- From: Gregg Vanderheiden <po@trace.wisc.edu>
- Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 16:27:41 -0600
- To: "'Uaccess-L'" <uaccess-l@trace.wisc.edu>, "EASI (E-mail)" <gv@trace.wisc.edu (TO EASI via CJTG)>, "'GL - WAI Guidelines WG'" <w3c-wai-gl@w3.org>
>From the web page
http://www.newsbytes.com/pubNews/128454.html
NEWSBYTES(R) Top Story
W3C Proposes Guidelines On Web Accessibility
25 Mar 1999, 3:12 PM CST
By Laura Randall, Newsbytes.
CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS, U.S.A.,
Charging that most Web sites don't provide adequate
accessibility for users with disabilities, the World Wide
Web Consortium (W3C) released draft guidelines on how Web
site designers and managers can provide better access to all
Internet users.
The guidelines, which were developed by the consortium's Web
Accessibility Initiative, are aimed at creating greater
awareness in the Web community of users who operate in
contexts different from the average Web user, including
persons who are visually or hearing impaired, those who
cannot a keyboard or mouse and those using text- only
screens.
"The majority of large sites are not accessible to people
with disabilities," Judy Brewer, director of the Web
Accessibility Initiative, tells Newsbytes. "There's not a
consistent level of awareness yet among Web developers that
it's important to maintain accessibility of their sites."
The World Wide Web Consortium, or W3C, is an industry group
that develops technologies used for the Web. Its hundreds of
members include AT&T, America Online, IBM, Microsoft and
SAP. Implementation of the guidelines is subject to member
approval.
The guidelines discuss accessibility issues and provide
accessible design solutions. For example, one way to make
Web sites more accessible is by using style sheets to
control font styles and eliminating the font element. This
gives hypertext markup language (HTML) authors more control
over their pages and makes those pages more accessible to
people with low vision.
Another guideline explains how content developers can make
images accessible by providing a text equivalent that states
the purpose of the image. This would allow a blind Internet
user with a speech synthesizer installed on his computer to
understand the function of the image. The total cost to the
Web site designer has yet to be established, Brewer said.
Other groups are also pushing for improved accessibility on
the Web. Disabilities Information Resources, a Trenton,
N.J.-based organization, is urging Web site managers to
voluntarily provide complete access to Internet users before
anti-discrimination challenges arise in conjunction with the
Americans with Disabilities Act.
"We don't think it's intentional discrimination, but it
would make more sense to address this before any problems
arise," DINF spokesman Phil Hall tells Newsbytes
For the most part, Web sites large and small are unaware of
the process involved in making their sites accessible and
maintaining that accessibility, Brewer said.
Jeff Thomas, director of marketing at iSyndicate, admits
that accessibility isn't a top priority at the San
Francisco-based Internet content service provider right now.
But, he adds: "It's on our radar screen. It seems like
something we would ethically want to do. The short-term
answer is we aren't doing anything now. The long-term answer
is it's definitely something we'd want to consider."
Reported by Newsbytes News Network, http://www.newsbytes.com
.
(1999032499/Contact: Phil Hall, Open City Communications,
212-714-3575 /WIRES ONLINE/W3C/PHOTO)
Copyright (c) Post-Newsweek Business Information, Inc. All
rights reserved.
For more NEWSBYTES(R) see http://www.newsbytes.com
Received on Friday, 26 March 1999 17:21:39 UTC