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Legislation To Make Web Devices Accessible To Disabled Users
pgmrdlm writes "In an effort to make web devices accessible to the disabled, the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act (H.R. 3101), submitted by Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-MA) passed the House of Representatives by a vote of 348 to 23. The related Senate bill has been introduced by Senator Mark Pryor (D-AR). Quoting Representative Markey's website: 'We've moved from Braille to Broadcast, from Broadband to the Blackberry. We've moved from spelling letters in someone's palm to the Palm Pilot. And we must make all of these devices accessible.' The Washington Post coverage notes, 'Some broadcasters put videos on the Internet with captions, but not all. That can make inaccessible everything from the political videos that are now common on the Web to pop culture clips that turn viral.' As someone who has 20/200 vision with my glasses on, I completely agree that the web has not been kind to individuals with various disabilities. But due to the size of the web, and the large number of different devices that access it, is it even possible to legislate something of this nature? Or should we rely on education and peer pressure on the various manufacturers?"
One of those things, if you don't have an economy and it causes the numbers of "unfortunate" to rise to a critical mass, civil rights usually become the least of your worries.
"The problem with socialism is eventually you run out of other people's money" - Thatcher.
I don't think Stephen Hawking regularly visits the pub around the corner from me, which is a listed building and had to spend tens of thousands of British Pounds putting in lifts and ramps, plus had multiple compliance inspections and certifications to handle. I don't think Stephen Hawkings regularly visited my old employer either, who had to spend thousands of British Pounds putting in a lift in its brand new office because they deigned to have an upper floor, while never having any employee or visitor who needed wheelchair access in the 8 years I worked there.
You can quote the exception to me all you want, and Hawking is just that, but the normal every day experience for these laws is a significant burden on certain persons and companies for little gain. At which point does it actually become acceptable to say "Look, you are disabled, you are different, and its not worth the cost of doing this - how about we look at it differently and stop trying to pretend that you have the same advantages in life that we non-disabled enjoy?".
I'm betting that last comment in the paragraph above is going to get me into hot water in this discussion...
The Disability Discrimination Act has been in effect here in the UK for years. Whenever I do work for a big company, there's usually an accessibility requirement in the brief somewhere. They started appearing not long after the DDA came into effect, and from talking to the clients, it's usually specifically due to this law.
Yep, it's worth pointing out that the DDA requires businesses to make "reasonable adjustments" to allow disabled people access to anything their able-bodied counterparts can access - websites included. So ramps for wheelchairs, WCAG compliant websites etc. but there is no universal service obligation - if it's going to cost too much relative to size of business, or if it's plain impractical you don't have to do it. Having said that, many businesses totally forget their website should be accessible.
If I have nothing to hide, you have no reason to search me
How many disabled customers do you need through that door in order for it to make financial sense?
Maybe fewer than you'd think. When I was a student, the choral society would go out for a few drinks after rehearsal each week. There were usually 10-20 of us, including one or two in wheelchairs. One of the local pubs didn't have wheelchair access, so we'd avoid it. They were only excluding one customer, but they were losing the business of 10-20 others. The same thing happens with restaurants that don't have a vegetarian option. They might only be excluding one member of a group, but it means that the entire group will eat somewhere else.
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There is a big difference between demanding equal rights and demanding that everyone who isn't blind or deaf dumb their webpages down to the lowest common denominator because you have a shitty browser and/or a shitty reader. The more they push these laws, the more they go beyond simple things like "Include alt tags for images" or even "Include closed captioning for videos" and the more they get into "Make this page text-only and very plain, or ELSE!" Equal in the sense of Harrison Bergeron, isn't being equal, it's just oppressing another group (i.e., those who CAN see and hear).
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Well first of all text-to-speech is a lousy substitute for text, and if you don't believe that why don't you try it for a day.
But that point aside, let's imagine there's a device that can read text and display Braille. Then let's imagine that all the publishers decide to publish their e-books in a format that no Braille display can read (say for DRM purposes, or to make them unreadable on a competitor's device, or because their layout people are too damned lazy to learn and apply open standards).
That's the issue of accessibility.
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
The ADA and other workplace protections say that you can't be discriminated against if you can do the essential functions of your job.
I'm waiting for the first appellate-level case where judges have to decide if it's okay to discriminate against someone if they can't use the corporate-standard handheld device but they can use a different, possibly much more expensive device, that is not the company standard.
