Quick points on accessibilty

In a recent post, Bruce Lawson, a member of the Accessibility Task Force and notable funny-guy, gives the following pointers on accessibility:

  • Accessibility is not text-only or a separate “cripples-only” site
  • Disability is more than blindness
  • Accessibility is not an exercise in political correctness; there are demonstrable, measurable advantages in usability for all
  • Accessibility isn’t a purely technical matter; it’s to do with content as well (and is thus also the reponsibility of the non-techy people in the organisation who produce content).

He also points out Legal & General as an example of a corporate web site that is both fashionable and accessible.

In a wonderful display of irony, Bruce’s contribution to the CSS Zen Garden project (a project revolving around beautiful, usable and accessible web site design) had me laughing out loud with a call back to Geocities personal home pages circa 1996. In this case, ugly is only skin deep :)

* This post was originally published on September 15, 2006 at http://www.csb7.com/blogs/whyblogwhy/2006/09/15/quick_points_on_accessibilty

Invisible Pink Unicorns are beings of great spiritual power. We know this because they are capable of being invisible and pink at the same time. Like all religions, the Faith of the Invisible Pink Unicorns is based upon both logic and faith. We have faith that they are pink; we logically know that they are invisible because we can’t see them.

— Steve Eley, Chief Advocate and Spokesguy for the Faith of the Invisible Pink Unicorn, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invisible_Pink_Unicorns#History