Re: Concerns with Accessibe joining W3C

Hi Karen,

I'll start by offering an observation: I've never personally heard anyone
say they were W3C compliant - I've heard WCAG compliant, but I cannot
recall W3C compliant. Nonetheless I take your point.

I think you raise some good questions/points, but at this time I must state
that I do not speak on behalf of the W3C (I'm just an old
opinionated punter who's been kicking around a long time) and your comments
are "above my pay grade" (LOL). I believe the conversation you'd like to
see happen should be kicked off by W3C management and staff, and as such I
will defer any further comment to them (and I know that Shawn Henry is
likely monitoring this discussion).

FWIW, I do share your concern about accountability of sites who claim
conformance to the WCAG Recommendation when it is demonstrably not true (I
am working on a proposal for WCAG 3 that I hope to present to that Working
Group soon that may help address that), but that is a secondary discussion
that I believe needs to be separated from the "...we shouldn't let XYZ
Widget Co. into the W3C because they do things we don't agree with..."
discussion. That becomes a slippery slope, and one that I personally
believe is both dangerous to W3C's larger credibility, but also one that
could be interpreted as discriminatory (which I also find to be tragically
ironic).

JF

On Sat, May 29, 2021 at 9:34 PM Karen Lewellen <klewellen@shellworld.net>
wrote:

