Accessibility

Hi Bob, I'm confused by some things here:

-- "all segments of the web that provide public services of any kind..." What kind of website is not a public service? Only an intranet, I'd wager, which is explicitly among consenting adults. Or do you mean "supported by taxation", which by definition is non-consensual? Or...?

-- If states have different laws, does that mean you can't deliver the same page to different areas? Under what rationale does a geographically-bound political force exert control over the global network?

-- I'm also still a bit ambiguous about that term "accessibility"... for websites people usually mean this as designing for similar use across multiple sensory modalities and with varying types of inputs (eg, sight-for-sound or sound-for-sight, motor or input differences, etc). But I don't see any mention of cognitive accessibility in these discussions... if I use a big word in a post, then doesn't that lock out a certain proportion of the public...?

Of these three, the second may be the most pertinent... huh? states have different requirements? like, uh, why!? Is it for their own government sites? If so, then have any met US Fed requirements yet...?

regarding John's comment(s):

"Under what rationale does a geographically-bound political force exert control over the global network?"

Ummm... we're talking about State laws which govern how their information/pages must be accessible... not some nefarious bid to control the world for pete sake.

"But I don't see any mention of cognitive accessibility in these discussions... if I use a big word in a post, then doesn't that lock out a certain proportion of the public..."

Awareness of cognitive impairment issues is a big start in the right direction. However, accomodating them is a notoriously difficult undertaking due to their highly subjective nature... The other impairments - Sight, sound, mobility are alot easier to address and accomodate. Beyond basic Universal/Usable design (small chunks of discrete content, clearly defined navigation, and purpose , etc.) I don't see how cognitive impairments could easily be addressed at what has to be an inherently high level (discussion threads, codified law, etc.)

As for the second "pertinent" question - "well duh - yeah they have seperate rules... Federal laws regarding accessibility Sect. 504, 508, etc.) only extend to states in relation to their receiving federal funds to support the programs/activities/sites in question. Which leaves alot of open ground. So - naturally they'd have their own rules.

Thanks for the comments all.

State policy operates like all policy. It governs activities in that state. In this case, it specifies what type of content should be generated by individual agencies. Perhaps more importantly, many states also have requirements on what technology can be acquired as well. This means if a state is interesting in purchasing a system to manage it’s park registration data, that system would need to be accessible. This is not a formal requirement in every state, but it is just as often an informal requirement. For example, agencies will often require that a tool work with a specific screen reader before they would consider buying that tool. The policy may not mandate it, but the buying agent can, just as they would mandate a certain degree of usability and compatibility with other systems.

In the private sector, this impact is felt, if not always directly. Let’s say I am a large, online retailer. Do I need to be accessible? It would be hard, if not impossible to force a company based in Wisconsin to meet the requirements in Arkansas. However, the power of these state policies is that they can use the purchasing power to influence behavior of their vendors. If I want to become a government reseller in Arkansas as an online retailer, I will have to answer to a purchasing agent who asks me how accessible my site is. If the answer is, not very, then I risk having a competitor say that they are accessible. In my experience, few vendors are willing to take this risk.

Cognitive disabilities often gets short shrift. Macromedia is participating in some research in that area at the University of East London. As a former teacher, it is an issue particularly close to my heart. One technique related to making content accessible to people with cognitive disabilities is to keep language simple. Does this mean all web content should use a simple vocabulary. Of course not. The audience matters. This blog targets a group with a certain familiarity with Flash and Macromedia products. I will frequently use words like ActionScript, instance and movie clip and assume people know what I mean. However, if I were writing to a broader audience, I might write a little differently.

As a side note, I am really interested in what Flash and Director can do for people with cognitive disabilities. There are lots of tools that help folks with cognitive disabilities by facilitating reading visually and with audio. I am proud to say that many of these tools use Director and Flash. Don Johnston makes several of good ones.