Lisa,

I've had the same experience you have. Many websites are hard to work 
with because of Flash. Occasionally the whole site is inaccessible. More 
often, only parts of the site are. Unfortunately, the problem may be the 
area I'm interested in reading. Using Skweezer and the mobile versions 
of the sites is an alternative, but many sites don't have mobile 
versions, and the Skweezer version often includes a message like: "To 
use all features of this site, you need to visit the full version."

What's especially frustrating for me is that this is an even bigger 
problem for work related sites. At one of my jobs, Impact 360, an 
employee website used for many routine tasks like weekly schedules and 
time off requests, is minimally accessible. I can do maybe 20% of the 
tasks I'm supposed to. At all three jobs, the web based training suite, 
which we use once or twice a year, is absolutely and completely 
inaccessible, and at all three jobs, parts of the other interfaces I'm 
expected to use regularly have a small number of Flash related 
accessibility issues. for example, I tend to lose focus about once every 
thirty seconds on all websites, and at one of my teaching jobs, I need 
to follow six or seven steps in order to access my rosters and post 
grades, but need sighted assistance for the last step, which is checking 
a box the screen reader doesn't detect. Since these suites are developed 
by large companies and sold to institutions and businesses, clicking the 
Contact Us link takes me to the local webmaster for the school or 
business, not to the people who develop the suite. I don't know for 
sure, but I suspect my complaints don't get forwarded because the local 
webmaster figures I'm a lone voice, one of a handful of blind peple with 
a job. I'm bothered by the fact that equal access hasn't made its way to 
software and professional websites. I'm not the only blind person with a 
job.

I've also heard that Flash alternatives will be developed. the Mac 
doesn't support it and neither do many mobile platforms. This makes life 
difficult for a lot of people, not just us. But I've heard the Flash 
alternative rumor for a couple of years, and I don't notice any changes 
at the work place. In fact, the version of Impact 360 we were using a 
year ago, when I started that job, was much more accessible than the new 
version, implemented earlier this summer. With the old version, I could 
do 50% or so of the things I needed to do. Now even checking my weekly 
schedule is slow, tedious, and buggy.

I guess the moral of the story is that we just have to wait for the 
magical Flash alternative.

Ciao


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