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Re: Question about Accessibility plugins

for

From: Lucy Greco
Date: Jun 12, 2019 12:01PM

hello: i wanted to add a note to what was said here i agree over all but
some of the toolbar options can actualy make your site hard to use for AT
users. i have found that some of the toolbar tools tend to draw focus and
or block other AT from working properly on your stie. lucy
Lucia Greco
Web Accessibility Evangelist
IST - Architecture, Platforms, and Integration
University of California, Berkeley
(510) 289-6008 skype: lucia1-greco
http://webaccess.berkeley.edu
Follow me on twitter @accessaces



On Fri, Jun 7, 2019 at 12:12 PM Birkir R. Gunnarsson <
<EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:

> Good discussion.
>
> Just to clarify, for anyone who is a newbie to the whole thing.
> There are two types of overlays:
> 1. Accessibility unicorn overlays - overlays that make your site
> accessible automatically. These accessibility unicorn overlays do not
> exist. Anyone that claims their overlay automatically fixes
> accessibility is practically scamming you.
> 2. Custom accessibility overlays - overlays that someone will develop
> specifically for your website. In order to do so you have to pay them
> to assess your site, to write the overlay and to update the overlay
> whenever you make any changes to the site. Though these work in
> theory, they are costly and do not build the knowledge or culture
> necessary for sustainable accessibility. Eventually you'll have to
> cancel the overlay subscription and do all the work you should've done
> in the first place.
>
> There is a third category, server-based accessibility options
> (server-based toolbars that let users customize the font, size, colors
> or have the webpage read out loud).
>
> There is nothing wrong with having those options as an enhancement
> (seriously, does your grandma know how to use browser zoom?) but those
> do not constitute making your site accessible. The site must first be
> made accessible before you consider those tools as an enhancement.
> Incidentally, most server based screen reader tools are pretty
> useless, they may work on static pages with a lot of content, like
> news articles, but fail utterly for any page with interactive content.
>
> I find documents to be a little bit more vendor friendly.
> We receive documents from various business units with important and
> time sensitiv info that urgently need to be posted to a website.
>
> These can be written by anyone of hundreds of employees, many of them
> are non technical, using any of 10 different authoring applications.
>
> In this scenario training and standardization is not going to take us
> very far. There are too many potential authors for that.
> The only way to ensure documents are accessible is to test and add
> accessibility at the time of posting.
>
> At that point you could train your content team and provide them with
> ttools, like Adobe Acrobat Pro or you could work with a vendor to do
> this for you.
>
> I can't say which approach I chose for my organization, but will say
> that there are reasons why a reliable vendor with a lot of expertise
> in the document accessibility industry and with experience and tools
> to det the job done quickly and efficiently would make sense in that
> scenario.
>
> It is not ideal, and if you have smaller teams you should always
> emphasize knowledge, processes and tools over remediation, but In my
> scenario I had to resort to the remediation option.
>
>
>
> On 6/7/19, <EMAIL REMOVED> < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
> > As a business person with an MBA, I don't know how managers can justify
> the
> > band aid approach: it just throws good money at media (websites,
> documents,
> > PDFs, ePUBs, A/V, whatever) that wasn't built correctly to begin with. An
> > elementary break-even analysis (B/E) would show this clearly.
> >
> > A similar model used in our American medical culture. Don't cure the
> > disease
> > or prevent it: just medicate it into submission and keep milking the
> > population for the long term.
> >
> > There's a time and place to take medicines, as well as to patch a website
> > or
> > document with this technology or that one. But the majority of stuff
> should
> > be built correctly right from the start. Everything would run so much
> > smoother.
> >
> > - - -
> > Bevi Chagnon, founder/CEO | <EMAIL REMOVED>
> > - - -
> > PubCom: Technologists for Accessible Design + Publishing
> > consulting . training . development . design . sec. 508 services
> > Upcoming classes at www.PubCom.com/classes
> > - - -
> > Latest blog-newsletter - Accessibility Tips at www.PubCom.com/blog
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: WebAIM-Forum < <EMAIL REMOVED> > On Behalf Of
> > Scott
> > Tate
> > Sent: Friday, June 7, 2019 2:15 PM
> > To: Birkir R. Gunnarsson < <EMAIL REMOVED> >; WebAIM
> Discussion
> > List < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
> > Subject: Re: [WebAIM] Question about Accessibility plugins
> >
> > I wouldn't necessarily say the fines are over stated. From our view
> > (Blndspt.com) we see settlements between 20 and 50k regularly. Some
