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Should Online Stores Be Subject To ADA?
prostoalex writes, "HTML tutorials usually mention alt tags for images and noscript tags as something optional that a Web designer should add to a site for the crawlers and users browsing with graphics or JavaScript turned off. However, a recent lawsuit against Target by the National Federation of the Blind accuses the retailer of not complying with the Americans with Disabilities Act. Since Target's online store is unbrowsable with a screen reader, the nation's 200,000 blind people who go online cannot become paying customers, the NFB contends. From the article: 'In denying Target's motion to dismiss the suit two months ago, Judge Marilyn Hall Patel... held that the law's accessibility requirements applied to all services offered by a place of public accommodation. Since Target's physical stores are places of public accommodation, the ruling said, its online store must also be accessible or the company must offer equally effective alternatives.' Does the judge's name ring a bell? Yes, it's the same Marilyn Hall Patel who handled the RIAA's case against Napster in 2001." Web builders and tools may need to start brushing up on the Web Accessibility Initiative.
Maybe finally we can put a stake through the never-to-be-sufficiently-damned Flash-only sites.
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
-b.
Luckily, my house has stairs, so they'll be stuck milling around outside in their wheelchairs when they come to get me.
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The accessibilities regulation when it comes to web sites have the same issues a LOT of things have when it comes to the web: They imply that the web is nothing more than a variant of a PDF browser. It doesn't consider that HTML/CSS were very poorly designed, that we have to deal with IE6 (even though IE7 came out), that the web already requires 10 bazillion skills, and if you need experts in every categories to do anything, a lot of companies will have to retire from the field, that a lot of the content is beyond the developer's control, etc etc etc.
The only thing one should require is to stick a div tag with CSS to make it invisible at the very very top of the site, that says "If you are a disabled person using a screen reader to navigate this page, and wishes to make a purchase, dial the following number and talk with one of our friendly representative who will be happy to help you, and give you any web-only discounts you deserve".
Otherwise, if you ever thought IE6 was holding the web back, never freagin mind screen readers. If your page is nothing more than documents with information, and maybe 1 form (which I guess a lot of e-commerce stores are), then go ahead and make it accessible. Its not very rough. But depending on your target audience, it very well might be a desktop-like application with all the wiz and buzz that it implies, and there's simply no way to make that accessible without ruinning your normal user's experience. And if you DO manage to make it accessible, it will be in the terms of the law only: it will still be useless a to a blind person. Those laws are out of date, simple as that: they consider the web as being nothing more than a giant e-book. It doesn't work like that anymore.
Flash = tyranny of the clueless.
I'm no fan of the ADA, but anything that puts Flash developers on the streets with signs saying "Will skip intros for food" is OK by me.
Define bad law for me.
Is a law bad because it requires businesses to accommodate ALL customers, regardless of whether or not they can see, hear or walk? Or are you a part of the group of pseudo-libertarians who think that government should butt out?
If it wasn't for ADA, my wife (who is confined to a wheelchair) and I would be extremely limited in where we go, what we do, and where we can shop, eat, or stay.
So it seems a bit ridiculous to you that Target was the target, and they want them to make the site accessible to the blind. It seems even more ridiculous to me that Target wouldn't do that in the first place (it may cost a bit more, but seeing as how they are a "good corporate citizen (compared to WalMart)", it would be befit their image.
Oh, but they don't want to. Now you see why laws like the ADA have to exist.
I'm not really a CPA, I just play one on TV
Congress decided the market wasn't working with respect to the handicapped. The costs were too high and the benefits accrued to too few individuals to make it worthwhile for most organizations to retrofit for handicapped accessibility. So, of course, nobody did.
If you don't care that people with wheelchairs can't get to the second floor of the Gap sometimes, then this is fine. If you do care, then it's not. Sort of a personal judgment call on how you feel about government intervention to protect the less fortunate.
Regardless of how I might feel about forcing retrofits (not a big fan), setting standards before establishments are built seems somewhat reasonable (and it's usually not all that expensive if you plan on doing it from the beginning). Having rules established ahead of time is basically the same as having building codes, and just as onerous.
