RE: [320] Ability to be expressed in words

Joe, please see messages from me, Paul Bohman, and others about this
issue.  They're in the list archive from back in the Spring, and the
subject line reads as follows:

RE: REF 1.1a - Add definition to 1.1 for ability to be expressed in
words

As you'll see if you follow that thread, there are a number of people in
the working group who share at least some of your belifes about the
complex relationships between words and images and would like to find
better language for this and related checkpoints.  Please give us a
concrete suggestions for language we might be able to use and I assure
you we'll consider it.

Thanks.
John

John Slatin, Ph.D.
Director, Institute for Technology & Learning
University of Texas at Austin
FAC 248C
1 University Station G9600
Austin, TX 78712
ph 512-495-4288, f 512-495-4524
email jslatin@mail.utexas.edu
web http://www.ital.utexas.edu
 


-----Original Message-----
From: Joe Clark [mailto:joeclark@joeclark.org] 
Sent: Thursday, August 21, 2003 12:56 pm
To: WAI-GL
Subject: Re: [320] Ability to be expressed in words



> Ability to be expressed in words
> This refers to content whose function or intended purpose can be 
> expressed accurately and unambiguously in a reasonable number of words

> (for example, diagrams, charts, illustrations,etc.)

I repeat my complaint that WAI and the WCAG WG continue to delude
themselves that everything can be boiled down to a "reasonable number of
words," i.e., "diagrams, charts, illustrations, etc." are actually
superfluous and offer no marginal benefit over "reasonable number[s]" of
words.

WAI and WCAG WG members obviously, after having had four years to study
this issue, still fail to understand that people draw "diagrams, charts,
illustrations" because *data relationships cannot be adequately summed
up in words*. Words-words-words: That's all WAI wants on every Web page
everywhere, save of course for those Web pages that must be
"supplemented" with "non-text content" for people with learning
disabilities.

It is false to contend that "diagrams, charts, illustrations"
categorically constitute content that can be expressed in words. WAI and
the WCAG WG continue to flaunt their ignorance of the philosophy and
practice of "diagrams, charts, illustrations," yet WAI and WCAG WG have
the temerity to dictate to the rest of the world that "diagrams, charts,
illustrations" can be "expressed accurately and unambiguously in a
reasonable number of words."

I'll give you the same homework assignment I gave you before:

<http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/w3c-wai-ig/2003JanMar/0291.html>

Take ten examples from each of Edward Tufte's volumes and "express
[them] accurately and unambiguously in a reasonable number of words."

WAI and WCAG WG peck away at picayune peripheral issues, tending to get
even those wrong, and never quite twig to the fact that their central
themes are even more wrong.

--

  Joe Clark  |  joeclark@joeclark.org
  Author, _Building Accessible Websites_
  <http://joeclark.org/access/> | <http://joeclark.org/book/>

Received on Saturday, 23 August 2003 02:58:39 UTC