[gui-talk] Fwd: E-Access Bulletin, October 2010: Accessibility is 'business opportunity', says minister

[Steve Pattison]

From:    Dan Jellinek dan at headstar.com
To:      eaccess at headstar.com

++E-ACCESS BULLETIN
Access To Technology For All, Regardless Of Ability
- ISSUE 130, October 2010.

A Headstar Publication.
http://www.headstar.com/eab/ .

Please forward this free bulletin to others (subscription details
at the end). We conform to the accessible Text Email
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++Issue 130 Contents.

01:  Accessibility Is ‘Business Opportunity’, Minister Tells
EAB
- Ed Vaizey details role of new UK e-Accessibility Forum.

02: Multimedia Report For World Standards Day
- This year’s global focus on accessibility.

03: Publishers And Campaigners Unite To Boost Text-to-
Speech
- Joint statement says accessibility ‘broadens the market’.

News in Brief: 04: Canadian Challenge: blind woman sues
government; 05: Equality, Updated: UK tightens law on
inaccessible web; 06: 21st Century: US communications access
law.

Section Two: Policy Focus – British Standard 8878 on Web
Accessibility.
07: Complementary Guidance: The British Standard on
developing accessible websites has been four years in the
making, but it looks to be worth the wait. Tristan Parker
reports.


[Contents ends].


++Section One: News.

+01:  Accessibility Is ‘Business Opportunity’, Minister Tells
EAB.

The work of the government’s newly-launched e-Accessibility
Forum will include demonstrating to businesses that
accessibility is a financial opportunity rather than just a cost,
the Minister for Culture, Communication and Creative
Industries, Ed Vaizey, told E-Access Bulletin in an exclusive
interview this week.

Led by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, the
e-Accessibility Forum ( http://www.bis.gov.uk/e-accessibility )
will bring together more than 60 members from government,
industry and the voluntary sector, working to deliver more
accessible digital services, content and goods for disabled
consumers. Some of the forum’s work is detailed in an e-
Accessibility Action Plan which will be updated quarterly (
available as a PDF at: http://bit.ly/8Xh71O ).

“The main challenge is to overcome the perception that e-
accessibility costs money, that it’s a burden on business as
opposed to being an opportunity for business,” Vaizey told
EAB. “We want to really embed e-accessibility into a whole
range of agendas, making sure that it is part and parcel of
everything we do.”

Overall awareness of e-accessibility needs to be improved by
promotion of the forum and its work, he said. “It’s all very
well for me to say that government should take a lead, but one
can pretty much guarantee that there will be a lot of individual
initiatives from government that won’t take account of the e-
accessibility agenda, and therefore it’s very important for me to
publicise it as widely as possible to my colleagues, so that they
know about this agenda and they understand what their
obligations are towards it.”

Government will play two key roles in the forum, said Vaizey.
The first is as a “co-ordinator”, part of which will involve
publicising best practice on, for example, web access standards
or manufacturing of accessible goods. Second, government will
help set the agenda for a specific ‘Regulatory work stream’ –
one of five work streams detailed in the Action Plan – which
will involve work on the EU Framework Directives for
Electronic Communications Networks and Services, and
applying public procurement standards.

Overall, the forum’s approach will primarily be one of working
with and educating organisations rather than forcing regulation.
However, Vaizey said this should not be a barrier to progress,
as the companies he has discussed these issues with so far are
proving receptive. “I have to say, I’ve found the private sector
very willing to engage in this agenda. I think they see it as
absolutely in their self-interest if they can provide products and
equipment everyone can use. I don’t feel like I’m bullying the
private sector into doing anything, I feel very much that this is
part of a very strong partnership.”

The Action Plan also features a ‘Websites services’ work
stream, which plans to issue regular updates on web access
issues, and highlight and encourage best practice. As more
government services move online, the whole e-accessibility
agenda will become increasingly essential, said Vaizey.

