A Review of Literature Relating to Web Accessibility and Ageing

I looked at this draft because the possibility of getting my mother to 
use the web has arisen again.

Whilst I think it covers the difficulties of elderly users, and what 
could be done to alleviate them, well, I think it is weak in terms of 
looking at "web designers"

My feeling is that the question that needs an answer is, "now that you 
have been told what is important, will you include them in your future 
designs?", and, if the honest answer is what I think it is, one then 
needs to cover ways of making it attractive to web designers (and their 
employers) to design for the elderly, when designing pages for general 
consumption.

My feeling is that the honest answer to this guestion, in respect of 
many of the suggestions, would be either "never", or "only on pages 
specifically targetted for the elderly".

I think the existing paper starts from the premise that the aim of web 
designers is to inform, when it is really to attract and, often, to 
directly influence, those people with a large amount of discretion in 
how to spend money.  In that context, it is perceived wisdom that many 
of the suggested features, although obvious good for usability, are 
things that should never be done.

-- 
David Woolley
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Received on Tuesday, 22 July 2008 21:12:31 UTC