The Internet vs. The Blind

[CFLarsen]

We wanted it to be bleeding-edge.

Being on the bleeding-edge leaves a lot of blood.

 

[Gurdur]

Cauterize at the same time. Problem solved.

 

[H3LL]

I assume you aren't a developer?

No I'm not. I'm not blind either.

The techniques described in that article aren't practical for a huge amount of sites.

I will have to assume you are correct on this.

And they add significant man hours to a project which most sites aren't worth paying for.

Sadly, Travis' comment springs to mind when I read this.

And the example given is for an educational science site. Such a site should be accessible, it's a public service.

I'm reading this to mean that blind people's web experience should be confined to shops and public services.

Did you look at the Dylan site I linked to? There's no way of making that blind-accessible. Do you therefore think the site shouldn't exist?

Yes, I looked at it. Very nice. I would be surprised if there was "no way" it can be made blind accessible. I would agree if you said there is no-way that the site provider would pay for it to be blind accessible or that there was no-way they could think of for a blind person to want to access it.

Where have I said or suggested that any website shouldn't exist?

Very naughty of you Teek.

Blind people can buy the Dylan album anywhere - the site promoting it is irrelevant to their needs. As I said, it's like complaining that they can't touch the Mona Lisa, yes it's a shame, but that's not what the artist had in mind when he created it. They're missing out on an experience that the sighted are fortunate to have. That's going to happen - they're blind.

What sort of argument is that?

Sighted people also miss out on experiences that blind people have. I will never get the experience of "feeling" the prose of Terry Pratchett?

That site can give a blind person an enjoyable experience. Their purse has decided that they won't.

The idea that all websites could or should be 'viewable' to the blind is silly. Only those equivalent to a shop front, in law, should have to adhere to disability discrimination laws. Nowhere does the law say "blind people must have exactly the same experiences in life as the sighted". That would be nuts.

All websites could give an experience to blind people. Their purse chooses not to.

The idea isn't "silly"...just more expensive.

I never said or suggested that the law should give blind people the same experiences as the sighted, nor visa-versa.

And it's also important to realise that companies make decisions based on ROI. When building a promotional site (not an e-commerce site), they should take into account whether or not the extra expenditure on accessibility will be repaid in additional revenue. With a niche market site, that's unlikely to be the case.

Quite possibly so.

I seriously doubt, however, that they have even considered the size of the market. There are (in the UK) approximately 2 million people that have a sight problem or seeing difficulty, almost 380,000 are registered blind and approximately 100 people begin to lose their sight each day.

(ETA: Quick Google, approx 1 million Legally Blind in USA)

Most of those people have partners, children, relatives and friends. As a marketing person, you should know that the potential market is not confined to the individual (2 year olds don't buy cradles, 10 year olds don't buy Playstations or Dylan albums, fiancee's rarely buy their own engagement ring).

Could it also be possible that blind people listen to much more music that sighted people...Why might that be, I wonder?

Here's another great site the blind can't use: [URL]http://mysims.ea.com/[/URL]

Yay!

That's mainly because the developers think having a site which reflects the game (which can only be done in Flash) far outweighs the extremely unlikely chance that a blind person is interested in reading about a game they can't play. They aren't going to pay for extra development, there's zero ROI. They would have to pay for an entirely separate site for the blind. Is it worth it? No.

See www.jkrowling.com for an example of how you have to have two different sites to have Flash for the blind. Now think about how much extra that cost JK Rowling.

Thus forcing all blind people to rely upon someone else make decisions for them.

Again, each person is not an island. People, blind or not, like to do things for others, like to buy things for others, like to discuss things with others.

.

 

[Madalch]

People who design in Flash "consider themselves artists," said accessibility expert Joe Clark. "They find the idea of a blind person wanting to (use) their site to be slightly weird."
Quote:
"We hesitated to use Flash, but we wanted (the site) to be noticed. We wanted it to be bleeding-edge. We had committed to a Shockwave game, and since we were going in that direction, we decide to try to use Flash."

I spent a lot of time on dial-up, and learned to abhor websites that put a lot of animation and other drivel on their website in order to look "bleeding-edge cool"- slowed the downloading to a crawl, without adding any content.

They're not artists, just flashholes.