With regard to the ADA and websites, it seems that the internet is not at all what was envisioned when the ADA was drafted and it should be looked at anew. If you want to set rules for website design, it has to be clear what those rules are going to be before design begins. Forcing major sites to redesign after they're established seems mean spirited and expensive. If this is something that people feel strongly about, they can go back to Congress and draft an amendment. Courts are probably wise to stay out of the way until then.
--
RumorsDaily
If it ends up banning flash from being a part of web site's UI, it's got my vote.
Where were you when the voynix came?
I just don't understand why people would be content to let a group of their fellow citizens be disenfranchised from large segmens of society because of their disability. Our sense of fairness demands that if we can do something to bring accessibility to people who don't have it, then we should.
These accesibility laws are not about making special exceptions to handicapped people. It's simply allowing handicapped people to live, participate, and work to contribute to themselves and their community just like everybody else.
Fascism trolls keeping me up every night. When I starts a preachin', he HITS ME WITH HIS REICH!
- There is a market in the first place (i.e. competition).
- The economic valuation is similar to the social one.
In this case there certainly is a market, but it leads to results we don't like. The problem is that the extra profits gained from selling to a small minority (the disabled) are probably much less than the expenses in accomodating them. Therefore it is rational for most retailers to simply ignore the disabled. Of course there will be a market solution: the disabled will have to use more expensive approaches (retailers who specifically cater for them, for example).What's wrong with that? First, on the money side, many of us believe that the disabled shouldn't have to bear all the costs of their disability -- that society should bear some of them. In this case we are forcing Target (and, indirectly, all of Target's customers) to pay for the fact that blind shoppers can't use a website which seeing users can.
More importantly, you have to realize that, both to the disabled person and to society, the value of shopping at Target extends beyond the price advantage.
Yes, but this is browsing the web, not a physical activity. Using the web is now a normal and necessary part of life for so many people. It doesn't take much to accomodate blind people at design and implementation time. If the web site designers/developers had done it correctly from the beginning then it wouldn't be so costly. It seems to me that many UI designers (be it web, traditional software application, media such as DVD, etc) are either ignorant or lazy. And anybody with a Comp. Sci degree has no excuse and should take this as a given - either that or their university was shit and the degree certificate isn't worth the paper it's printed on. This is fundamental and very basic HCI.
I've bought quite a few things at Target's website, and I'm stunned that it's unusable with screen readers. There's little or no dynamic content, and none that couldn't be easily done by showing/hiding DIVs with CSS. Granted it's graphics-intensive, but there are still descriptions of products and other stuff that should make it usable for VI people using screen readers.
So I went to target.com in Lynx, which is our quick and dirty check for SEO and screen reader usability (we do other checks before we finalize designs). And I was stunned I had to hit PGDN 6(!) times before I got through the navigational garbage and got to any of the content on the main page. Target's site is apparently not designed to provide an optimal exprience to anyone outside of someone running IE6/7 on Windows XP and a modern PC. Screen readers, scrapers, search engines, text-only browsers, and mobile users do not appear to be welcome. To boot, in FireFox 1.5 on Linux I was unable to use some of the nav elements because they were hidden behind the Flash content.
Target ought to flog whoever designed their website. If it only works properly in modern IE browsers, then it's alienating maybe 20% of their consumers. More if you consider mobile users and screen readers that can't make use of that terribly designed site.
I've said it before, I'll say it again:
It is absurdly difficult to accommodate screen readers.
They are undetectable, and cannot be sniffed.
Therefore, you have to assume that potentially anyone coming in can be using a screen reader. You have to program extra code, but not too much extra code, or the screen readers will be reading "spacer" "spacer" "spacer" for three hours. You need to have noscript, and noembed tags in everything, and offer an alternate text version of your site that needs to be up to date and relevant. The law even goes so far as to state that you need to have alternate text on images, or specify the location of a file with a description of the image in it. Style sheets can be against the rules or not, depending on which contradictory section you intend adhering to, and you can pretty much forget about rendering anything on the client side. Although flash can be accessible if you write your code in sequence, make your text selectable, and make sure to specify an alternate text version of your applet (just in case).
It's a frustrating, even maddening standard to work with, especially when your boss won't spring for Jaws (or the like), which he sees no point in doing because no one in your workplace actually needs it.
I wonder if Porn sites could be held to that kind standard...
