Hi folks,

Here is the text from my brief evaluation of the TalkCanada YouTube
page where people can submit questions and vote on questions submitted
by others.  The idea is that Steven Harper will address the questions
that get the most votes.  Unfortunately, this crack at the democratic
process has a few cracks of its own. The link follows my name.

The comments below outline my user experience of the following website
with ZoomText screen-reader:

http://www.youtube.com/TalkCanada

The AppReader feature of my screen-reader highlights words on the
screen as it reads them aloud.  AppReader does not work at all on the
TalkCanada website.

The MouseOver feature of my screen-reader announces words or lines of
text directly under the mouse-pointer.  MouseOver will announce some
linked text, such as names of people who have posted questions for
prime minister Harper, but it will not read their questions.
MouseOver does not announce the video controls, nor is their a link to
accessible audio anywhere on the page that I can find, but again, my
ScreenReader cannot access most of the page.  This limits my ability
to search for anything on the page.

The purpose of this page, however, is to post, read, and vote on
comments from other posters.  Since neither of the features of my
ScreenReader can access this information on the TalkCanada YouTube
the site is essentially inaccessible to me, excluding me from
participating in this exciting initiative.  I fully endorse social
networking tools for use in the democratic process, but once again,
our Government has demonstrated through its choice of actions that
including all Canadians in the democratic process is not a priority
for the Government of Canada.


Although I was not able to read the questions from other posters, or
submit my vote, I was able to locate the text box at the top of the
screen where I submitted the following question to the current prime
minister:

"Mr. Harper, how does the Government of Canada account for its
exclusion of over 800,000 Canadians from access to information and
services through its websites as a result of its failure to comply
with W3C website accessibility guidelines?"
Derek Wilson, Vancouver, BC

Regards,
Derek Wilson

TalkCanada: All Quiet on the Accessibility Front « Blind Equality link below:

http://bit.ly/9Tj0A1

Again, you can support us in calling for website accessibility
compliance from the GoC here:

http://www.petitiononline.com/GCWAP/petition.html


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