> folks
> > tend to ratchet that up a bit depending on the target client.
> >
> > However, let me give you a quick example of overlays:
> >
> > We built a quote for a client to remediate an entire site for x
> dollars. 3
> > years ago, they got quotes for the same thing. At the time, they decided
> > the price was too high to fix their 100+ pages and decided to go the
> > overlay
> > route. As everyone out there does, 3 years later, they've been paying
> for
> > the overlay annual fees, and guess how much they've spent in 3 years?
> You
> > guessed it, MORE THAN X!
> >
> > As a result, they are no farther along, have literally learning nothing
> > about accessibility, are in the same position they were in 3 years ago
> > having spent that budget on a band aid instead of fixing the problem.
> From
> > our view, the vast majority of folks that use overlays generally:
> > 1) Spend the amount they would have spent to fix the problem within
> > 24 months (or less)
> > 2) Never learn what it means to build a culture of accessibility in
> > your organization
> > 3) Never end up fixing root issues
> > 4) End up spending the same amount again anyway a few years down
> the
> > road to finally fix the issues.
> >
> > Just our perspective. We work with Karl a lot, so we read all of the
> > overlay articles, and we wholeheartedly agree that overlays are making
> the
> > problem worse in the world.
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Scott Tate
> > Chief Information Officer
> > http://www.blndspt.com/accessibility
> >
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Birkir R. Gunnarsson < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
> > Sent: Thursday, June 6, 2019 1:04 PM
> > To: WebAIM Discussion List < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
> > Subject: Re: [WebAIM] Question about Accessibility plugins
> >
> > Check out the Accessibility overlays don't work website:
> > https://overlaysdontwork.com/
> > karl Groves also has multiple articles on the topic and I agree with
> them.
> > You can Google "karl groves accessibility overlays"
> >
> > Looking at this particular homepage I notice they exaggerate the fines
> > levied under ADA lawsuits ($50000 for first, $100000 for subsequent, I've
> > never heard those numbers anywhere, under the ADA you cannot award
> damages,
> > only fees, you can under some state regulations, particularly California,
> > but those are not mentioned on the site).
> > Also the alt text for the accessibility statistics is inserted kind of
> > inside an unrelated sentence, I would fail that under 1.3.2 WCAG content
> > order, the site itself is not perfect.
> > It also way overdoses on ARIA landmark regions, though I would flag it
> as a
> > usability concern, not a fail.
> >
> > The big question, if this is an overlay that you purchse. Is the vendor
> > willing to assume full responsibility and indemnify your website team
> from
> > any litigation claims?
> > That is real accessibility guarantee.
> > Another approach would be to install the plugin then run a full automated
> > and manual accessibility testing of the content with the plugin
> installed.
> > That will ultimately give you a state of accessibility of the particular
> > site using the particular plugin.
> > Again, if you are paying for it, that might be part of the contract, any
> > issues discovered through the process would have to be remedied by the
> > plugin provider at no cost to you.
> >
> >
> >
> > On 6/6/19, Mike Barlow < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
> >> I'm working with a company who is developing a site (using Wordpress)
> >> and their developers installed the "Userway Web Accessibility Widgit
> >> <https://userway.org/>" and wanted my opinion of it.
> >> Now I have my own opinions of "magic bullets" that you can just "drop
> >> this in and your site is accessible", and I've seen a couple of them
> >> over the years and have yet to find one that I would include in any
> >> site I was developing.
> >> I also did some searching for feedback on the Userway widgit - one
> >> from "A Bright Clear Web
> >>
> > <
> https://www.abrightclearweb.com/the-userway-web-accessibility-widget-does-i
> > t-boost-accessibility/>"
> >> had both good and bad comments about it, and there was even a question
> >> on Quora
> >> <https://www.quora.com/What-do-you-think-of-accessibility-widget-like-
> >> userway-org-Do-they-help-small-sites-to-be-adhere-with-accessibility-l
> >> aws>
> >> about it.
> >>
> >> But I want to get some real expert opinions from this group before I
> >> tell the customer what I think.
> >>
> >> So, anyone out there with any experience (both good and bad) about the
> >> Userway widgit???
> >>
> >> TIA.
> >> *Mike Barlow*
> >> Development Manager
> >> Web Accessibility/Section 508 SME
> >>
> >> Lancaster, Pa 17601
> >> Office: 732.835-7557
> >> Cell: 732.682.8226
> >> e-mail: <EMAIL REMOVED>
> >> > >> > >> archives at http://webaim.org/discussion/archives
> >> > >>
> >
> >
> > --
> > Work hard. Have fun. Make history.
> >
> > > > > archives at
> > http://webaim.org/discussion/archives
> > > >
> > > > > > > > > >
>
>
> --
> Work hard. Have fun. Make history.
> > > > >