You are missing my point. I was not comparing anything, I was relating
history and fact. Please read my message again. I did not say that
accessibility is in ada law. I did not say that the civil rights act was
comparable to accessibility.
What I did say was that when society has fallen on financial hard times,
societal rights have not gone away. Now, if you want to talk about tstuff
done in the name of national security, things did change after 911, they are
still trying to repeal the constitution wholely and completely.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Mike Pietruk" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, November 19, 2008 9:20 AM
Subject: Re: [VICUG-L] inaccessible websites
David
First of all, as has been stated by someone else, ADA has nothing to do,
except perhaps tangentially, with accessible web pages.
Secondly, comparing accessible web pages with the Civil Rights Act is
utter nonsense and, if truly believed by some, is an indication of totally
self-centerness
and out of contact with the realities faced by people of the real world.
I suspect, David, as an access trainer yourself, you well realize that a
lot of the difficulties blind users face on websites is due not to
problems associated with the websites (though some certainly might be
designed better for all users) but due to a lack of familiarity with the
power of their screen readers and operating system.
No perfect website, even if we could agree on what that might be, is going
to solve the real issue for these users.
Moreover, what's more important: Target having an accessible website
according to the NFB definition or Target being in my community?
What's more vital: a blind user being able to use an ATM or that bank
being in existence.
We clearly are living in different times. The benefits won were done so
in a time of economic prosperity and when money was available for such
things both from the government and private industry.
Right now, the government focus is directed away to economic survival of
the financial, auto and business sector; if it isn't, the rest might not
matter.
Some experts have suggested that the Obama administration, despite its
campaign rhetoric and talk, may have to put aside its original agenda (at
least for some time) as it will have to deal with the economic crisis and
pump more money into that.
And that pumping money means that the government will have less for social
issues; and even if the economic fix takes effect, that pumping will
require taxpayers to ultimately foot the bill.
That, in turn, will cool the appetite of the public to support seemingly
trivial things like ramped curbs, identifiable money, talking voting
machines, and accessible pages -- all of which are nice and valuable
things but hardly essential.
After all, the world got along without all of these until recently, and
can do so again.
And businesses who truly value their blind customers, with or without
sanction, will seek to have their sites usable by as many segments of
society as possible.
Sure, I appreciate websites being usable (obviously so), but I also sense
that medical care being affordable, folks having food on the table, the
financial and banking system being stable, and a myriad of other things
have a far higher priority in the grand scheme of things not only for me
but the community as a whole.
rather see my investment and saving accounts prosper because of
economic certainty than whether or not the provider's website is
perfectly usable.
For one thing, I can always switch to another bank or brokerage firm; for
another, if things are stable, I don't have to check on them so often to
see what they are doing.
All things are important and benefitial, but some have greater importance
than others.
Optasia Ministry offers a wide variety of free electronic Christian
resources to
blind US residents;
Many of these are not available otherwise in free electronic format, and
some are particularly formatted for use on legacy and current portable
reading devices.
Distributed on DVD and cds, details and a catalog can be found at
,
http://www.optasiaministry.org
-
=====
VICUG-L is the Visually Impaired Computer User Group List.
Archived on the World Wide Web at
http://listserv.icors.org/archives/vicug-l.html
Signoff: [log in to unmask]
Subscribe: [log in to unmask]
VICUG-L is the Visually Impaired Computer User Group List.
Archived on the World Wide Web at
http://listserv.icors.org/archives/vicug-l.html
Signoff: [log in to unmask]
Subscribe: [log in to unmask]
|