The entertainment value there would be priceless.
This signature has Super Cow Powers
They're part of the community that can walk up steps. If they dont want to cater to 100% of the population that's their choice.
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
Nope. Deaf dude calls relay operator, relay operator calls store and "translates" between.
Unfortunately, use of a relay operator is becoming common for scammers, etc. to hide accents and out of area calls.
Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos
So easy to say that (and so flippantly too) when you're not disabled.
Well, in California, we have a statewide, free, public relay service so that TDD users can communicate with anyone with a phone with no problem, so its not an issue. I thought that was fairly common, and not unique to California.
That's an interesting parallel case. However, in this case, the law requires that the PHONE company (and hence you) find a way to make the PSTN work for the deaf. There are organizations (names escaping me right now) that have non-deaf operators that provide the interface between the deaf and the non-deaf worlds: if you are deaf, you call these operators via TDD, and they make a voice call to the destination, translating back and forth.
Should the law perhaps require ISPs to fund a similar service for the web? The blind call up the service, and operators with special training "translate" the essentials of the page into spoken word? I don't think that's a great idea, but until the technology of screen readers and authoring tools catches up, maybe they should?
If you've never experienced the flip side, you wouldn't know.
One of the law's provisions is that service animals are largely unilaterally allowed in places of public
accomodation. My wife is disabled as was our housemate at the time. They both have service dogs- certified
as such. Service animals aren't just seeing-eye or deaf dogs, there's a lot more there than that- and they
do actually help out in a lot of ways and you can't just arbitrarily separate them from their owners willy-nilly.
Needs to be very specific reasons- and there's not a lot of them.
My wife went into a store with said service dog and was physically accosted for her "dog"- the owner didn't
care if she was disabled or the dog was legally allowed. The police in Plano, TX backed up his "right" to
refuse service to anyone- never mind that like the blind and seeing eye dogs, she's in a protected class
(For this VERY reason...).
Until you experience the other side, you will never understand, never get that it's not QUITE
the thing you make it out to be. I only hope that neither you or any of those you love and care
for end up needing to be covered under the laws or that you aren't on the receiving end of someone
like yourself with that comment you just made.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
Should be require every mom-and-pop store and restaurant to buy a TDD (Teletype Device for the Deaf) so that deaf people can call them on the phone and place orders?
No! Every store should have to employ someone who signs in American Sign Language (and every other dialect too, of course, in case you get a foreign handicapped person) to be ready to answer a video conference call. Also, in case of a Helen Keller type situation, you'll need someone who can spell things out in brail, real-time. Also, if that person weighs 500 or so pounds, the required electric wheelchairs (which should be able to auto-navigate the store in case you're blind, and read out to you in brail, what's on the shelves as you go by) should be able to handle at least half a ton skinniness-challenged shopper.
*sigh*
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
go ahead
In which case you vote with your wallet by not partonizing them.
Welcome to capitalism.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
Stuff I've built generally meets all the relevant accessibility guidelines - except I wasn't deliberately aiming for them.
If you keep to standards and don't defecate non-semantic pseudo-HTML from your crutch of a WYSIWYG editor, then it's really easy. Alt tags are required by HTML 4 and XHTML - they're not optional. Non-Javascript alternatives reduce support costs - for instance, you don't have able-bodied twits phoning up, asking why a particular section of their website doesn't work just because they disabled half of the features in their browsers when bored.
Check your website using lynx, or some other excessively simple browser. If the pages are still perfectly navigable and understandable, then you're doing okay. Being unable to write HTML or design websites isn't an excuse.
Tedious Bloggy Stuff - hooray?
These accesibility laws are not about making special exceptions to handicapped people. It's simply allowing handicapped people to live, participate, and work to contribute to themselves and their community just like everybody else.
(Applause)
It _is_ a special exception. But it's a relatively _small_ investment on the part of the business owner which makes a HUGE difference in the independance and quality of life of the disabled. What society gains is a change between an individual who before was dependent on others and a burden - like in the pre 1970's era; and now is a capable, productive individual. There's a sound reason why the disabled are a protected group and that laws were created to oblige people to take that extra little step to help them out.
