Re: Fwd: Accessibility, discrimination, and WCAG 2.0

At 7:09 PM -0700 10/22/00, Anne Pemberton wrote:
>At 07:58 PM 10/21/00 -0700, Kynn Bartlett wrote:
>>2.  If we give "use alt text" and "use graphics" the same status,
>>      then we are demanding graphics on all pages or we are saying
>  >     that alt text may not be that important.
>Kynn,
>     Is the only time alt tags are needed for graphics? Are there other
>elements for which alt tags are used? If not, describing the need for alt
>tags along with explaining the need for graphics seems to tie them together.

No, my point actually is that most of us consider the ALT attribute on
IMG to be an "absolute" -- it's a "must do".  I'm arguing that we
also need to consider to what degree "explanatory graphics" should
be considered mandatory.  For certain people, there _will_ be absolute
needs for images; they won't be able to understand what a page is
about without those graphics.  This is analogous to the idea that
without ALT text, some users likewise won't be able to understand the
page.

When Charles Munat asks if "explanatory graphics" should be legally
required, he is asking a good question.

>  >3.  While acknowledging that it increases usability for everyone,
>>      might it be possible that graphics represents a "good to do"
>  >     concept and not a "must do"?
>Are alt-tags merely "good to do", or a "must do"?

They're clearly a "must do."  The question posed in #2 is whether or
not these are equivalent situations.

Is your answer that they are?  (I don't think it's an obvious
equivalency, and certainly up to some debate.)

If we have established that "explanatory graphics" are a "must do",
then next we have to explain how exactly someone accomplishes that,
and be able to identify when they have met the need.

There are pages out there (no URI handy, sorry) which spell out
exactly how to add ALT text (and longdesc) to images to increase
accessibility -- we need a similar one for "explanatory graphics."

>  >4.  Who decides whether the material is written at an "appropriate"
>>      level?  Without any way to gauge this, it's left to the author's
>>      discretion.  Will that be sufficient when a person with
>>      cognitive disabilities writes to the webmaster and says "this is
>  >     too complex for me"?
>If a cognitively disabled person can identify a page with needed
>information as "too complex for me" via e-mail or mail, the page is too
>complex for an awful lot of people who couldn't or didn't write, and the
>author has sorely missed his mark in judging his "audience".

That's a dangerous assumption, though, don't you think?  That if one
person is, for whatever reason, unable to understand a page -- there
is necessarily a problem?

How would you write a guideline for this?

>   Is the webmaster required to rewrite the
>>      entire site because of one cognitively disabled person, or is
>>      it a WCAG-sanctioned defense to say "I don't expect people of
>  >     your cognitive level to use this site"?
>Yep, and that will put him in the news as a bad guy!

Actually, I don't believe that the news media is the best place to
fight this battle, and it may ultimately be counterproductive in the
area of access by people with cognitive disabilities.  Many of us on
this mailing list, and most web designers in general, have a hard
time with this issue, and I can't imagine that, say, a story about
the W3C site being protested by people with disabilities would make
much sense to the average person.

>Seriously, it will
>depend on the intended audience. If the audience is the taxpayers of the
>U.S. then a certain degree of cognitive ability can be assumed to have the
>capacity to pay taxes. Ditto for voters. But information on rights that
>apply to those with cognitive disabilities has to go further in meeting
>their audience than the IRS does ... Ditto for information on social
>security and medicare ...

How do you define this, though?  And how do you deal with other issues
on non-government web sites?

What level of cognitive ability _is_ necessary to pay taxes?  In the
private sector, what level of cognitive ability is necessary to
use e-commerce?

When people come to our guidelines, they are going to want answers
like this -- and won't want to simply be told "do the right thing"
when that is undefined.  Thus it falls to us (as a working group) to
define exactly how and when sites need to consider those with
cognitive disabilities, because the average web designer is not an
expert in cognitive disabilities and is going to rely upon us to
tell them what's necessary.

So -- what's necessary? :)

--Kynn
-- 
--
Kynn Bartlett <kynn@idyllmtn.com>
http://www.kynn.com/

Received on Monday, 23 October 2000 03:00:48 UTC