RE: A proposal for changing the guidelines

Hi Charles,

    I am not advocating that we address particular regulations --  but I
think we should address the issue of whether the guidelines are developed in
such a fashion that they can be reasonably used for evaluating good effort
toward access.   It is difficult indeed.   But if we cant figure it out -
then it is doubtful that others will be able to.  And whether reasonable and
effective regs are developed is quite important to what we are about.

I also think that this needs to be carefully coordinated with the Evaluation
and Repair Group...  though it isn't something they can fix if we don't do
our job effectively.

I don't know what if anything we could or should do.  But I think we should
address it at the face-to-face   -  so I brought it up here to allow anyone
else who wont be there to voice an opinion or give input.

Gregg


-- ------------------------------
Gregg C Vanderheiden Ph.D.
Professor - Human Factors
Dept of Ind. Engr. - U of Wis.
Director - Trace R & D Center
Gv@trace.wisc.edu, http://trace.wisc.edu/
FAX 608/262-8848
For a list of our listserves send "lists" to listproc@trace.wisc.edu

 -----Original Message-----
From: 	Charles McCathieNevile [mailto:charles@w3.org]
Sent:	Monday, March 13, 2000 9:48 AM
To:	Gregg Vanderheiden
Cc:	w3c-wai-gl@w3.org
Subject:	RE: A proposal for changing the guidelines

I agree that we should think this through. And I think we should conclude
(in
my humble, but considered opinion) that it is inappropriate for a body which
has undertaken the task of finding out what (internationally) are the
requirements for accessibility of the web to add to the onerous task the
requirement of fitting in with International law, an area in which most of
us
are woefully ignorant. Slightly less appropriate, of course, would be to
base
our work on the law of a couple of countries just because we know it better.

The education and outreach group has a specific mission to develop materials
and raise awareness among policy makers. Perhaps we should be providing them
with more feedback if we feel that there are specific areas that need to be
looked at differently from a policy perspective than from an accessibility
perspective. If we know of a particular country that is going to make a
decision we think is inappropriate, then those of us who are citizens of
that
country, and the EO group as a representative of W3C, should make
submissions
to the relevant bodies. But I seriously doubt we know enough about law and
policy around the world to be able to incorporate it into the priority
scheme
in a helpful way, especially given the constant change both in it and in the
state of the art.

cheers

Charles McCN

On Mon, 13 Mar 2000, Gregg Vanderheiden wrote:

  Some short notes and an important call....

  Short Notes (opinions not rulings)

  4) We should look again at the interaction of our priority guidelines and
  regulations.   In the past our priorities have been determined basically
by
  what makes a page accessible.... Not by its ease of implementation.     If
  regulations are going to say Priority 1 and 2  -  then we need to think
this
  through carefully.  I hate to say this but I think we do.

Received on Monday, 13 March 2000 21:55:48 UTC