Redoing a website - or adding a special website for the blind - is not a multi-million dollar investment. Heck, it doesn't even have to look good if it's for the blind. It just has to work.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Can we get them to go after the RIAA for not making their music accessible to the deaf?
Spoken like an old web page designer who hasn't seen what the web can do.
Again: if all I'm doing is a standard web page, thats fine. Its pretty easy (to some extent). Being purely XHTML compliant doesn't make you accessible, and there are some things in some situations that are pretty rough to deal with.
That being said, as soon as you use something like, let say, Ajax (I use this as an example because everyone heard of it, and from your post you really don't seem to realise what people have used the web for these days, so I won't go in any more details), screen readers don't pick up the refresh, and thus its not compliant. So woohoo, I have to kiss ajax good bye. If I was using Ajax to refresh a dropdown list or something, thats easily remedied. If I'm doing something akin to Google Calendar in features, making an "accessible" version can take months.
Again: The Web is not a giant e-book reader anymore.
Put them in solitary confinement until they can fill out a 500 page webform explaining why they should be released. Every page has a non-skippable flash intro, the answers on the form are maintained by session cookies and the form is only accessible by a very noisy 14.4 dialup connection that can't be re-established without closing their browser.
It's not life imprisonment, officially, but it might as well be.
Good, inexpensive web hosting
There are many examples of this foolishness. Here in San Francisco the ADA-compliant public self-cleaning restrooms are so large inside that they are mainly used by hookers as a convenient place to deliver a blow job. All apartments recently constructed here in the city have ADA-compliant bathrooms large enough to U-turn a fire truck. Let me tell you that it really impinges on your 800-square-foot apartment when your bathroom is statutorily required to be at least 100 square feet. And even a remodel triggers the ADA: in my former office, we had obnoxious ADA-compliant bathrooms which were both huge and furnished with uncomfortably-tall ADA-compliant toilets.
At all the new parks in the city, the picnic tables are 1) missing one of the seats and 2) have tables mounted neck-high so you can run a wheelchair underneath them. The furniture is very uncomfortable for the 99.9% of the normally-abled public.
The ADA had the right idea but the implementation has been a nuisance.
(Or they could just make a .html version, but ...)
I see your point on the retrofit vs building from anew. Still I don't think I could justify forcing every website that sells something to be ADA compliant (or some other standard). I run an ISP in rural America. I can think of literally hundreds of Ma & Pa businesses that sell something crafty that has a small website for displaying pictures of their wares. What possible justification could I provide them as to why they're required to make their website ADA compliant. They use whatever generic website building program came with their PC, or Netscape, or Microsoft Publisher, or some other similarly inate WYSIWYG design app. I don't think they could justify buying Dreamweaver, let along hiring a pro to revamp the website. I feel for those with disabilities but what about those people with teeny tiny businesses that happen to have a website? ADA compliancy could easily outweigh any dollars that site could generate.
So your problem is with the law, not deaf people. If she was allowed to charge more, there would be no problem. Nice empathy there, dick. I guess if you ever go deaf you'll be more than happy to sit in your room all the time not doing anything.
If you want to try out what the online world is like for the blind and you have a Mac running OSX 10.4 or better you have a screen reader built into the OS. Here are the very simplified instructions for getting it running so you can test a website.
Make sure your using Safari as your browser.
Press command-F5, you will here the computer say "VoiceOver on"
You navigate using the control, option and arrow keys Hold down the control and option keys and then press the arrow keys to move through the controls.
When VoiceOver says "HTML content" press the control-option-shift-down arrow keys to interact with the content.
Now for the real test, control-option-shift-F11 will turn off the screen so you will learn what it is really like to try and navigate with out sight. pressing this command combination again will turn the screen back on.
To get to the menus do command-option-m once for the main menu, twice for the utility menu and three time for the spotlight menu.
Greg Kearney
Flash always ignores my browser default text settings. It also makes noises when I have configured the browser to be silent. On top of that, there are bugs in it that mean that highlight,copy,paste doesn't work. Of course, these would not be a problem if the flash users followed the basic rule to never use Flash as part of the UI, and only use it as part of media to be viewed or a game to be played.. If they followed that rule, it would get rid of the frustration of having to fight against a Flash UI that fails at following ui/web standards.
Where were you when the voynix came?