- From: David Poehlman <poehlman1@home.com>
- Date: Thu, 27 Dec 2001 15:29:43 -0500
- To: <w3c-wai-ig@w3.org>, "William R Williams/R5/USDAFS" <wrwilliams@fs.fed.us>
I think that was my only personal remark to him but It has rought your excellent message into which I have inserted comments marked with dp: a question or two too. ----- Original Message ----- From: "William R Williams/R5/USDAFS" <wrwilliams@fs.fed.us> To: <w3c-wai-ig@w3.org> Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2001 3:03 PM Subject: Re: Jakob Nielsen's PDF format report Whazzup??????? I'm having a difficult time with this thread, and other recent postings, because some folks have (apparently) taken things personally. Perhaps this is good, as emotionally-charged writings reflect the importance of the web accessibility issue. On the other hand, how does one sincerely move toward full accessibility if personality influences everything...a state which leads to powerful disagreements? dp: personality is a fact of life but I do agree that it gets a little high in the mix some times. Often, it is not accessibility in this instance for instance that we squabble about but something in the tone of a message or a remark in the message that has nothing to do with accessibility or perhaps just out of sheer frustration due to our humanity. I am mostly of a mind that email is just email. No wonder web accessibility is such a mess. The organization for whom I work (i.e., USDA Forest Service) purchased the NNGroup Beyond ALT Text... report and made it available for my co-workers upon my request. I believe the report is targeting workers in the web development field and that particular audience will likely count Adobe Acrobat as one of their development tools...it shouldn't be a problem that this report is available only in pdf format. dp: it is not a problem that it is available in pdf If the pdf is accessible and easily convertable into something that web developpers who cannot use acrobat reader to read it can still have access to it in braille or in audio. It certainly isn't a waste of money either -- the 75 design guidelines alone are worth the purchase. The guidelines offer nothing startling, just solid design techniques that are worth the reminder. Too, that it is research-based adds credibility to the entire concept. Research based. While no one here talks about screen magnification, the report does while providing guidelines to deal with it. dp: Screen magnification comes up quite a bit on this list and deffinitely in my testing so I don't think the reort has anything over us but since I cannot read it, I won't know unless it is provided. Instead of troubling ourselves with "his majesty," the price of the report, or its usability; why not focus on its utility? dp: because in order to focus on its utility, I have to be able to read it. As I have gone about trying to explain to my co-workers about issues such as constructing valid html files, implementing document structure, offering alternatives to pdfs, understanding the conversion (to html) process, labelling appropriately, etc.; I have met with a lot of resistence, even from so-called "web producers," who often believe that hacking out a FrontPage site is sufficient for presentation on the web. Take a look at the "crap" we put out, starting at: http://www.fs.fed.us/ ...it's embarrassing, Section 508 has changed what we do very little (tho' we're supposed to comply with it), and, still, many with whom I work believe they are expert. "Web minutae," "nirvana," and other such terms are offered up often when I try to explain the importance of professional mark-up to people who should know better. This is frustrating. dp: and I thought I was alone when I worked for a us federal web shop, I got the same brush off. It seems everyone believes they know all there is to know about web accessibility. Or, perhaps people are just compensating for a real lack of understanding (by being 'know-it-alls"). I don't know, and it's frustrating as well. dp: I'm learning all the time. I don't think the signals are that they think they know it all, It is just that there is a lot of frustration over things that are being made to seem so abnormal and abhorant. It kind of puts me in mind of the scare in the media last year before the 508 requirements hit the street about how difficult and ugly it was going to be to make things comply. Meanwhile, the web -- mostly constructed by so-called experts -- is 3 times easier to use for non-disabled people according to the Nielsen report. dp: If it is three times easier for non disabled people than for me than why is not every non disabled individual out there buying, selling, interacting, trading making and just plain having fun on it? I know my capabilities. A long time ago, I came to the conclusion that I must approach web development work with a sense of humility; mostly because things change so quickly and there is simply too much to fully understand. Plus, about the time one thinks they're any good, along comes a site that just knocks your socks off. I think being humble might help others here -- no one's expert. dp: I guess this depends on how yu define expert and remember, this is a continuum. Skills you learned and which stood you in good stead several years ago will still stand you in good stead now but newer skill sets are emerging out of the continuum that were not available when your quest began. For instance, I am of the mind that many things are separate. I grew up with radio and tv and vynal discs and cassette tapes and that stint with 8 track for a while and so on. After I was grown along came the internet for us and I've seen more changes over the past 10 years on it than I saw the entire time I was growing up with tv, radio and audio recording. Now, we are at a point where all of this stuff is connected and while I can intellectualize it, my peers who are 20 years younger live and breath it as I lived and breathed my environment at that point in my life. This makes for a completely different view on things and there are other things that might cause something to knock your socks off too but that does not mean you have to be humble because of it although I don't knock humility. I joined this list due to a recognition that the W3C is the clear leader in the world of web development. And there's much to learn. Please let's work together to make it a better web. Thanks. dp: Thank you. ====================== Bill Williams Communication Technician USDA Forest Service, Region 5 707.562.9005 wrwilliams@fs.fed.us ====================== Stay we no longer, dreaming of renown, But sound the trumpets, and about our task. --William Shakespeare "David Poehlman" To: "Scott Luebking" <phoenixl@sonic.net>, <poehlman1@home <w3c-wai-ig@w3.org> .com> cc: Sent by: Subject: Re: Jakob Nielsen's PDF format w3c-wai-ig-requ report est@w3.org 12/27/01 10:00 AM stuff it. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Scott Luebking" <phoenixl@sonic.net> To: <w3c-wai-ig@w3.org> Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2001 12:36 PM Subject: Re: Jakob Nielsen's PDF format report Hi, One of the problems that the disabled community has is that in many ways it is isolated because of people's reactions and also some of the community's behavior. If there is any chance of getting through to people and educate them, it is not clear how this type of rhetoric helps in that direction. It now has me wondering if there is now a need for damage control. Scott > >>seems to me that if he was writing about accesibility, he'd have > >>had a perfect opportunity to demonstrate it. > > It would not have killed the mighty NNGroup to have published the > report in Acrobat 3 format (in keeping with his excellency's diktat > to use outdated Acrobat versions) *and* the accessible Acrobat 5. As > for accessibility in other forms-- it's essentially a printed report > in drag. The obvious course of action is to sell an audiotape and/or > a Braille version. Everybody's happy. (Impediment: The big fish in > that small pond, RFB&D, can take months to bother responding to > snatchmails and phone calls asking for a quote, and even then will > demonstrate breathtaking incompetence. That's one of many reasons why > my book ain't gonna be available in audiotape unless the Library of > Congress or similar entity does the job itself.) > > >His primary audience for this was not people with disabilities. > > That horse won't hunt. Discussions of accessibility must be accessible. > > >PS: Frankly, I find the price of Jakob's study much more > >objectionable than the delivery format. > > As professional reports go, it ain't that bad. Even I sell my reports > for vastly more than that. > > And for those of you trying to ply your "contacts" in the mighty > NNGroup for help: Keep in mind that his excellency can and will > forbid his employees to answer your mail if you displease him; > NNGroup distributes essentially no free copies of anything (not even > New Riders, his excellency's publisher and mine, gets comps of his > reports); and researchers refuse to answer even politely-posed > questions concerning small details of methodology (e.g., "How many > subjects did you survey?"). There are reasons why his excellency and > his royal consort are so very widely despised. The difference here, > as compared to people like me, is that his excellency and his consort > can get away with pretending the enemies do not exist.
Received on Thursday, 27 December 2001 15:29:17 UTC