And you can comment on this story now, on EAB Live:
http://www.headstar.com/eablive/?p=492


+02: Multimedia Report For World Standards Day.

A new technical report on accessibility for audio, video, and
multimedia systems and equipment has been published by the
International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC), an
international standards body for electronics, as part of activities
to mark this year’s accessibility-themed World Standards Day.

The report, IEC/TR 62678, provides information on
accessibility and usability terms, activities, completed and
ongoing standards, technical reports and projects, and is
available as a pdf from:
http://www.stc-access.org/2010/10/15/iec-offers-free-technical-
report-on-accessibility-for-multimedia-systems-and-equipment/
Short link: http://bit.ly/cL1PJf

World Standards Day 2010, which took place on 14 October,
was themed ‘accessibility for all’ in an effort to promote the
importance of codes, standards, and conformity assessment
activities in developing and maintaining the built environment,
products, technologies and systems that are accessible for
persons with special needs:
http://www.iso.org/iso/wsd2010.htm

The project unites the work of the three main global standards
bodies – the IEC, the International Organization for
Standardization (ISO) and the International Telecommunication
Union (ITU).

Meanwhile, the AccessAbility special interest group (SIG) of
the Society for Technical Communication, a professional
association for technical writers including editors, graphic
designers and web page designers, is set to release a draft copy
of guidance on producing conference accessibility guides.

Aimed at anyone involved in the organisation of a major event
or conference, the document will describe what areas to cover
from an accessibility perspective including transport to and
from the venue, accommodation, a venue guide and
presentation equipment, Karen Mardahl, Co-Manager of the
SIG, told E-Access Bulletin.

When published it will appear online at:
http://www.stc-access.org

And you can comment on this story now, on EAB Live:
http://www.headstar.com/eablive/?p=494


+03: Publishers And Campaigners Unite To Boost Text-to-
Speech.

A call for text-to-speech functions to be included on all
electronic book platforms to improve their accessibility has
been issued by a group of publishing and literary organisations.

The Publishers Association, The Society of Authors, The
Association of Authors Agents and The Right to Read Alliance
– itself an umbrella campaign group, whose members include
The Royal National Institute of Blind People – grouped
together to issue the joint statement. It recommended that
speech functions, which help many print-disabled readers
access a range of otherwise inaccessible e-books, “is routinely
enabled on all e-books across all platforms, at least where there
is no audio-book edition commercially available.”

The statement continued: “It is in the interests of publishers for
their published content to be available and accessible to as
many people as possible. This includes the broadening of the
market to those with visual impairments or other disabilities”.

The recommendation follows ongoing disputes over the
inclusion of text-to-speech functions on e-book readers. Last
year US manufacturer Amazon allowed publishers to disable
the feature on an early version of its Kindle e-book reader,
after an authors’ rights group claimed that the text-to-speech
function effectively breached a royalties agreement ( see E-
Access Bulletin issue 110:
http://www.headstar.com/eablive/?p=244 ).

However, Amazon subsequently agreed to incorporate extra
accessibility features into the Kindle after several American
universities rejected the device as a potential teaching-aid,
citing inaccessibility to blind students ( see
http://www.headstar.com/eablive/?p=383 ).

And you can comment on this story now, on EAB Live:
http://www.headstar.com/eablive/?p=496


++News in Brief:

+04: Canadian Challenge: A blind woman has launched a case
against the Canadian Government in the country’s Federal
Court after she was unable to apply for a government job
online in 2004 or complete a 2006 online census using a text-
to-speech screen-reader. Donna Jodhan, an accessibility
consultant who has won four design awards from IBM, is
arguing that the inaccessibility of online government
information constitutes a breach of her equality rights under
the Canadian Charter Rights of Freedoms. The case has now
been heard, although the court is not expected to announce its
decision for about six months:
http://www.bakerlaw.ca/taxonomy/term/60
Short link: http://bit.ly/dnPEnt


