[thelist] flash accessibility/usability

[John Dowdell]

At 4:14 PM 2/26/2, Burhan Khalid wrote:
> However, our ultimate goal is not to impress our visitors with
> technitronics, but it is to convey information. This should be the
> bottom line for every website design issue. Are we getting our
> information across to our LCD?

True, thanks. I'd change that last part a little, to "how well is our
audience receiving our message", but agree with you that this is the bottom
line.

Here are some of the things that contribute to a message's effectiveness:

--  do we know what we want to say?

--  are we saying it?

--  are we saying it to the people we want to hear it?

--  are they hearing it, and understanding it as we desire?

--  is everyone reacting the same way? if not, what differences are there
in audience response? can we tailor the speech to more effectively reach
more of the desired listeners?

--  overall: are we eliciting the actual response we desire? Is our
communication actually _working_?


Often during "accessibility" discussions I think of vocabulary choices.
Sometimes a complex word gets the idea across most compellingly. But can
the entire audience understand that word? When we discuss things on
English-language mailing lists, how often do we resort to local
colloquialisms and idiomatic speech to punch a point home, and how often do
we speak in a more culturally-neutral way?

If we were really concerned about being usable and accessible for all, then
we wouldn't be on the internet... we've already segmented the audience,
just by the nature of the medium. But I feel sure everyone on this list
already has a commitment to making useful, meaningful messages for others,
while minimizing barriers whenever possible. There's a range of
distinctions to be made here -- a continuum rather than a binary divide --
and I'm not certain there's a single "right" answer....

jd






John Dowdell, Macromedia Tech Support, San Francisco CA US
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