 

[tkingdoll]

I'm sorry, H3LL, but if you're saying that every website should have another few thousand spent on it to make it accessible to the blind, then you know nothing at all about the web development market. Many sites simply wouldn't exist if that were the case. They are developed for the markets in which they exist, or to promote some kid's band, or to share someone's baby photos.

I just cannot understand why a website about something blind people can't use, such as the MySims site I linked to, would need to have a whole other version made for the blind. That's just crappy business sense. That site would have cost at least £10k. And it would take probably another £10k to make a special version for the blind. Give me one good reason why it's worth it.

What about business-to-business websites? Do those need to be accessible to the blind, too? What about amateur sites like the kid's band or the baby photos?

Regarding the Dylan site, I'm pretty sure there's no way of making it accessible to the blind, because the text on the final output is not known to the site. It's inputted by the user, so no up-front programming is possible because the developer doesn't know what the text is going to say.

Maybe there is a way round that but I'm not aware of one. All the Flash accessibility panel does is allow you add 'readable' tags to objects - but you have to do that during the development stage. I'm 99% sure you can't add in code that adds readable tags to user-inputted text.

 

[Nick Bogaerts]

I'm reading this to mean that blind people's web experience should be confined to shops and public services

I think you're reading too much into what Teek is saying. There is a place for Flash in web development. The problem is that it'#s ben overused by clients who don't know better and developers who ought to have known better, and has become a bit of a bugbear in the industry.

I've been working as a web developer previously in the heritage industry and now in the banking industry. Both require top-notch accessibility, which, unfortunately, they don't alwaysget. Now I'll admit, I'm a back-end coder by vocation, so I'm not the foremost expert on accessibility. But there is a hell of a lot you can do to make websites more accessible, and how far you go depends on both the target audience and the money available. But I'd like to stress the difference between not doing something deliberately, and not doing something because you are incompetent. And in Target's case, they probably got saddled with incompetent developers.

And yes, I am aware that hiring and retaining talent is hard. Even in the Thames valley, which is probably the best place to find people outside of London.

 

[Complexity]

That is of course your perogative. You may also believe that it is not the government's business whether or not you beat your wife.

Thanks for the strawman. Just in time for Halloween.

Society at large, and the government that represents that society, disagrees. As such, they have enacted laws that you are compelled to obey regardless of whether you think it's their business.

Competing gangs of thugs rule this country. They pass laws and decree that everyone must obey them.

I am neither morally nor ethically obligated to regard their rule as legitimate or their laws as binding.

The will of the majority means nothing to me.

I am not compelled to obey their laws. I always have a choice of giving in to their threats or facing the consequences.

I pay taxes because they threaten to seize my possessions by force and imprison me if I do not.

I tend to follow laws that I regard as just and disregard laws that I regard as unjust or inappropriate. I often consider the expected penalty for breaking a law as a practical matter.

I am ashamed to say that I sometimes have allowed fear of consequences prevent me from breaking their law in the past when I should have done so.

I hope that I will have the courage to do the right things, regardless of their laws or consequences, in the future.

 

[Phrost]

The reason behind the success of the Internet is because it puts anyone with a connection and some free time on the same playing field as large corporations. Corporations can deal with the expenses incurred by ridiculous over-regulation of a nanny state trying to make everything in life fair, by force.

The blogger who exposes the next government scandal cannot.

 

[Gurdur]

Competing gangs of thugs rule this country. They pass laws and decree that everyone must obey them.

Oh, the sheer drama! This is ever so exciting.

I hope that I will have the courage to do the right things, regardless of their laws or consequences, in the future.

Do make sure to let us know when that is actually and provably so.

 

[H3LL]

So, as I see it from this thread, reasons to not improve disabled access to web sites:

• I'm not disabled and neither care nor understand about disabled peoples needs (Complexity)
• It takes too much time
• It takes too much money
• Customers don't ask
• Developers are incompetent
• Competent developers are hard to find
• There's enough money around to keep rubbish, lazy developers in business
• It's only for commerce and public information sites
• Don't do it because its a law/rule/regulation I don't like (Complexity again)
• Pre-conceived ideas, without evidence, about what disabled people can and cannot do.
• Pre-conceived ideas, without evidence, about what disabled people want to do.
• Disregard for the disabled persons desire to interact with able-bodied friends and relatives around them.
• When two businesses communicate with each other, neither business employs disabled people
• Forgot to check after doing an upgrade
• Not liking "Nanny State" interfering with the "free" Internet.
• It's difficult, so don't even try the basics
• It can't be done.

