Web Accessibility

 
Web Accessibility
Enabling your Web site to meet the needs of individuals with disabilities is an issue relevant
to all businesses. Persons with disabilities make up a significant portion of the population,
and legal ramifications exist for Web sites that discriminate by not providing adequate and
universal access to the site’s resources. In this chapter, we explore the Web Accessibility
Initiative and its requirements, various laws regarding businesses are their availability to
people with disabilities and how some companies have developed their systems, products
and services to meet the needs of this demographic.
7.11.1 Accessibility: Regulations and Technologies
In 1999, a lawsuit was filed by the National Federation for the Blind (NFB) against AOL
for not supplying access to its services to people with visual disabilities, a mandate of the
Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. [***D.Z. “They Oughta Pass a Law, and
They Did, but Is It Working,” Presentations September 2000: 45.***] Many other efforts
have been made to address this issue (Fig. 14.1).
WeMedia.com™ (Fig. 14.2) is a Web site dedicated to providing disabled individuals
with the same opportunities as the general population. The site serves 54 million disabled
consumers with an estimated $1 trillion in purchasing power.
[***<www.wemedia.com>***]We Media provides online educational opportunities
for people with disabilities.
Act Purpose
Americans with Disabilities
Act
The ADA prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability in
employment, state and local government, public accommodations,
commercial facilities, transportation, and telecommunications.
[***Americans with Disabilities Act***]
Telecommunications Act of
1996
The Telecommunications Act of 1996 contains two amendments to
Section 255 and Section 251(a)(2) of the Communications Act of
1934. These amendments require that communication devices, such
as cell phones, telephones and pagers, be accessible to individuals
with disabilities. [***<www.usdoj.gov/crt.ada/
cguide.htm#anchor63109>***]
Individuals with Disabilities
Education Act of 1997
Educational materials in the school setting must be made accessible
to children with disabilities.
Fig. 7.6 Acts designed to protect access to the Internet for people with
disabilities.
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202 Legal and Social Issues; Web Accessibility Chapter 7
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The Internet has also enabled disabled individuals to work in a vast array of new fields.
Prior to its advent, 25 percent of the 15 million Americans with disabilities found employment
as a result of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). [***M. Conlin, “The New
Workforce,” Business Week 20 March 2000: 65.***] Technologies such as voice activation,
visual enhancers and auditory aids afford disabled individuals with more work
opportunities. For example, visually impaired people might use computer monitors with
enlarged text or electronic equipment with braille operating controls.
Within the next year, information provided through technology will have to be equally
accessible to individuals with disabilities. [***M. Conlin, “The New Workforce,” Business
Week 20 March 2000: 65.***] For example, federal regulations similar to the disability
ramp mandates will be applied to the Internet to meet the needs of those with
impaired hearing, sight and speech. In the future, sites heavily laden with graphic images
might have to simplify their appearance. [***S. Tillet, “E-Commerce for the Blind,”
Internet Week 8 May 2000: 31.***]
Fig. 7.7 We Media home page. (Courtesy of We Media Inc.)
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Chapter 7 Legal and Social Issues; Web Accessibility 203
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7.11.2 Web Accessibility Initiative
On April 7, 1997, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) launched the Web Accessibility
Initiative (WAI™). Accessibility refers to the level of usability of an application or Web
site for people with disabilities. The vast majority of Web sites are considered inaccessible
to people with visual, learning or mobility impairments. A high level of accessibility is difficult
to achieve, because there are many different disabilities, language barriers, hardware
and software inconsistencies, etc. As greater numbers of people with disabilities begin to
use the Internet, it is imperative that Web-site designers increase accessibility to their sites.
The WAI is an attempt to make the Web more accessible; its mission is described at
www.w3.org/WAI. Chapter 34, Accessibility, discusses programming techniques used
to provide users with disabilities Internet access through both wireless and wireline devices.
The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 (www.w3.org/TR/WCAG10) are
divided into a three-tier structure of checkpoints according to their priority. Priority-one
checkpoints are those that must be met to ensure accessibility. Priority-two checkpoints,
though not essential, are highly recommended. Priority-three checkpoints improve accessibility
slightly. The WAI also presents a supplemental list of quick tips—this list contains
checkpoints aimed at solving priority one problems. More information on the WAI Quick
Tips can be found at www.w3.org/WAI/References/Quicktips.)
7.11.3 Web Accessibility and Wireless Devices
Wireless technology will profoundly improve the lives of people with disabilities. For example,
wireless technology may be used to help visually impaired people navigate. Consider
a visually impaired person trying to cross a busy intersection. The traffic light could
be equipped with Bluetooth technology to broadcast messages to Bluetooth-enabled GPS
wireless devices. The wireless device would receive a signal that the crossing sign says
“Walk” and would then convert that message to audio for the person to hear. The device
could also warn the person on-coming traffic and tell the person when it is safe to walk.
Wireless technology may also help hearing-impaired people. For example, a hearingimpaired
person shopping in a mall cannot hear an announcement about a sale in a store.
Using Bluetooth technology, the mall could broadcast the announcement to the person’s
Bluetooth-enabled PDA device, which would convert the speech to text and display the text
message for the hearing-impaired person. The same technology could be used to connect
the PDA wirelessly to a television or radio to provide closed captioning for broadcasts.
Wireless applications designed for people with disabilities are also discussed in Chapter 3,
Location-Based Services and Chapter 34, Accessibility, walks the user through programming
techniques designed to provide users with disabilites Internet access.
In this chapter, we explore how electronic communications, including the growing
wireless phenomenon, have affected our legal system, as well as our social structure. We
investigated issues relating to privacy, defamation, Internet taxation and copyright. We also
examined how wireless communication has advantages and disadvantages. In the next
chapter, International Wireless Communications, we discuss how the wireless Internet is
being developed in regions worldwide, and compare this growth to that of the United
States.
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