Also, I'm waiting to see if any judge will dare tell any company "if you insist on using method A for corporate communications and it effectively discriminates against the disabled, I'll order you to allow disabled people to use method B and I'll order you to make sure method B is functionally equivalent to method A or I'll order you to stop using method A unless you can show that method A is essential to your business."
In other words, if a company either deliberately or tacitly uses non-accessible communication methods not because those particular methods are essential compared to accessible methods, but either as a smokescreen to discriminate or simply as a way to save money without caring about the impact on the disabled, I expect judges to rule against them.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Crippling debt, exponentially-increasing entitlement costs, addiction to empire-building, Wall Street raiding the American workers' pensions via their whores in the White House and Congress, Mexican drug cartels operating with impunity along the southern border while our young men and women die halfway around the world to bring our "way of life" to people who hate us, and this decadent bum is bitching about accessibility on mobile devices. Can anyone deny any longer that we are an empire destined for the trash bin of history unless there is REAL wholesale change in Washington D.C.? Hey Markey you fucking douchebag - why don't you propose some legislation to tax corporate profits generated overseas at a much higher rate than profits generated here in the US and bring some of the manufacturing jobs we lost back home, you fucking pig?
The point at which society is willing to pay all disabled individuals a disability payment at least equivalent to median salary while being perfectly content to letting the disabled not work a day in their life. You do realize that that's a major reason for the law to allow accessibility is precisely to allow disabled individuals the opportunity to work, right? Without such laws, most places end up being unwilling to spend "thousands of pounds" or whatever just to hire one new individual. Hence, the employer pool drives down wages for all disabled, regardless of how little their disability effects their actual work. It also drives down employment opportunities, resulting in massive unemployment for the disabled (it was around 50% before the ADA was passed in the US and now is around 13% today; I presume figures in the UK are similar or perhaps worse).
I wonder, do you bemoan having to subsidize public transportation as well?
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You want to know what's rich? Believing that accommodating folks with disabilities is something that should be left to profit seekers. There are a ton of no-extra cost changes that could have been made, but lazy, cheap, or simply uninformed people didn't make them. Some cases you can see they actually chose a path that was more expensive and less accessible.
It's like safety. Many people will forgo even buckling up their seat belts if you let them, let alone a ton of other, more involved methods. Heck, I'm sure most people would piss in their own water supply if you let them.
People are that stupid.
Besides, these laws don't require everybody everywhere to blow away money on accommodating every disability, there are provisions in the laws that establish reasonable expenses instead. Sure, some people will still want to do things on the cheap. So what? I know folks who would, in South Florida, not bother worrying about hurricanes, or nailing their roof in properly. Even if it's just an extra nail for every three of them.
Disability accommodation often falls under the same banner. Don't believe me? Then look up some DOJ filings.
Yeah, it adds up. On the other hand, so does the danger of every house in a neighborhood blowing away because some lazy home builder or roofer couldn't bother following the law.
They might only be excluding one member of a group, but it means that the entire group will eat somewhere else.
... why would you care? They'll take care of it themselves. And if all of that is true, and they can't be bothered, then ... why would you care? They'll lose business to someone else, right?
... look! No government intrusion required! The market addressed the issue, and did so creatively and competitively. There have neve been so many choices, in that way. If enough people convincinly show a business owner that the math is in favor of expensively re-tooling around a very small, infrequent demographic, then they'll act. If the math doesn't work, so be it.
And so your point is that these business owners are simply too stupid to understand this? That it has never occurred to them that this might be an issue? And that only the wise Nanny State has the smarts to point this out?
Will the Wise Nanny State also help them with their business plan and accounting, and show them how they're better off losing a year's services of a couple of their staff so they can afford all of the legal, contractual, and business-interruption costs of remaking their establishment to accommodate a once-in-a-while customer that they'll have to now make sit around longer because they can't afford to pay as many staff for the year?
Here's an idea: If a business wants the public relations and warm-and-fuzzy benefits of giving up floor space, a second floor, and all sorts of other utility so that they can woo clients with wheelchairs, or movie-goers who are blind, etc., then let them decide it makes sense to do so. If you're right, and dozens of people will regularly skip a venue in favor of one that had re-made itself as friendly to every possible disability or lifestyle, and the lost revenue from losing that business actually matters to them and would pay for the added expenses
Your vegetable-eating example is especially spurious. There are all sorts of establishments that either cater exclusively to, or gladly make offerings to people who don't eat meat (or certain kinds of meat, or meat handled in certain ways, etc). This wasn't true decades ago. And
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