JD on EP

Hi John,

I agree with your point that multimedia can be far more effective in communicating a message than text alone. Those that use it wisely, like the OTA, do indeed, "get the Web."

But, I think you're missing the point about accessibility. People with disabilities buy groceries too, and the agency that developed the piece for the OTA could have made the Flash content accessible to that audience without much trouble.

Buttons should have text labels and one should be able to activate them using a keyboard.

Video as compelling as "Store Wars" deserves to be captioned. There are several tools (Hi-Caption, NCAM's MAGpie, and Captionate) that make this easy to do in Flash, especially when a script or transcript exists.

I'm not finger-pointing; just trying to raise awareness. StoreWars.org is a great site and the widest possible audience should be able to experience it.

You've got me confused here... I didn't say anything about text captions being bad. I said that turning an experience into a linear stream of spoken text is not the sole measure of whether an audience can make use of that experience.

My point is that "accessibility" is rarely defined solely as "can you make a machine say it, one word at a time?".

With Flash, we can make multimedia experiences accessible to many more types of users than just those who can, or who prefer to, point and click with a mouse, or those who have their speakers turned up, or those who have perfect vision. We developers have to get into the habit of thinking about and testing for those kinds of users. In doing so, we make our experiences better for all users.

Experience matters, right!

I'm a disabled Flash developer and believe it or not, I totally agree with John. I'm not blind, mind you, but his point would be like someone insisting the Mona Lisa should be allowed to be touched by a blind patron at the Louvre in order to feel the canvas and painted texture.

I'm well aware that I'm being very 'un-pc' but truth is truth regardless of a need for everyone to feel the same. I would NEVER expect something like the Parthenon to be 'ramped over' just for me or anyone else in a chair. I'm an artist first.

I've been asked to take more accessability issues into consideration and in a practical sense, I indeed try to but I can't accurately narrate the visual aspect of the UI or a painting or a 'sight gag'. It doesn't work.

In a corporate sense, in 99% of the cases, accessibility is an afterthought, generally introduced by their lawyers. Harsh but true.

I suppose I should expect to get flamed to some degree here but I certainly hope not. Flash IS about bringing an experience. Whether it be sensory or by content, nothing can truly cater to everyone equally. The earth's pretty interesting like that.

Brian Gilbert
Darklight Studio

Brian,

I'm not talking about the Mona Lisa here. I'm talking about software. To me, testing for basic UI behaviors, like being able to activate a button by tabbing to it and hitting the Enter key, or adding a name property for a button by using the Accessibility panel doesn't seem like too much to ask.

As for the Parthenon:

http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/_w_articles_politics_10799257_13/08/2004_45956

I hope you get to visit it someday.