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Number of posts in this thread: 10 (In chronological order)

From: Steven Henderson
Date: Thu, Apr 01 2010 4:12AM
Subject: Blatant abuse of the term 'accessibility'
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I've seen a worrying increase of websites blatantly abusing the term
'accesibility' in the current climate in which we try so hard to encourage.
An example of what I am talking about is using accessibility as a vehicle to
validate an almost worser evil such as keyword-stuffing SEO tactics (perhaps
due to genuine misunderstanding, or perhaps not) like the following example
(observe the heading 'Links for Accessibility' that introduces the so-called
accessibility links, below the visually-obvious main content):
http://alturl.com/8xzu



What do other people think can be done to stop people doing this? And more
importantly, encourage them and their clients to consider this distasteful
practice. It is not accepted in the real-world, so why should we accept it
online.

From: Geof Collis
Date: Thu, Apr 01 2010 6:36AM
Subject: Re: Blatant abuse of the term 'accessibility'
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Hi Steve

I'm not sure what can be done but up here in Ontario with the new law
governing website accessibility expected soon people who have no
business calling themselves web accessibility professionals/experts
are popping up like dandelions.

I expect a lot of Companies are going to be taken to the cleaners.

cheers

Geof


At 05:10 AM 4/1/2010, you wrote:
>I've seen a worrying increase of websites blatantly abusing the term
>'accesibility' in the current climate in which we try so hard to encourage.
>An example of what I am talking about is using accessibility as a vehicle to
>validate an almost worser evil such as keyword-stuffing SEO tactics (perhaps
>due to genuine misunderstanding, or perhaps not) like the following example
>(observe the heading 'Links for Accessibility' that introduces the so-called
>accessibility links, below the visually-obvious main content):
>http://alturl.com/8xzu
>
>
>
>What do other people think can be done to stop people doing this? And more
>importantly, encourage them and their clients to consider this distasteful
>practice. It is not accepted in the real-world, so why should we accept it
>online.
>
>

From: Nancy Johnson
Date: Thu, Apr 01 2010 7:45AM
Subject: Re: Blatant abuse of the term 'accessibility'
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Along with abuse is also tremendous misunderstanding. I'm working on
a site that the jquery's that came to us were not keyboard accessible.
There was one, however, the dropdown menus in the global navigation
came to us screen reader accessible.

Many companies also believe that if they run their favorite
accessibility validator then they feel their site is accessible.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/ puts a sitemap of their site in the footer
because their drop-down menus are not keyboard accessible, or at least
they weren't in the past. Would you consider it a help the keyboard
user? or keyword stuffing?

Nancy

On Thu, Apr 1, 2010 at 7:32 AM, Geof Collis < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
> Hi Steve
>
> I'm not sure what can be done but up here in Ontario with the new law
> governing website accessibility expected soon people who have no
> business calling themselves web accessibility professionals/experts
> are popping up like dandelions.
>
> I expect a lot of Companies are going to be taken to the cleaners.
>
> cheers
>
> Geof
>
>
> At 05:10 AM 4/1/2010, you wrote:
>>I've seen a worrying increase of websites blatantly abusing the term
>>'accesibility' in the current climate in which we try so hard to encourage.
>>An example of what I am talking about is using accessibility as a vehicle to
>>validate an almost worser evil such as keyword-stuffing SEO tactics (perhaps
>>due to genuine misunderstanding, or perhaps not) like the following example
>>(observe the heading 'Links for Accessibility' that introduces the so-called
>>accessibility links, below the visually-obvious main content):
>>http://alturl.com/8xzu
>>
>>
>>
>>What do other people think can be done to stop people doing this? And more
>>importantly, encourage them and their clients to consider this distasteful
>>practice. It is not accepted in the real-world, so why should we accept it
>>online.
>>
>>

From: Simius Puer
Date: Thu, Apr 01 2010 8:15AM
Subject: Re: Blatant abuse of the term 'accessibility'
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Hi Steve

You have to remember that 'accessibility' does have other meanings than 'Web
accessibility', all of which were around long before the Web even existed,
let along the WAI and WCAG etc.

