I usually start this way when I present to a group or organization: "Keep your hand down if you've ever had a problem with a website". After all why make people go through unnecessary effort if they don't have to. Since you probably didn't raise your hand when you read this, you've probably had some kind of problem with a website at some point in your (bad geeky pun) "Browser History".
Now imagine if you had a visual impairment or were blind and could not see the copy/text on a web page. Imagine you are hearing impaired and cannot hear audio that might be on a web page. Imagine you are physically impaired and cannot use a mouse to navigate a web page. Imagine you have a cognitive/developmental impairment such as autism, ADD, dyslexia, alzheimers, etc and are trying to use a website.
It's impossible to say quantitatively how much more difficult it is percentage-wise for people with these various impairments to access the internet, although I'm sure there is some number cruncher somewhere who would take a stab at it. But I am 99.9% opinionated that the qualitative experience of those with the impairments I mentioned is compromised/poor/impossible when they use a website.
And the government agrees, at least for people with visual disabilities. A very brief description of Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act (which is the action arm of the Americans with Disabilities Act) says: "Section 508 was enacted to eliminate barriers in information technology, open new opportunities for people with disabilities, and encourage development of technologies that will help achieve these goals."
One of the main technologies that has resulted from this is screen readers for the visually impaired and blind. This is software that a visually impaired person buys, installs and learns how to use. What it does is "reads" aloud in audio format the information on a web page. Being visually impaired myself, I have learned how to use a screen reader. But I do not like it. The robotic, monotone computer voice becomes intolerable to me after one paragraph and most websites are not designed to accommodate a screen reader in ways that make it easy to get where you want to go. As a result I feel like my online experience is compromised and inferior to that of a normally sighted person.
Granted, since a majority of web pages rely on the sense of vision to obtain information, those with visual impairments face significant barriers. Thus it make sense that most of the assistive technology development would enable access for this impairment. But what about those with audio impairments? Or physical impairments? Or cognitive/developmental impairments?
For people with audio impairments, the FCC is about to step up. The "Twenty First Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act" will require certain videos online to be closed captioned. For the physically impaired it is possible to place "access keys" in the code of a website so that the site can be navigated with the keyboard. But it is not mandated, is not widely known/implemented and its functionality is different depending on the browser the person is using. For the cognitively/developmentally impaired there is basically nothing.
What I notice about the various "assistive technologies" is that they seem to treat access as an afterthought that results in an inferior access experience. Kind of like building a building and then figuring out later how to add on ramps and elevators. From a regulation standpoint there doesn't seem to be any consistency—the ADA is under the Dept of Justice Civil Rights Division and the Twenty First Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act is under the FCC. From an organization's standpoint, to be access compliant they'll have to put out access fires separately. First figuring out how to make their site screen reader friendly and then figuring out how to make their videos closed captioned. And this still leaves out those with physical and cognitive disabilities.
The stakes can be high. In 2008 retailer Target had to pay $6 million because their site was not accessible. Some companies like Amazon and Microsoft build separate sites for the disabled. They include less information than exists for "normal" visitors and in the case of Amazon do not even meet online accessibility requirements. To me the separate site approach harkens back to a time when a certain segment of the population was required to use different, inferior facilities…
The question in my mind is how can people with visual, audio, physical and cognitive/developmental impairments have the same or better access online than someone who is not considered impaired? How can online access be a humane and better experience vs. an inferior and worse experience? How can online access require no need to incur costs for assistive technology? How can access be built in from the ground up instead of being treated as an afterthought?
And don't get me started on the mobile space…
Chris Lona—CEO—CL Design
425 462 7824
experience@cldesign.biz
