RE: Undue Burden and AOL

What about using audio descriptions.  I guess that that is also too
expensive to do.  I'm sorry, but making video content accessible is just as
important to me as making a web site accessible with alt text tags.  The
tests to do are two fold.  

	1.  Is the accessible solution proposed technically feasible?  

	2.  is it readily achievable?  Readily achievable can be looked at in
various ways as this is a very vague term.  Does it mean that you need to
go back and make everything accessible from the time you started doing
business on the net?  I don't think so, not when you put the arguement of
cost against the accessible solution in making the company go bankrupt.
However, I do believe that it means to plan and budget properly so that
future presnetations will take into account the need of accessible
solutions for all people.  

Just for your information, closed captioning on taped video content not
only gives access to the deaf/hard of hearing, but in conjunction with the
audio description which help theblind/visually impairred community, the
learning/cognitively impairred populations benefit by having the redundency
in information being presented.  Please remember this when you think about
wanting to make some type of video presentation via the web.  yes, it is
technically feasible and yes, it can be readily achievable if you plan and
budget properly for the accessible solution.  

Jeffrey Pledger 
President, Able Channel At 02:56 PM 11/26/99 -0800, Kynn Bartlett wrote:
>At 02:52 PM 11/26/1999 , jeffrey pledger wrote:
>>         What might be deemed as a compromise solution to the problem you
bring up
>>is a phased approach to making one's site completely accessible.  For if
>>you could put the arguement for not making your multi-media files
>>accessible, why wouldn't the same arguement work for mot making the web
>>site accessible for the blind/visually impairred? 
>
>Because in some cases it might be harder/more work/more expensive
>to make the web accessible to some groups than to others.
>
>For example, ALT text on images is a "poster child" for blind accessibility,
>and transcripts are the same for deaf accessibility.  However, it's easier
>and less time-consuming (and therefore less expensive) to add ALT text
>than to add a transcript.
>
>Some may wish to argue legal specifics here, and that's fine, but we
>have to also consider the economic impact of our demands, because that's
>what the people who make the decisions are going to have to consider
>as well.
>
>-- 
>Kynn Bartlett                                    mailto:kynn@hwg.org
>President, HTML Writers Guild                    http://www.hwg.org/
>AWARE Center Director                          http://aware.hwg.org/
>
>

Received on Friday, 26 November 1999 19:31:08 UTC