[nfbwatlk] Fw: NFB Victory: Class Certified in TargetClass-ActionLawsuit

[KAYE KIPP]

That's great news.

Kaye
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Mike Freeman" <k7uij at panix.com>
To: "NFB of Washington Talk" <nfbwatlk at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Wednesday, October 03, 2007 9:40 PM
Subject: [nfbwatlk] Fw: NFB Victory: Class Certified in 
TargetClass-ActionLawsuit


> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: Bryan Bashin
> To: NFBC Info at NFBNet
> Sent: Wednesday, October 03, 2007 5:30 PM
> Subject: [Nfbc-info] NFB Victory: Class Certified in Target
> Class-ActionLawsuit
>
>
> Hi folks,
>
> Haven't seen this reported yet on our lists, but NFB has scored a
> major victory here in San Francisco when a federal judge certified
> our class-action lawsuit.  This ruling means we can now procede with
> what promises to be a groundbreaking trial on internet
> access.  Here's the report, below, from today's Los Angeles Times.
>
> Bryan Bashin
>
>
> Lawsuit seeks to improve website access by the blind
> A judge's ruling in a suit against Target could mean that businesses
> and government
> agencies would have to make their sites compatible with
> screen-reading software.
> By Molly Selvin, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
> 1:52 PM PDT, October 3, 2007
> A ruling by a judge in San Francisco could mean that businesses and
> government agencies
> would have to make their websites accessible to the blind, something
> disability rights
> advocates say is vital as the routine transactions of everyday life
> take place more
> and more on the Internet.
> U.S. District Judge Marilyn Hall Patel granted class-action status
> Tuesday to a lawsuit
> alleging that Target Corp. is in violation of California and federal
> laws because
> its website doesn't work with screen-reading software, essentially
> making the site
> unusable for blind people.
> To comply, Target would have to tag product images on its site with
> word descriptions,
> allowing the software to "read" those images aloud.
> FOR THE RECORD:
> An earlier version of this article identified John Pare as an
> executive of the National
> Foundation of the Blind. The organization is the National Federation
> of the Blind.
> Many retailers, including Wal-Mart Inc. and Amazon.com, have upgraded
> their websites
> or are in the process of doing so, said John Pare, executive director
> for strategic
> initiatives for the National Federation of the Blind. Most companies
> have done so
> voluntarily, he said, in response to concerns raised by the
> 50,000-member foundation.
> The lawsuit contends that some 10,000 people in California alone use
> reading software
> to access the Internet.
> Target, in a statement, said its online business had made
> "significant enhancements
> to improve the experience of our guests who use assistive
> technologies." The company,
> based in Minneapolis, said it would request an immediate review of
> the judge's ruling.
> The ability to access websites is particularly important to the
> visually impaired,
> whose mobility is limited because they can't drive, said Eve Hill,
> executive director
> of the Disability Rights Legal Center at Loyola Law School in Los
> Angeles.
> Judges have applied California's disability accommodations law more
> broadly than
> the federal Americans With Disabilities Act, Hill said; the federal
> law focuses on
> access to physical locations such as stores or banks.
>
> _______________________________________________
> Nfbc-info mailing list
> Nfbc-info at nfbnet.org
> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/nfbc-info
>


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


> _______________________________________________
> nfbwatlk mailing list
> nfbwatlk at nfbnet.org
> http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/nfbwatlk
>