Re: URGENT: Help

Francisco,
 I don't know much about accessibility law in Portugal but it is often
helpful if you relate things like this to physical access law which people
seem to understand better.  Curb-cuts are a great example! They do cost more
to install and a retrofit is even worse but the benefits have turned out to
be great, far beyond the wheelchair access it was meant for.  I don't think
we really know how far reaching accessible web design will be but I think we
can safely predict that it will be useful for other emerging technologies
such as telephone web access.
Another good point is that "retrofit" is always more expensive so the sooner
new web design meets the criteria the less retrofit, i.e. less expense.
Marti

-----Original Message-----
From: Francisco Godinho <f.godinho@mail.telepac.pt>
To: WAI Interest Group <w3c-wai-ig@w3.org>
Cc: guia.pasig@bigfoot.com <guia.pasig@bigfoot.com>; Dolphin - Neill McBride
<support@dolphinaccess.com>; Hadar - Hans Sundstrõm
<hans.sundstrom@hadar.amu.se>; CAPS - Luis Azevedo <pclma@alfa.ist.utl.pt>;
IBM - SNS - Phill Jenkins <pjenkins@us.ibm.com>; IBM - SNS - Jim Thatcher
<thatch@us.ibm.com>; IBM - Robert B. Mahaffey <bmahaffe@us.ibm.com>; Javier
Romañach <jromanac@dial.eunet.es>; Alexis Donnelly
<Alexis.Donnelly@cs.tcd.ie>; Emmanuelle Gutiérrez y R.
<sinarmaya@mx3.redestb.es>; Francisco Antonio Soeltl
<fsoeltl@micropower.com.br>; Hadar - Jens Hansen <jens.hansen@hadar.amu.se>;
SIVA - Massimo Ferrario <massimo.ferrario@siva.it>; WAI - Judy Brewer
<jbrewer@w3.org>; Ricardo Silva <rsilva@pobox.com>; Microsoft - Gary M.
Moulton <garymo@microsoft.com>; Microsoft - David A. Bolnick
<davebo@microsoft.com>; NCAM - Larry Goldberg <Larry_Goldberg@wgbh.org>;
NCAM - Geoff Freed <Geoff_Freed@wgbh.org>; Robert Neff
<rcn@fenix2.dol-esa.gov>; SIVA - Renzo Andrich <renzo.andrich@siva.it>;
Sun - Earl Jonhson <earl.johnson@eng.sun.com>; Sylvie Duchateau
<sduchate@hall.snv.jussieu.fr>; Waddell, Cynthia
<cynthia.waddell@ci.sj.ca.us>
Date: Friday, July 23, 1999 7:04 AM
Subject: URGENT: Help


>Dear friends,
>
>The Portuguese law about web accessibility is ready to be
>approved or rejected by the Government in few days.
>
>This law, in Portugal, could be very important to
>web accessibility in Europe and Brazil.
>
>However, there is one question that is crucial for the decision:
>Some members of the Government think that
>accessible web authoring is expensive and difficult.
>
>I have 24 hours to summarize some arguments
>(one page) to overcome this lack of information.
>I would be grateful if you could help me today.
>
>In the W3C/WAI FAQs, I  found some arguments:
>
>9. Does it cost more to make a site accessible?
>http://www.w3.org/1999/05/WCAG-REC-fact.html#text
>
>Designing a new site to be accessible should not add significantly to
>development cost. Some aspects of accessibility, such as use of style
>sheets, can actually reduce the costs of maintaining or updating sites, and
>this benefit should increase over time as style sheets are more evenly
>implemented in browsers and available as an authoring strategy in authoring
>tools.
>
>For existing sites, the ease or difficulty of making sites accessible
>depends on a variety of factors, including the size of a site, the
>complexity of a site, and the authoring tool that was used to make a site.
>Periodic upgrades or reviews of sites can be good opportunities to review
>the accessibility of sites. When compared with the broader audience that a
>site is available to, and the greater usability for other users as well,
>accessible sites can be cost-effective.
>[end]
>
>I think that I need more arguments.
>
>Should I alert for the production's cost of alternative formats
>like braille or audio tapes  ?
>
>Thank you for your help
>Francisco Godinho
>Co-coordinator of the Petition for the Accessibility of the Portuguese
>Internet
>PASIG - Portuguese Accessibility Special Interest Group
>http://www.acessibilidade.net/index_eng.html
>
>
>

Received on Friday, 23 July 1999 07:31:34 UTC