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The Fear of Making Web Sites Accessible
When I browse the web, more often than not I find sites which are not very accessible, or not accessible at all, for that matter. When I start a conversation with the site owner about it, without an exception they all agree that sites should be accessible for people with disabilities. That's when I don't hesitate to throw in a couple of ideas on how to achieve accessibility.
However, often when I go back to the site later, not a thing has changed. So, what happened? We agreed it was a good idea. We came up with solutions on how to do it. In many cases, I find that site owners are held back by something which they think would negatively effect them, or their sites. When we dig into it a little more, it turns out that this fear could have been remedied, and accessibility could have been achieved without a compromise.
Sometimes the reason is the cost of redesign, or the fear of compromising the site quality. But there are many other reasons.
If you agree with me that web sites should be accessible to people with disabilities, but you have not made your site accessible yet, what is holding you back? Ideally what would you like to see to make you happily jump on making your site accessible? Is there anything you feel is out of your reach or possibilities to make it happen?
If you leave a comment and share it with the Even Grounds Blog readers, my promise to you is that I will address your concern, and suggest a solution on this blog.
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Great post - looking forward to the feedback
I hope you're able to garner some insight from your readers. I suspect making their web site accessible is on many site owners' to-do list but there are probably other items that have a higher priority in the day-to-day running of an organization that trump it. Eventually, the to-do will move to the top of the list ... I hope.
Company's to-do list
Sandi,
You have a great point there. Obviously, all companies have a to-do list. And unless we take care of the highest priority items, we cannot get to lower ones. And when a small company starts out, accessibility cannot be the highest. For the simple fact that we need to take care of day-to-day operations first. If I can't get new orders or can't pay taxes, accessibility has to be lower on the list. However, there are many other items on this list which usually stay on the same level together with accessibility. But let's say a small business has budget to accomplish 5 things and they have 20 would be nice to do items. Based on my experience, accessibility is usually not one of the 5. I believe that accessibility is not only the right thing to do to achieve equal access to all, but it actually does generate more income. Honestly, it is one of the best marketing tactics I have seen. Once you open up your site to people with disabilities, you will right away have more potential clients. Also, once you have an accessible site, you can directly advertise it to people with disabilities. Take it to conferences, mailing lists, events, etc. where mostly people with disabilities make decisions. It all of a sudden makes your product very competitive among a large nitch.
my thoughts on this topic
I'm one of the persons who'd really want to make our website
accessible, but I'm worried that, if we do make our site accessible for say, the blind users, such moves may in turn affect the browsing experience of persons with other disabilities such as the deaf.
Accessibility is for all
Steve,
The idea is to make a web site accessible to all. To all people who can't see, who can't hear or who live with any kind of a disability. And let me take it one step further. A site should be accessible to all people, with or without a disability.
It is certainly true that if you target one group of disabilities and try to develop a site exclusively accessible to them, other people might not enjoy it that much. But there are ways around it, you can create sites which address the needs of people with any kind of a disability, but still do not exclusively target any particular groups.
how does one make the site accessible?
This is a great idea, frankly one that I have never thought about. One tends to forget or rather not think about this subject at all. We take it for granted that we are able to see, write, or whatever as we do not have a disability. But what about those of us who do?
I do not have a website, not yet, but planning to as soon as I train as a life coach - any ideas out there? So it would be nice if I could make my website accessible.
Many thanks for bring this to our awareness.
RE: how does one make the site accessible?
Unfortunately most of the cases I work with already existing sites which we want to make accessible. For those instances, I just wrote an article on how to make your site accessible when you don't have the finances.
However, in an ideal case, you would start to think about accessibility before you start designing your project. You will save yourself lot's of headache and time, as it is much more difficult to change things later on.
First, understand how people with disabilities use the computer.
After that, there are a couple of things you can do without going wrong: make sure all graphical information has a textual interpretation. Make sure all audio information has a transcript or a captioning associated to it. Make sure you don't use only color to indicate information. Make your site well structured and use proper coding. For a starter, these suggestions will make a big difference.
WCAG seems too intimidating
Hi,
In my case, I'd really like to work on the accessibility of our website, and I saw this WCAG document. It's supposed to be the main tool for making sites accessible. But looking at all the WCAG's points and subpoints, I am a bit intimidated by its complexity. I'm afraid I won't be able to follow the guidelines and I'd end up making my site more inaccessible. Hope you could help me with this concern. Thanks!
RE: WCAG seems too intimidating
Nicole,
I agree with you, it is certainly a very large and complex series of documents. But also consider that many items may not even apply to your site. For example, if you are not posting videos on the site, you already cut out a bunch of success criteria. You can always contact me with specific questions, but right now I'm working on some materials which will help you get a better handle of the materials.
I agree with Nicole that WCAG
I agree with Nicole that WCAG is too intimidating. I have tried to make my site WCAG 1 compliant; and there are still several failures. With the adoption of WCAG 2.0 in December 2008; the World Wide Web Consortium/WAI Team has discontinued helping me on WCAG 1.0 accessibility.
I believe the real burden in my situation is on them.
They should continue to provide service for individuals who want to make their site WCAG 1.0 compliant.
The World Wide Web Consortium/WAI and WCAG 2.0 is my greatest fear.
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