- From: David Poehlman <poehlman@clark.net>
- Date: Tue, 1 Dec 1998 21:41:53 -0500 (EST)
- To: Kynn Bartlett <kynn-hwg@idyllmtn.com>
- cc: love26@gorge.net, "w3c-wai-ig@w3.org" <w3c-wai-ig@w3.org>
hmmm, a post of mine didn't make it to the list but you said it better. On Tue, 1 Dec 1998, Kynn Bartlett wrote: _At 07:41 a.m. 12/01/98 -0800, William Loughborough wrote: _>Although I'm not much of one for being concerned about Political _>Correctness or even what things are called it seems to me that we might _>substitute "Inclusive Design" for the rather vague "universal design" _>since it says something about what we're really talking about and _>promotes the central notion of our "aboutness". Inclusion is furthered _>by inclusive design, etc. _ _At risk of starting a semantics/"politically correct" debate, I _don't like the idea of "inclusive design" because the connotations _of "inclusive" seem to imply an active* "outreach" to a group of _people* who have special needs* in order to be included. _ _I marked with a * the items that I think are questionable. While I _do believe that inclusive/universal design is important for granting _access to our friends with various disabilities, I don't feel that _it's necessary to emphasize these as "extra work you have to do to _provide for the blind and handicapped", which is how many people _will interpret what's said above. _ _I don't think you need to _actively_ "reach out and include" people _as part of universal design; the strength of the term universal _design (or a similar concept) is that the web pages can be used _by anyone or anything, not just that they're "including" some _minority group. Sad to say, there is a backlash against "inclusion", _at least in many parts of the US -- witness Mr. Raspberry's _mean-spirited little tirade in the Washington Post. If it smacks _of "political correctness", many people will have knee-jerk _reactions against even simple common sense suggestions, let alone _anything that truly is just. _ _For these reasons I feel we get farther by emphasizing that the _benefits of "universal design" grant "inclusion" to whatever people _may be lacking it, PLUS it makes it easier for non-standard high- _tech browsers to use the web, PLUS it makes it easier for search _engines and other intelligent sifters to parse your site, PLUS _blah blah blah. Sell it all as a package, and we're much more _likely to get at least ONE point that speaks to the listener. _ _In short, people suck, and most don't care about being "inclusive", _so if we put all our eggs in a basket with that label, we'll be _screwed. _ _-- _Kynn Bartlett <kynn@idyllmtn.com> http://www.idyllmtn.com/~kynn/ _Chief Technologist & Co-Owner, Idyll Mountain Internet; Fullerton, California _Enroll now for web accessibility with HTML 4.0! http://www.hwg.org/classes/ _The voice of the future? http://www.hwg.org/opcenter/w3c/voicebrowsers.html _ -- Hands-On-Technolog(eye)s touching the internet voice: 1-(301) 949-7599 poehlman@clark.net ftp://ftp.clark.net/pub/poehlman http://www.clark.net/pub/poehlman Dynamic solutions Inc. Best of service for your Small Business network Needs Http://www.dnsolutions.com
Received on Tuesday, 1 December 1998 21:42:02 UTC