I think in the case you've highlighted here, the website is not abusing the
'web term' but simply using the 'word' - I could be wrong, but I think they
are quite innocent.

There is not a lot that can be done about the charlatans that pop up. Even
some of the more credible consultancies I've dealt with have given out some
really bad advice or audited websites and given them the all-clear when
clearly they were dreadful (including ones advising the Government/Civil
Service here in Ireland).

It would be great to see the industry regulated but we are talking about the
Web here - not exactly the best regulated industry in the world. If it was
we probably would never have seen the bubble that led to the initial .com
bust that wiped out so many start-ups in the 80s. On the other hand it is
argued that regulation stifles innovation - not that I agree with that, I
just think it stifles those that want to do things "quick and nasty". Those
people are the ones who are likely to fail anyway, and have introduced so
many bad practices that we are still trying to stamp out years later (tables
for layout, javascript-only menus, "convert to HTML" in Word etc....)

I'm ranting now aren't I? oops!!

Going back to your original point Steve - if you do see any sites making a
false claim in the UK let the RNIB know. They are very proactive and have
even run name-and-shame campaigns which have had great effect on the likes
of supermarket and banking websites.

And if the website claims to be accessible and was provided by an outside
agency don't be afraid to approach the company that owns the website
direct. I've done this and sometimes you get no response or thanks, other
times they are very keen to understand and fix problems (not to mention
asking their supplier why they did not deliver what was promised in the
first place!).

From: Steven Henderson
Date: Thu, Apr 01 2010 8:18AM
Subject: Re: Blatant abuse of the term 'accessibility'
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Nancy,

On the basis that using the keyboard requires about 100 key presses before I
know where I am on the whitehouse homepage (and most of these are main menu
links), links are clearly not designed to be accessible, outright.

As for keyword stuffing, the whitehouse footer is clearly designed
sympathetically to the website as a sitemap. Even if this was to help SEO in
any way, it has clearly been designed to appear useful to visual site
visitors. I honestly don't see why in addition, they could not make the main
menu work for keyboard use though ... that is just laziness.

The example I provided however, used keywords that clearly have nothing to
do with the aiding the user, otherwise why would they choose different link
text to those in the main menu of the content area (which are clear and best
suited to visual users), push the list a mile down the page and visually
present it as a separate afterthought by retaining none of the design and
styling of the main content area. And then using 'accessibility' as a
leading heading which only a search engine wouldn't consider out of context
of the rest of the website, and thus not flag it as suspiscious.

Steven

From: Simius Puer
Date: Thu, Apr 01 2010 8:24AM
Subject: Re: Blatant abuse of the term 'accessibility'
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>
> which only a search engine wouldn't consider out of context
> of the rest of the website, and thus not flag it as suspiscious
>

Actually it would Steve. Anyone who still practices key-word stuffing at
the bottom of a page is not only a black-hat SEO-er, but also horribly
out-of-date. Content stuffed at the bottom of a page with little or no
semantic mark-up is going to get next to no search engine "weighting" and
can even receive an SEO penalty.

This reinforces my previous suggestion that I think this was done innocently
rather than for SEO/false accessibility purposes. They could probably use a
good Web Manager to run their site ;]

From: Denis Boudreau
Date: Thu, Apr 01 2010 8:39AM
Subject: Re: Blatant abuse of the term 'accessibility'
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Morning,


On 2010-04-01, at 7:32 AM, Geof Collis wrote:

> I'm not sure what can be done but up here in Ontario with the new law
> governing website accessibility expected soon people who have no
> business calling themselves web accessibility professionals/experts
> are popping up like dandelions.

We have the exact same thing happening here in Quebec. Looking at all the companies that suddenly claim to have the expertise, you'd think that accessibility is just as recognized and has been around for as long as programing or design... :/

No doubt, the upcoming mandatory standards are attracting a lot of hungry people who want their piece of the pie (and yours also, if they can grab it). Nothing new here. We've seen that happen countless times before.

