We received an email which raised the subject of web accessibility, in other words, are our web pages accessible by people with disabilities.

In this case, the writer was referring to sight impairment, although there are many kinds of disability that can be considered.

Accessibility Inquiry*

I noticed your page onlymelbourne.com.au links to timeanddate.com from the world clock.

Unfortunately, that site isn’t very accessible for the sight impaired. Would you consider adding a link to a more accessible version like thetimenow.com which is WCAG 2.0 compatible?

Thanks,
Liz Cook | accessibilityunited.org

*Enquiry

WebAIM

We have web accessibility in mind
Our mission is to empower organizations to make their web content accessible to people with disabilities.

WebAIM offers complete web accessibility services. Regardless of the type or size of your web site, WebAIM can help ensure that your site is accessible and usable to those with disabilities.

While we specialize in developing and retrofitting web content for accessibility, our accessibility approach is one that empowers our clients to maintain that accessibility into the future. Though we are a small team, we have years of experience in accessible web design and can work with you to make your site meet the highest levels of accessibility.

• webaim.org
• wave.webaim.org – web accessibility evaluation tool

WCAG 2.0 Compatibility

How to Meet WCAG 2.0
A customizable quick reference to Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 requirements (success criteria) and techniques.

• w3.org

Debate

Does a publisher design and structure content to suit what is effectively a low percentage of traffic.

Key facts for sight impairment

• 285 million people are estimated to be visually impaired worldwide: 39 million are blind and 246 have low vision.
• About 90% of the world’s visually impaired live in low-income settings.
• 82% of people living with blindness are aged 50 and above.
• Source: who.int

So, if a web page content was aimed at a demographic of young (18-30) X gens, then the number of sight impaired that may visit the page are less than 0.01%.  Add: location, gender, and subject and the traffic percentage falls again.

Publisher Point Of View

My take is not a popular one with accessibility groups.

It’s hard enough generating traffic and more importantly ‘advertisers’ without adding to the infrastructure costs of delivering the content.

Not unlike free to air television: the model is advertiser based funding to deliver free television.  Our model is the same, we deliver free content to readers funded by advertising.

Yes, some publishers sell printed content which funds their online content, then there is good argument that they should be Web Accessible.

Having stated my case (publisher), each web site owner should look at their own target markets before deciding whether they should be accessible.