+05: Equality, Updated: New UK legal provisions on equality
have come into force that could be used to take action against
owners of inaccessible websites. Some 90% of the provisions
of the Equality Act 2010 came into force on 1 October,
including a new concept of “indirect discrimination”, which
means that discrimination does not require knowledge. This
could mean that even if website owners are unaware that their
sites are inaccessible, they could still be breaching the act. The
act also introduces an obligation for service providers and
employers to provide information in accessible electronic
formats:
http://www.equalities.gov.uk/equality_act_2010.aspx
Short link: http://bit.ly/cGXuL1


+06: 21st Century: Accessing the internet on mobile devices,
viewing online TV programmes using captioning and making
internet-based telephone calls will all become easier for US
citizens with disabilities after a bill improving technology
access was signed into law by President Barack Obama earlier
this month. The 21st Century Communications and Video
Accessibility Act sets new standards for the
telecommunications industry, and is expected to help around
60 million US citizens affected by visual or hearing
impairments:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-
office/2010/10/08/remarks-president-signing-21st-century-
communications-and-video-accessib

Short link: http://bit.ly/bTlwym

[Section One ends].


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++Section Two: Policy Focus
British Standard 8878 on Web Accessibility.

+07: Complementary Guidance
by Tristan Parker.

It’s certainly taken a while, but next month should finally see
the long-awaited arrival of BS 8878 – a British Standard on
web accessibility.

Developed by IST/45, a sub-committee of the British Standards
Institution ( BSi: http://www.bsigroup.com/ ), BS 8878 provides
guidance on making websites accessible for disabled and
elderly users. It has been in the making for some four years,
with two public drafts released for comment, of which there
was plenty. After further input from a wide range of field
experts, extensive user testing, and numerous modifications,
the final version of the standard is now expected to be
published at the end of November.

When discussing standards, it’s tempting to associate them with
technical knowledge, especially when concerned with a
complex topic like website accessibility. However, BS 8878 is
aimed at people who, generally, will not possess a large degree
of specialist IT knowledge.

David Fatscher, sector development manager at BSi, told E-
Access Bulletin this month: “It’s definitely not what we’d call a
technical standard. It’s very much aimed at website owners,
who may not think about technical issues when they’re about
to procure a web-based product. This could be people in a
press or marketing department, and some organisations are
rolling out web-based products internally, so again, the site
owner could be someone from the HR department.”

Neither is the new British standard an attempt to replace the
latest version of the well-established international Web Content
Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), Fatscher says. Those
guidelines ( http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG20/ ) are aimed
primarily at web developers, and contain detailed technical
accessibility recommendations. BS 8878 aims to complement
WCAG by providing a straightforward narrative for a non-
technical audience. The result, says Fatscher, is “a very
readable document to help people understand what they need
to consider when revamping or launching a web product for
their users.”

The standard has gone through huge changes since its first draft
several years ago, and is now “tremendously different” from
its original incarnation, says Fatscher. The foundations of BS
8878 were laid down in 2006, when BSi was commissioned to
create a web accessibility guidance document by the Equality
and Human Rights Commission. The result was a ‘Publicly
Available Specification’, ‘PAS 78: a guide to good practice in
commissioning accessible websites’.

“Because technology is changing so rapidly, we felt we needed
to revise that document” says Fatscher. “This happens with any
commissioned work that BSi takes on. After three years, we
talk to the sponsor and say ‘does this work or shall we re-
commission some new work?’ We felt that it would be useful
to revise PAS 78, update it and bring it up to full British
Standard status, to give it even more credibility.”

After extensive public feedback on the first draft, issued in
December 2008, a second draft was published in May 2010,
which contained additional guidance on areas including: The
Equality Act 2010; procuring accessible web products; and
dealing with feedback and complaints on accessibility from
users.

However, many of the key changes made to BS 8878 reflect
the constant technological advancements that have taken place
since the first draft. Two years is a long time in technology,
and the final standard has also been adapted to encompass new
methods of accessing the internet, such as the onset of web-
enabled mobile devices, including smartphones.