I can't say I'm convinced.

 

[tkingdoll]

Ignoring your strawmen, misinterpretations, and failure to answer my questions, I will make one or two last attempts at an analogy:

Would you expect every restaurant in the world to publish its menus in braille and/or audio as well as the printed version on the table? And if it is the sort of restaurant where the menu changes regularly, do you think it is worth the additional cost to the restaurant to pay for the accessible version every time, on the offchance that a blind diner might turn up alone?

Billboard advertising could have a sensor-triggered speaker that describes the advert when someone walks past. The technology exists. That would ensure that blind people would have the same access to the content that the sighted do. Do you think that businesses should include that feature when they post an ad on a billboard?

As for your last point, I have already demonstrated that for one site at least, it absolutely can't be done. What is your solution to that issue? Given that you've admitted you're not a developer, I would like to see your real-world solutions to the issue. How would you make the Dylan site accessible to the blind without spending any more money or compromising the ROI?

 

[H3LL]

Ignoring your strawmen

My strawmen?!? Items from the list were as a result of comments made by other posters.

Misinterpretations

Nothing is deliberately misinterpreted - It is how I understand what I have read - Got a specific - correct me.

and failure to answer my questions

Apart from failing to answer the questions you just posed...Which ones?

I assume you aren't a developer? Answered
Did you look at the Dylan site I linked to? Answered
Do you therefore think the site shouldn't exist? Answered My question on it to you was not.
Is it worth it? No. Rhetorical
What about business-to-business websites? Covered in the list of points.
Do those need to be accessible to the blind, too? Covered in the list of points.

Your new questions:

Would you expect every restaurant in the world to publish its menus in braille and/or audio as well as the printed version on the table? And if it is the sort of restaurant where the menu changes regularly, do you think it is worth the additional cost to the restaurant to pay for the accessible version every time, on the offchance that a blind diner might turn up alone?

Slippery Slope fallacy - My Bold - I should leave it there, but;
No I would not - It seems to be imagined that I'm advocating blanket disabled access to all able-bodied resources - This is not indicated in anything I have written.

To clarify, where possible, disabled access should be done - out of common courtesy, if not from legal liability. Would it be so much trouble for a restaurant to have one or two large print version of its menu available behind the counter? Many are printed in house, particularly the ones that change them regularly.
It doesn't take long to change a font size.

Billboard advertising could have a sensor-triggered speaker that describes the advert when someone walks past. The technology exists. That would ensure that blind people would have the same access to the content that the sighted do. Do you think that businesses should include that feature when they post an ad on a billboard?

And flowers should have labels pinned to them to describe their smell to the nasally impaired.

Sarcasm out of the way, this at least shows imagination. It reminded me of the billboards in Blade Runner.

As a point of fact, and personal experience, such a system already does exist and is in common use. Not common enough IMHO and goes unnoticed by most people.

As for your last point, I have already demonstrated that for one site at least, it absolutely can't be done. What is your solution to that issue? Given that you've admitted you're not a developer, I would like to see your real-world solutions to the issue. How would you make the Dylan site accessible to the blind without spending any more money or compromising the ROI?

You haven't demonstrated anything. Which site - Dylan or game? I'm not a developer - do the new innovations in flash I linked to still make it so that it can't present the content to a blind person?

I sent a Dylan message. What about entering text in boxes is so impossible in a blind accessible format?

The lower half of the screen seems to be just a picture - No tags - Why?

The site detects when I have the features it needs turned off - Is that part of the code? Can it detect someone using access software? Maybe a developer knows.

Is a small, tagged link at the bottom and a bog-standards HTML page of explanation too hard? Would such a thing cost the same as the whole site? Same for the game.

Something could be done. In most cases something could be done. Not perfect, not giving blind people able-bodied experiences but something could be done. In many cases, simple, old-fashioned, quick and easy to write code and some unformatted text. The simpler the code probably for the better.

Something can always be done - Woolly excuses and fallacious arguments seem to show that nothing is done for no good reason.

.

 

[ponderingturtle]

The reason behind the success of the Internet is because it puts anyone with a connection and some free time on the same playing field as large corporations. Corporations can deal with the expenses incurred by ridiculous over-regulation of a nanny state trying to make everything in life fair, by force.