> Hi John,
> what your post illustrates, rather well actually, and what Steve's does as
> well, is precisely the thing I asked about before.
> How the w3c exists broadly, and what individuals like Steve hear when
> seeking access are two different things.
> It is not  so much that Steve is misinformed, it is that in many ways the
> general public is as well.
> In conversations about inclusion, someone will state that they are w3c
> compliant..talking about accessibility.
> Does the w3c do many other things? certainly, does that mean there is not
> a part of the general public who associates the term with accessibility?
> likewise as well.
> Honestly? if long standing members like Steve reasonably believes that w3c
> equals dedication to accessibility..and likely little else,  what has the
> w3c done to prevent this kind of confusion?
> frankly the organization could use some large scale press, because in the
> day to day lives of a fair number of individuals experiencing
> disabilities, what happens here impacts their  paths to solutions, and it
> has the w3c's
> name on it.
> Does that make sense?
> Karen
>
>
>
> On Sat, 29 May 2021, John Foliot wrote:
>
> > Steve writes:
> >
> >> For a start, they actively discourage website owners from learning about
> > accessibility and fixing the issues with their websites. That is not some
> > peripheral opinion of theirs - it's the basis of their entire business
> > model. *That alone puts them completely at odds with the objectives of
> the
> > W3C and all its existing members.*
> >
> > Really? I'm sorry, but I believe you are now working under a very false
> > assumption. (Doubly so, as seemingly Test Partners is not even a W3C
> member
> > - https://www.w3.org/Consortium/Member/List#xT - although I would be
> happy
> > to learn otherwise.) I am curious to understand how you came to this
> > assertion?
> >
> > First, the W3C is about more than just accessibility (although the work
> and
> > contributions that happen inside the W3C's Web Accessibility Initiative
> to
> > advance digital accessibility is an important part of the W3C's mission).
> > First and foremost the W3C is a stakeholder consortium that focuses on
> > technical standards. It is NOT a 'social change' organization, and in
> fact,
> > with members from quite literally around the planet, including countries
> > with decidedly non-western political constructs like Russia and China,
> the
> > W3C walks a fine line there. (There has been some discussion within the
> > membership about that, and it proves to be a very tricky line to walk
> > indeed).
> >
> > You may or may not recall that within the W3C a while back there was
> quite
> > some consternation about supporting the EME
> > <https://www.w3.org/TR/encrypted-media/>, which, while not (NOT!!!!) DRM
> > (Digital Rights Management), was nonetheless technical work on
> developing a
> > standardized API for browsers to support Encrypted Media. There were
> > numerous "Open Web" advocates that wanted the W3C to avoid doing that
> work
> > ("DRM is Evil"), up-to and including the EFF "joining" the W3C to try and
> > block that work. They too came to realize that this was simply not how
> the
> > W3C operated, and that work continued despite major frustration from many
> > rank-and-file participants. (Sadly, the EFF does not appear to be a
> member
> > today - I suspect they did not renew their membership when they didn't
> win
> > their fight, but that is just a guess on my part.)
> >
> > Second, while accessibility *IS* an important part of the work the W3C
> > does, I suspect that there are more than one member who have joined the
> W3C
> > for reasons that had nothing to do with accessibility, and who perhaps
> have
> > joined because as a tech company they wish to also 'bask in the cache' of
> > being associated with the W3C - again for reasons that have nothing to do
> > with accessibility.
> >
> > For example, a quick visit to https://www.w3.org/TR/ - the 'repository'
> of
> > Technical Recommendations at the W3C - (thus the /TR) shows a lot of
> > emergent effort to address issues related to internationalization and
> > non-western characters and layouts. I suspect that most of the people
> > working on *THAT* pressing and far-reaching issue (also related to
> > equitable access) are not participating at the W3C for issues related to
> > accessibility.
> > (For the curious and those who like to learn new and interesting 'stuff',
> > check out:
> > https://w3c.github.io/typography/gap-analysis/language-matrix.html)
> >
> > In fact, some here may be surprised to learn that there is a W3C policy
> > that emergent specifications get an accessibility "horizontal review" (by
> > the Accessible Platform Architecture Working Group) SPECIFICALLY because
> > the majority of the active participants within the numerous working
> groups
> > at the W3C are equally unfamiliar with the nuances of accessibility
> > considerations, and the task of that Working Group is to help our fellow
> > W3C colleagues NOT create specifications that reinforce or frustrate
> > accessibility issues. And as an active member of that group, I can assure
> > you we still see items that, if we did not capture and report them, would
> > harm "accessibility" even further - so again, accessibility at the W3C is
> > important, but it is not the only driver, and it is NOT why all members
> > join the W3C.
> >
> > So respectfully Steve, while I truly do understand the frustration that
> > having accessiBe become members causes (and FWIW that ship has sailed -
> > they ARE members today <https://www.w3.org/Consortium/Member/List#xA>),
> > your assumptions and assertions of what the W3C's role and mission is are
> > somewhat misinformed. I stated earlier, while I too am disappointed and
> > frustrated with accessiBe and their business model, I would also fight
> > tooth and nail to retain accessiBe's right to join the W3C.
> >
> > Anything else is the antithesis of inclusion, and if nothing else, we
> need
> > to eat our own dogfood.
> >
> > Respectfully,
> >
> > JF
> >
> > On Sat, May 29, 2021 at 8:21 AM Steve Green <
> steve.green@testpartners.co.uk>
> > wrote:
> >
> >> I would agree with you if the only thing we knew about accessiBe is that
> >> they propose to become members. But we know a great deal more. For a
> start,
> >> they actively discourage website owners from learning about
> accessibility
> >> and fixing the issues with their websites. That is not some peripheral
> >> opinion of theirs - it's the basis of their entire business model. That
> >> alone puts them completely at odds with the objectives of the W3C and
> all
> >> its existing members.
> >>
> >> We know that not only does their tool not make a significant improvement
> >> to the websites it is applied to, but the tool itself has serious
> >> accessibility barriers. These could be easily fixed, but it is an
> >> indictment of the company's competence and/or commitment to
> accessibility
> >> that it either doesn't know about them or has chosen not to fix them.
> >>
> >> I do not believe that we should overlook these and their other
> behaviours
> >> when assigning motives or predicting their future actions.
> >>
> >> Steve
> >>
> >>
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >> From: Charles 'chaals' (McCathie) Nevile <chaals@yandex.ru>
> >> Sent: 29 May 2021 07:09
> >> To: w3c-wai-ig@w3.org
> >> Subject: Re: Concerns with Accessibe joining W3C
> >>
> >> Again, this is ascribing motives to individuals and making specific
> >> assertions about what they will do based on those motives. That is not
> >> reasonable behaviour.
> >>
> >> As Patrick pointed out, a vast amount of work done over the 24-year
> >> existence of WAI was done by private companies, or organisations funded
> by
> >> investment money, or individuals looking to be paid by someone.
> >>
> >> Investors can choose whatever reason, or combination of reasons, to put
> >> money into an organisation.
> >>
> >> Completely hypothetically (I neither know nor care about the specific
> >> details of this case), it is entirely possible that the series A money
> came
> >> from some organisation whose mission is to improve accessibility, and a
> >> condition of the funding is participation in W3C and demonstrating an
> >> improvement in the effectiveness of their work specifically to counter
> the
> >> current stream of bad-mouthing that many in the accessibility community
> >> raise against them, by actually answering the complaints with
> improvements.
> >>
> >> It is quite reasonable to point out things that don't work as
> advertised,
> >> or why a certain solution they develop fails to meet a certain
> requirement.
> >> It is reasonable in turn to question whether that requirement still
> makes
> >> sense. The point is to reach consensus on the answers to such
> questions. We
> >> have been doing that in WAI for 20-odd years, and should continue.
> >>
> >> cheers
> >>
> >> Chaals
> >>
> >> On Sat, 29 May 2021 01:56:00 +1000, Steve Green <
> >> steve.green@testpartners.co.uk> wrote:
> >>
> >>> Their investors expect the company to maximise the return on their
> >>> investment and won’t want anything to get in the way of that, >even if
> >>> it makes the world better.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> --
> >> Using Opera's mail client: http://www.opera.com/mail/
> >>
> >>
> >
> > --
> > *John Foliot* | Senior Industry Specialist, Digital Accessibility
> >
> > "I made this so long because I did not have time to make it shorter." -
> > Pascal "links go places, buttons do things"
> >



-- 
*John Foliot* | Senior Industry Specialist, Digital Accessibility

"I made this so long because I did not have time to make it shorter." -
Pascal "links go places, buttons do things"