The concept of website personalisation is also addressed in the
final version of BS 8878. As discussed by IST/45 committee
chair Jonathan Hassell of the BBC after the second draft of the
standard was opened up for public feedback (see E-Access
Bulletin issue 125: http://www.headstar.com/eablive/?p=427 ),
personalisation takes into account that different people use and
access websites in different ways.

The final standard develops this idea and advises website
owners on options for building tools into their site to give users
a customisable website experience. This is particularly useful
for sites such as e-learning platforms, social networking sites
and educational establishments, which encounter a wide user-
base performing a variety of functions.

User feedback on the BS 8878 drafts was critical in shaping the
structure of the final standard, says Fatscher, and provided
much of the incentive for changes and additions, as each draft
was subject to rigorous public consultation. “The user
community is rightly very vocal in terms of what they expect,”
says Fatscher, “and what we found was that while that first
draft was a pretty good stab, it didn’t reach into all the areas we
needed to explore. So it was very much a case of going back
over things and looking at all the public comments.”

The volume of user feedback was one of the main reasons for
the considerable delay in launching the final standard, which
had previously been estimated at summer 2009. “This is the
whole point of the British Standard development process” says
Fatscher. “It’s not something that has just been cooked up by
12 people around a table and then made available as ‘good
practice’. [The standard] has gone out to public comment to
become more robust and credible. Because the draft got the
reaction it did, it meant we had to come back to it and take on
board those comments, but that makes it a stronger document.”

The second delay came during summer of last year, when the
European Committee for Standardization (CEN) intervened due
to concerns about harmonisation of standards. CEN were
worried that a second set of web accessibility guidelines (after
WCAG) may confuse people. However, after BSi explained
the nature of BS 8878 and demonstrated that the standard
referenced WCAG 2.0 and complemented it, work was allowed
to continue.

As for the future, it is hoped that BS 8878 will tie-in with wider
e-accessibility plans unveiled by government, says Fatscher, as
digital accessibility becomes an increasingly prominent topic. A
promising start has already been made in this area, with the
standard being referenced in the recent ‘eAccessibility Action
Plan’ launched by Ed Vaizey (see lead news story, this issue),
with a request for government to help BSi promote and
implement the standard: “The BSI should be supported in their
work to develop BS8878 which signposts website developers
and commissioners to WCAG2 and provides credible non-
technical guidance on how to implement these guidelines,” the
Action Plan says.

Fatscher is now optimistic that government support, for both
the standard and e-accessibility overall, will help to spread the
message about BS 8878 far and wide: “There’s been a lot of
goodwill and good talk from government about e-accessibility,
and I would expect lot of public sector websites to be procured
and developed with BS 8878 in mind. In terms of the private
sector – as digital inclusion becomes more of talking point, [the
sector will realise that] if you don’t have a website which is as
accessible as it could be, you are going to be shutting down
10% of your potential customers.”

The final version of BS 8878 is expected to be launched next
month, with an official launch event following on December 7
in London. BSi has produced an introductory video on BS
8878, which can be viewed on their YouTube Channel:
http://bit.ly/crl7gt .

And you can comment on this story now, on EAB Live:
http://www.headstar.com/eablive/?p=498

[Section Two ends].


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++End Notes.

+How to Receive the Bulletin.

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with 'subscribe eab' in the subject header. You can list other
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Please send comments on coverage or leads to Dan Jellinek at:
dan at headstar.com .

Copyright 2010 Headstar Ltd http://www.headstar.com .
The Bulletin may be reproduced as long as all parts including
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Please also inform the editor when you are reproducing our
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is also cited.

+Personnel:
Editor: Dan Jellinek.
Reporter: Tristan Parker.
Editorial advisor: Kevin Carey.

ISSN 1476-6337.

[Issue 130 ends.] 

Regards Steve
Email:  srp at internode.on.net
MSN Messenger:  internetuser383 at hotmail.com
Skype:  steve1963
Twitter:  steve9782