Accessibility

Costumer Conversion Online Master of Digital Marketing 2011 Class Hult International Business School

Andrena Goncalves Sousa January 31st 2011

A) Laws concerning discrimination against disabled people UNITED KINGDOM A Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) was enacted in 1995 to: protect disabled people against discrimination in relation with employment, provision of goods, facilities and services or the disposal or management of premises make provision about the employment of disabled persons establish a National Disability Council In October 2010, the Equality Act replaced most of the DDA. To explain the new statutory provisions of the Equality Act and to ensure that lower courts and tribunals apply the law consistently, the Equality and Human Rights Commission produced Codes of Practice on: employment equal pay services, public functions and associations As these Codes were issued by the Commission on 26 January, it is probable that they will be fully in force around 28 February 2011. This act places an obligation on information providers to ensure their web products are accessible. According with the Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB), the DDA, required certain employers and service providers () to comply with the Act and therefore make their websites accessible. In 2010 the British Standard Institution (BSI Group) launched the first British standard to address web accessibility and the challenge of digital inclusion called BS 8878 Web accessibility - Code of Practice. According to the Equality and Human Rights Commission this code is consistent with the Equality Act 2010 and is referenced in the UK governments e-Accessibility Action Plan as the basis of updated advice on developing accessible online services. The eAccessibility Action Plan enables UK to ensure accessibility, affordability and equal participation for disabled users in the digital economy. Its main purpose is to address accessibility challenges in the world of digital communications through collaboration between business, voluntary sector, and government (Department of Business, Innovations & Skills, 2010). To claim conformance public and private organizations should follow BS 8878 Web accessibility recommendations for building and maintaining web experiences that are accessible to, usable by and enjoyable for disabled people. In general terms companies should: Evaluate impact of web technologies and web content authoring tools on disabled peoples experience of web content. Follow web accessibility guidelines: Web Content Accessibility Guidelines

(WCAG)1, Authoring Tool Accessibility Guidelines (ATAG)2, User Agent Accessibility Guidelines (UAAG)3 Define and implement an accessibility policy for the organization. Involve disabled people in the planning, development and testing of the website. VENEZUELA In Venezuela there is a law called Law for disabled people. This law protects all persons with disabilities and applies to public bodies and private entities, national and international activities carried out within the territory of the Republic. The law doesnt include any specific information about implications on the development of websites. But there are some interesting initiatives that try to help people with visual disability to use digital tools such as word processors spreadsheets, and Internet, through educational programs. B) http://www.directgov.gov.uk and http://www.amazon.com experience On www.directgov.gov.uk the TAB key allows navigating through the whole page but it does it by columns (starting on the left) and from the top to the button of the page. It called my attention that the buttons that are at the top of the page (Cymraeg, Accessibility, etc) are the last ones to reach. At some points it was impossible to visually identify what the selection was. On www.amazon.com the TAB key allows going through all the clickable items on the page, most of the times from left to right and from the top to the bottom of the page. In terms of visibility, it can be identified what element is selected (a thin line around the item), but it could be more striking. Every time a selection is made and the page reloads, to select another item/button it is necessary to start again from the very top of the page. In general it was easier to navigate the Amazon pages than the Directgovs. I think it has to do with the logic order in which I expected to browse the pages.

World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is an international community that works to develop web standards. It currently has 324 members (35% from United States, 8.8% from United Kingdom). It has a specific section where includes information on how make pages accessible to people with disabilities (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines-WCAG), to internationalize them, and make them work on mobile devices. 2 ATAG define how authoring tools should help Web developers produce Web content that is accessible and conforms to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. (www.w3.org) 3 UAAG explain how to make user agents accessible to people with disabilities, particularly to increase accessibility to Web content. User agents are web browsers, media players, and assistive technologies, which are software that some people with disabilities use in interacting with computers. (www.w3.org)

References World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) (http://www.w3.org/) Royal National Institute of Blind People (www.rnib.org.uk) Equality and Humans Rights Commission (www.equalityhumanrights.com) British Standards Institution (http://shop.bsigroup.com) Department of Business, Innovations & Skills. The eAccessibility Action Plan (12 October 2010). Available from: http://www.bis.gov.uk/assets/biscore/busi ness-sectors/docs/e/10-1194-e-accessibility-action-plan.pdf