[thelist] accessability guidelines - good/bad?

> > of discussion: 1) Are accessibility guidelines reasonable? 
> > and 2) should the
> > Federal government mandate their use?
> 
> Their use had to be mandated in the physical world...

Had to be? 

> Okay, I knew this. However I was of the opinion that after a few legal
> challenges, this would be met with the same sense of skepticism as
requiring
> all homes in the United States to have wheelchair-accessable ramps and
> bathrooms. 

A horrible way to enact law...

> The Federal government asserts widespread control over every
> other form of communication we have today. Why do you expect 
> the web to remain above this?

Why not?

> Even though I don't relish the thought of the government
> mandating certain things, uncontrolled anarchy is not the 
> U.S.'s answer to creating a cooperative market/environment (at least not
yet 
> ;-).

So it's the government's job to create the right market environment? The
government's general absence in e-commerce to date seems to have been a huge
plus, not a detriment.

> I feel that most major sites that cater to the public should meet 
> federally mandated accessability guidelines that make sense.

I agree that major web sites should strive for the greatest accessibility
possible. But instead of using the big stick of Federal mandate, I recommend
a more positive approach that encourages businesses to make their web sites
accessible, and software makers to build-in and automate accessibility in
web-dev apps. Non-profits leverage the power of positive public exposure all
of the time to encourage the private sector to donate and take part. Would
this ever achieve full accessibility across the web? Of course not. But it
would do much to advance accessibility without eliminating the freedom of
those who choose not to conform (that used to be something important --
thought I read about it in some founding document somewhere :).

James Aylard
jaylard@equilon.com