The blogger who exposes the next government scandal cannot.

why is a blog an immage? If you write a blog and post a picture of it would seem to be the way that this would be un accessable. Text is accessable. Also unless the blog is selling something I don't think anyone serious is proposing it needs to be accessable/

 

[Phrost]

why is a blog an immage? If you write a blog and post a picture of it would seem to be the way that this would be un accessable. Text is accessable. Also unless the blog is selling something I don't think anyone serious is proposing it needs to be accessable/

I wasn't just speaking about blogs specifically. Internet forums too, such as this one and my own, can do a lot of good by educating the community and providing (literally) a forum for discussion.

I'd wager that 95% or better of the discussion forums on the Internet are privately owned and operated by individuals and not large corporate entities. Many make little to no profit and are operated as labors of love or as hobbies.

The more regulation you apply, the less freedom people have to both innovate, and operate. And guys like me who can't afford to do backflips every single time a new regulation comes down requiring us to be accessible to the next micro-minority group, will be run out of the game. Consequently, the level of participation by the public goes down that much more.

Life is not fair. Nature sure as hell isn't. And any time you see the words "fair" and "government" side by side, it usually doesn't mean the weaker and less fortunate are being given a leg up to the level of the average citizen. It usually means the average joe is having his legs kicked out from under him in order to be on the same level as the less fortunate, in the name of "equality".

That said, if this were a case of having a standard accepted practice for webmasters to make a "best effort" at accessibility, I'd have no issue with it. I generally do this anyway. But the notion of having someone come into my e-backyard and tell me I need to build a handicapped ramp is asinine, and nothing more than an attempt at chipping away at the rights of property owners; be they digital or brick and mortar.

 

[Gurdur]

.....Something could be done. In most cases something could be done. Not perfect, not giving blind people able-bodied experiences but something could be done. In many cases, simple, old-fashioned, quick and easy to write code and some unformatted text. The simpler the code probably for the better.

Something can always be done - Woolly excuses and fallacious arguments seem to show that nothing is done for no good reason.

Exactly. Well-said and seconded.

 

[ponderingturtle]

I wasn't just speaking about blogs specifically. Internet forums too, such as this one and my own, can do a lot of good by educating the community and providing (literally) a forum for discussion.

I'd wager that 95% or better of the discussion forums on the Internet are privately owned and operated by individuals and not large corporate entities. Many make little to no profit and are operated as labors of love or as hobbies.

In what ways are they not accessable? The thing would seem to be the tags at the bottom.

 

[tkingdoll]

H3LL, we seem to be talking about different aspects of the Dylan site. I am talking about the finished product - once you have input your text and sent the link off to your friends for them to view your message on the site, there is simply no way of a blind person being able to know what you typed. Flash just does not do that. That site simply can't be accessible to the blind, end of story.

I agree that there are some aspects of some sites which could be improved. But it does seem that you are arguing for the whole internet to be accessible and that simply isn't going to happen. And restaurants aren't going to print large print or braille versions of their menus because they don't get enough (or any) blind customers for it to be worth the extra cost. Ditto websites. Even an hour of extra development time can take a project over budget. Clients will make savings where they can. Unless there is a good reason for them to think a blind person will want to view their website (and in the case of something like a videogame website, I can't imagine what that reason would be) then there's simply no reason to spend the extra money. That's how businesses work. When I say to a client "you realise that the site you want will not be accessible to people with older browers, for example those in the third world" they usually reply "that's not our priority so we're happy to let it go".

 

[Beerina]

And they add significant man hours to a project which most sites aren't worth paying for.

To quote Hillary Clinton, "I (i.e. the government) can't be held accountable for every under-capitalized business out there."

I.e. "Tough [solid body waste], follow the law."

 

[ponderingturtle]

To quote Hillary Clinton, "I (i.e. the government) can't be held accountable for every under-capitalized business out there."

I.e. "Tough [solid body waste], follow the law."

But the other thing is that aren't accessable sites easier and cheaper than unaccessable? Basic text would seem to be easier than fancy flash crap, and it is the flash crap that makes things unaccessable.

 

[tkingdoll]

To quote Hillary Clinton, "I (i.e. the government) can't be held accountable for every under-capitalized business out there."

I.e. "Tough [solid body waste], follow the law."

It's NOT the law. It's only the law for sites which qualify as a 'shop window', that is, e-commerce sites. There's no law that says the blind have a right to be advertised to.