[thelist] FWD: Internet World - The Dark Side Of Regulation

Alan,

> A. There is really nothing in the proposed guidelines that 
> would create a "burden", either on the coding or the tools side.

Of course there is. They require additional coding, which is de facto a
burden. That is not to say that it is necessarily an unreasonable burden, or
that there aren't ways to minimize the burden. Automating the inclusion of
what I will call "accessibility extensions", especially on sites built using
database backends, could go a long way to minimize the impact, but it is
still there.

> B. The proposed regulations are an extension of the ADA and the federal
> governments responsibilty to provide equal access to the services that we
> pay taxes for and have legislated.

Well, if that's the justification, then the government can pretty much take
control of anything.

> C. Yes, we know that we would have done things differently, 
> but that's the way our government works.

I know it works that way all too often. Not that it should, however.

>     A. We as designers and the people where the buck stops, have not done
a 
> good job of being aware, understanding, or caring about how our work
impacts
> our clients and their customers.

Well, we can certainly do better. But I don't think we should be regulated
into it.

> > Actually, the Justice Department has concluded that the ADA applies
> >to "private" web sites. Taken literally, this means *all* 
> >non-government web sites.
> 
> That is not correct.

Patrick's statement does not contradict mine; it merely cites fairly broad
categories targeted for regulation, while excluding nothing. With limited
research, one reference that I was able to pull up for my claim is a
characterization of the Justice Department's stance that can be found in a
news advisory on the House Judiciary's web site at
http://www.house.gov/judiciary/na020800.htm. I am fairly certain, however,
that I have read an actual quote from Janet Reno that simply uses the
blanket term "private". If I am mistaken on this, then I do apologize.
Regardless, though, the question of the appropriateness of such government
regulation still stands.

> *NOTE* AOL is currently being sued by the National Federation for the
Blind
> under the theory that AOL Is a public accomodation.
> (with 14 million members it's hard to fault the logic of this lawsuit)

Believe me, I'm not sympathetic to AOL in this. It is astonishing that AOL
has never bothered to make its software more accessible -- but then AOL and
customer service have never been terribly synonymous. But why insist on
using AOL? There are many other choices out there. The reason for the suit,
I suspect, is rather to call down the hammer of government regulation than
to reform AOL. Instead, I think the NFB should make a PR campaign out of AOL
(apart from a lawsuit, that is).

> The catagorical belief that anything the g'vment does is evil, and will
> cause you harm, is to ignore the fact that without regulation you would
not
> be reading this, nor would their be a internet to discuss these and all of
> the other issues we discuss.

Well, I don't use the term "evil". I would say that much government
regulation is counterproductive, and occasionally truly destructive, in that
it typically imposes blunt solutions in an effort to solve what are often
rare, categorical, and/or perceived problems. This is even more true today,
when many laws are vaguely worded with the assumption that vast
bureaucracies and the judiciary will decide what they mean and how to
implement them.

I don't buy the part about government regulation making the Internet
possible. The initial implementation, yes, kudos to the Feds. But the
government could never have developed the Internet as it exists today.

> The Section 508 guidelines apply to U.S. Government websites, State
> Government websites and to public/private websites that do 
> Business with the government.
> 
> It does Not apply to sites that do not do business with the government.
> It does not tell You what to use, how to use it, or restrict your
creativity.

This contradicts even what Deval Patrick said. And the definitions of these
terms can expand as desired to mean what their proponents want them to mean.

> The problem is in our individual use of features. We are all guilty of
> hearing the siren song of new stuff and techniques, extending and
> incorporating them into the next site we build. From images to applets, we
> try them, use them, change them, improve them and my case, break a lot of
> them.

I don't think that this freedom to innovate should ever be regulated or
squelched.
 
> You, your employer, or clients will have to determine how 
> many people can see what you do.

I do agree with you on this. This is how it should be.

James Aylard
jaylard@equilon.com