Like you, I also feel these people threaten the credibility of the field we work so hard to promote. The risk here being that their lack of expertise could hinder the credibility of web accessibility before we even have the chance to really build it.

I doubt anything can be done to stop this, but it can probably be controlled in some way: what we are doing in Quebec (as we are quite visible and recognized from the government's perspective) is create an accreditation/certification program surrounding the expertise on web accessibility.

Thanks to a government funding, we're working on establishing ourselves as the PMI <http://www.pmi.org/>; or Six Sigma of accessiblity in Quebec. As a non-profit organization, we have nothing to gain from this really, besides protecting clients from clueless consultants and sharks (therefore, trying to protect the reputation of accessibility). We expect to launch the program within the year as our standard is coming to.

We're thinking about putting together a checklist of measurable things a would-be expert needs to be able to do, as well as regular training sessions and activities. We're thinking some sort of profesional order, with a recognized/able logo.

We also intend to promote recognized experts from different profiles through a categorized listing freely available on our website, so people who need an a11y expert could come and "shop" for one, with reasonable confidence that the person they select will be able to do the job.

In order to ensure the expertise, we only plan on working with individuals, not companies. That way, a company will be able to present itself through their resources and not the opposite. As we all know, people come and go, so a company that has 5 experts could lose them all in one day if its resources all decided to go work for the competition. We feel expertise is never (or rarely) about the company, but always about the people working for it.

We know that most people that are new to accessibility will do their best to do an honest job but might learn as they go. It'll cost extra, but someone will have to pay for the learning curve. That's part of reality whether we like it or not.

But others, a small portion of people with debatable ethics, will only see this as an opportunity to make money from just-as-clueless clients. These are the people we work to counter with such a program.

By doing this, we hope to be able to control part of the chaos, but we know it will only be able to do so much.

I'm guessing usability experts have had their share of this chaos in the past 10 years or so.

New field of expertise, same old battle.

--
Denis Boudreau
www.twitter.com/dboudreau

From: Simius Puer
Date: Thu, Apr 01 2010 9:09AM
Subject: Re: Blatant abuse of the term 'accessibility'
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Hi Denis

Great idea - have you seen Guild of Accessible Web Designers
GAWDS<http://www.gawds.org/>;?
It's broadly along the same lines although not focusing as much on local
legislation.

A minor suggestion - you may want to check the colour contrast of your
Twitter profile (I only suffer minor colour-blindness but had problems with
the right-column).

Best of luck with establishing your PMI bid and hope it really takes off as
what your are proposing sounds like a great approach.

From: Steven Henderson
Date: Thu, Apr 01 2010 9:15AM
Subject: Re: Blatant abuse of the term 'accessibility'
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I second the program you have proposed Denis. And thanks for the GAWDS link
Andrew.

Steven

From: Denis Boudreau
Date: Thu, Apr 01 2010 10:33AM
Subject: Re: Blatant abuse of the term 'accessibility'
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Hi Andrew,

On 2010-04-01, at 10:08 AM, Simius Puer wrote:

> Great idea - have you seen Guild of Accessible Web Designers
> GAWDS<http://www.gawds.org/>;?
> It's broadly along the same lines although not focusing as much on local
> legislation.

Yes, our focus is taking care of our backyard before we can even consider helping others take care of theirs. ;p

I've known about GAWDS for a few years now, but never really took the time to understand what it was exactly. Guess I will now!


> A minor suggestion - you may want to check the colour contrast of your
> Twitter profile (I only suffer minor colour-blindness but had problems with
> the right-column).

Oh, good point. Blame this on laziness. Will fix that up ASAP.

Thanks for taking the time to point it out.


> Best of luck with establishing your PMI bid and hope it really takes off as
> what your are proposing sounds like a great approach.

Thanks. That's very nice of you. I appreciate it. :)

--
Denis Boudreau
www.twitter.com/dboudreau





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