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Web Site Accessibility and Compliance with the WC3 Standards and ADA regulations

Written by: Sandy Andrews

Article Overview: Thomas Ingham, Chief Technologist/Co-founder of Coalmarch Productions discusses Web site compliance as it relates to the discrimination allegations against Target.com and its possible effects on e-tailers.

Web Site Accessibility and Compliance with the WC3 Standards and ADA regulations

Although more complex than generally reported in the media, the discrimination suit filed on February 7, 2006 against the Target Corporation is, at essence, about accessibility for the blind to certain retail Web sites. What exactly does that mean? How can a company find out if their site is compliant and, if it is not, how can it be fixed and how much will that cost?

Accessibility in this context refers to the ability of an assistive device (usually a screen reader) to read and translate text into audio output. Obviously, all of the visible text on a site is readable and easily translated. However, images are the problem, and accessibility requires extra steps taken to prepare the content for a screen reader.

In the past, images were simply given a file name, usually in the form of a string of characters and numbers that meant nothing to the user. The advent of Web browsers that searched for pertinent sites based on keywords submitted by the user prompted the addition of text (or alt-tags) to describe the image to better attract the browsers to a particular site.

For a site to be screen reader friendly, the alt-tags must provide enough information to adequately describe the product. For example, simply titling an image, “Toast-o-Matic toaster,” is sufficient to attract browsers searching for toasters. To be compliant with industry standards, the alt-tag might be expanded to, “Toast-o-Matic toaster; four slice; wide-slot; in white, black or chrome; 20% off marked price of $30.00; sale expires 12/31/2007; to order 'click' Add-to-cart; located in aisle 6, 'Small Appliances' in your local store.” This provides details for a visually impaired user to either order online or pre-select a product before physically visiting a store to purchase the item. (One of the variables in the Target suit addresses whether full accessibility pertains to just operations that have both brick-and- mortar stores and click-and-order Web sites or if pure e-commerce sites not affiliated with actual stores.)

A major concern in determining what is compliant is the unavailability of clearly defined laws under the ADA to use as guidelines when developing sites. Although regulations have been written to cover accessibility to Web sites operated by government agencies under Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act, no such regulations are available for private business. Instead, we have industry standards developed by the World Wide Web Consortium (WC3). However, these are unenforceable and act more to stimulate the advancement in technology and to encourage the adoption of consistency. In fact, many of the products sold by the decision makers in the WC3 are not compliant with their own standards.

As an industry group that recommends standards, the WC3 has no enforcement authority and compliance is voluntary. In fact, I am not aware of any commercially available browsers that adhere to the WC3 standards, not even those manufactured by members who established the standards.

At least the WC3 has done a good job making it easy to test your site for compliance with their industry standards. Simply go to their Web site (www.w3.org) and click “Accessibility,” go to the “Web Accessibility Initiative” (WAI) page then click “Evaluating Accessibility.” There you will find tools that can be used to simply and easily evaluate your site for compliance with recommended industry standards. If problems are found, you will be told exactly how your site is out of compliance with the WC3 guidelines.

If your site exhibits compliance issues, and the site was developed dynamically and not with a compiler, it can be a relatively easy and economical fix. On average, it can take a knowledgeable Web development professional approximately three months and $40K in service fees to get your site in compliance with the WC3 recommendations. However, without clearly defined, enforceable laws and regulations to rely on, you can't guarantee that the rules won't change in the future.

Currently, much of the ADA is only addressing “reasonable” access which leaves the matter open to interpretation by the Web site owner and their site developer. Now that we've ventured down the rabbit hole of full-accessibility by virtualizing sites for the visually impaired, we'll be expected to continue to virtualize to the nth degree. It isn't fair to expect any one party to be accountable.

Vendors cant' be 100% accountable, the retailer can't be 100% accountable, neither can the manufacturers of screen readers and other assisted devices. It needs to be a collaborative effort between the industry and the regulators. Until the legislators and the regulators provide clearly defined guidelines and regulations, and then provide funding for developing the necessary revisions, the best solution is to leave the solution up to the WC3 and the developers.

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Article Tags: accessibility, advent, aisle 6, assistive device, brick and mortar, brick and mortar stores, discrimination suit, image toast, images, local store, retail web, small appliances, target corporation, toaster, toasters, variables, visible text, web browsers



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