it's not that clear cut in the US for example. It depends on your industry, your physical presence (judges seem to apply the rule of thumb of "if you have accessible buildings to do business, your website must be too", etc).
3grdlurker 5y ago
The phrasing is certainly provocative, but a truly conscientious person would pick a side on the basis of merit. There's hardly any point in reasoning with someone who's obviously looking to make a decision based on the emotions evoked by an article.
- dudul 5y ago
  The thing is there isn't much in this article other than emotion. A sound thesis would examine (at least seemingly) legitimate arguments against accessibility. Another comment on this thread points out that designing/implementing accessibility comes at a cost. Why would money-tight companies use resources to do it? Maybe mention the market share represented by people who need accessible sites. Maybe provide the numbers for how many websites are truly accessible. Highlight the fact that by spending resources on it it could almost be akin to targeting a niche with very little competition. That's how you convince conscientious people, not by saying "if you don't do it, you're a fraud".
  - 3grdlurker 5y ago
    There are good articles that make for good, thought-provoking discussions, and then there simply are bad ones.
- pwillia7 5y ago
  sick burn
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
at_a_remove 5y ago
I agree -- the tone of this article doesn't help, and it is mostly aimed at the wrong people. In reality, I was always told to hustle hustle hustle on the design. FUCK accessibility. I would have to counter to my masters with a stick (that Target ADA complaint) and a carrot (almost all accessibility is a medium-grade form of whitehat SEO that will increase rankings). The stick wasn't usually taken as being important, but that carrot ... whoo! Nibble nibble. In my web design days, I would love for the chance to linger, to tweak, to test on browser after browser, to poll people at random. Breaking the design, then repairing it. However, we're all so busy, aren't we?
- forgotmypw17 5y ago
  You pulled the text straight out of my mind... Eventually I had to turn to self-directed unpaid development in order to do work I wasn't ashamed of.
  - at_a_remove 5y ago
    I have done various accessibility spiels on HN before. I think most people who are ... (and heaven help me, what do we even call this now? "Webmaster" is out, "web designers" seem to focus on almost anything else in the real world, "programmer" is too broad ...) people who are responsible what actual HTML tags and CSS attributes are assigned in the final output either care about this to some degree or simply haven't been introduced to the concept. Overall, we'd rather close our tags and put in the alt attributes and so on. There's nothing malign about it. However, the people who decide what our time will be spent on dismiss even the barest accessibility as soon as it hits their radars. Even when I could get "through" to them, well, it's all about what the client wants. And accessibility is a concern that ranges deeply enough through our efforts that we cannot simply squeeze it in as five percent, or a skunkworks project. I help out a little old lady (eighty-eight this year) and my mother with computer "stuff," and that's a whole dimension of accessibility which just gets ignored. Not every user of an application is some sharp-eyed twenty-something with fine motor control and an ingrained habit of scanning the UI for changes, and yet these people are effectively ignored. I am out of the webdev biz, and happily so, but this remains a point of lingering bitterness.

dudul 5y ago

Agreed - the perceived tone of the post is not very convincing. The sibling post ( https://gomakethings.com/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-website-or-web-app-that-doesnt-need-to-be-accessible/ https://gomakethings.com/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-website-o... ) is also really light on facts. "In many countries around the world, accessibility is a legal requirement." Would have been nice to name a few. AFAIK it's not that clear cut in the US for example. It depends on your industry, your physical presence (judges seem to apply the rule of thumb of "if you have accessible buildings to do business, your website must be too", etc).

3grdlurker 5y ago

The phrasing is certainly provocative, but a truly conscientious person would pick a side on the basis of merit. There's hardly any point in reasoning with someone who's obviously looking to make a decision based on the emotions evoked by an article.

dudul 5y ago
The thing is there isn't much in this article other than emotion. A sound thesis would examine (at least seemingly) legitimate arguments against accessibility. Another comment on this thread points out that designing/implementing accessibility comes at a cost. Why would money-tight companies use resources to do it? Maybe mention the market share represented by people who need accessible sites. Maybe provide the numbers for how many websites are truly accessible. Highlight the fact that by spending resources on it it could almost be akin to targeting a niche with very little competition. That's how you convince conscientious people, not by saying "if you don't do it, you're a fraud".
- 3grdlurker 5y ago
  There are good articles that make for good, thought-provoking discussions, and then there simply are bad ones.
pwillia7 5y ago
sick burn

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

at_a_remove 5y ago

I agree -- the tone of this article doesn't help, and it is mostly aimed at the wrong people. In reality, I was always told to hustle hustle hustle on the design. FUCK accessibility. I would have to counter to my masters with a stick (that Target ADA complaint) and a carrot (almost all accessibility is a medium-grade form of whitehat SEO that will increase rankings). The stick wasn't usually taken as being important, but that carrot ... whoo! Nibble nibble. In my web design days, I would love for the chance to linger, to tweak, to test on browser after browser, to poll people at random. Breaking the design, then repairing it. However, we're all so busy, aren't we?

forgotmypw17 5y ago
You pulled the text straight out of my mind... Eventually I had to turn to self-directed unpaid development in order to do work I wasn't ashamed of.
- at_a_remove 5y ago
  I have done various accessibility spiels on HN before. I think most people who are ... (and heaven help me, what do we even call this now? "Webmaster" is out, "web designers" seem to focus on almost anything else in the real world, "programmer" is too broad ...) people who are responsible what actual HTML tags and CSS attributes are assigned in the final output either care about this to some degree or simply haven't been introduced to the concept. Overall, we'd rather close our tags and put in the alt attributes and so on. There's nothing malign about it. However, the people who decide what our time will be spent on dismiss even the barest accessibility as soon as it hits their radars. Even when I could get "through" to them, well, it's all about what the client wants. And accessibility is a concern that ranges deeply enough through our efforts that we cannot simply squeeze it in as five percent, or a skunkworks project. I help out a little old lady (eighty-eight this year) and my mother with computer "stuff," and that's a whole dimension of accessibility which just gets ignored. Not every user of an application is some sharp-eyed twenty-something with fine motor control and an ingrained habit of scanning the UI for changes, and yet these people are effectively ignored. I am out of the webdev biz, and happily so, but this remains a point of lingering bitterness.