we have met the user community and he is us

[deborah]

There's been discussion today on the JISC-Repositories mailing list about accessibility standards and repositories. The primary question is whether requiring fully accessible data formats for repository deposit places too high a barrier for repositories which really need all of the deposits they can get (the general consensus of the mailing list is that yes, it is too high a barrier). This discussion has been carried to UK Web Focus and even to Open Access News, so the discussion is getting around.

Over at accessify, Ian Lloyd asked the question: "How did you get into web accessibility? Was it because you have a relative that is affected and you felt the need to spread the word, or did you do it simply because it seemed like a niche market that you could become an expert in?" Note that he doesn't offer as an expected choice "do you have a disability"? He asks instead if readers have an affected relative.

Both of these discussions come from well-meaning people. Moreover, these well-meaning people are making many of the huge bounds forward in accessibility of information. The open repositories movement, for example, by making it possible for people to access information even if they are incapable of traveling to the repository where the hard copy is stored, has made huge strides for accessibility.

Yet in both of these cases I see a situation I've seen consistently in the accessibility movement: there is an assumption of otherness. An assumption that we are serving some community which is not ourselves, some other people -- those poor, unfortunate, deserving disabled people -- who have a right to access information. And sometimes, of course, it's reasonable to say "in this case it's a little bit too hard; in this case we need a flash website; in this case we need to accept PDF documents; in this case it's too difficult to design a non-JavaScript alternative". Because after all, we are trying to reach the highest number of users with the highest amount of information, right?

Amazing how that seemingly rational discussion of maximizing usability seems less fair when it's the librarians and web developers ourselves who have disabilities. Amazing how many discussions (all by incredibly well-meaning and helpful people) on adequate usability and legal requirements devolve into people looking the other way and whistling whenever somebody in the conversation says "you know, I'm the staffer who's supposed to be assisting these users with this tool, and I'm unable to use it."

It's this "good enough" attitude that has resulted in the website of a nonprofit with which I am affiliated, a nonprofit formed to serve a disabled community, being completely inaccessible. It's this attitude which resulted in a sign being placed on a library's bathroom door which said "if you need assistance, please ask at the circulation desk", because in the middle of a major capital library construction project, placing an automatic door opener on the brand-new bathroom was not deemed a priority.

I can't see the big picture anymore. I have to keep standing on the sidelines while everyone else is being reasonable and balanced, saying "it's not good enough". Because it's not.

Comments

[tattycat.livejournal.com]

it disappoints me that full accessibility is counted higher in our field. In my former place of employment, we had no one available after 4 p.m. who knew how to use the access station, no one ever who could fetch books for disabled patrons, and very little thought was given to accessibility when designing the new website.

I have bad eyesight, and the beginnings of carpal tunnel. Neither are full disabilities-- G-d willing I continue to put a yet in there-- but it still startles me that people are surprised when I mention that during accessibility discussions. "Hi. You need to make the screen resolution bigger here, because *I* can't read it." "Could you please look into ergo peripherals?"

*sighs* I'd wanted to think we were making better progress. May I join you on the sidelines and point as well?

[deborah]

I had the disability coordinator at my workplace keep telling me I could remain private, and didn't need to out myself, and yet I found that what you say here -- "*I* can't use it" -- is sometimes the only comment that works.

*passes you a sidelines cookie*

[cavlec.livejournal.com]

Ugh. I am at least somewhat guilty of the Othering you mention, because I did get involved (insofar as I am) with accessibility because Janina Sajka inspired me with a vision of her, her personally, being able to go into Borders or Barnes and Noble to buy a perfectly ordinary book right off the shelf.

I DUG that vision. That was frickin' AWESOME.

WRT IRs, Les Carr on the JISC-UK list (I think) pointed out that the decisions that lead to inaccessible documents happen so far in advance of those documents landing in a repository that it's kind of absurd to lean on repository managers about it.

I agree with him. The problem (and Les Carr knows this!) is that publishers are so insanely print-centric that they do not know or care about the text-artisanry involved in accessible documents -- and nobody's forcing them to care.

Slowly, textbook publishers are being forced to care by legislation. I don't think anything short of legislation is going to make a difference, honestly. Publishers are that horrible.

[deborah]

See, there's the whole incredibly well-intentioned people making great strides issue. I worked for a while on the xvoice project, and we found that project never went anywhere, because *everyone* involved was disabled, so none of us had enough wherewithal to really push the project where it needed to go. And your vision *is* frickin' awesome, and you getting involved probably improved things on the accessibility front.

But Janina Sajka *isn't* an anonymous disabled user. She's one of us: an accessible technology advocate who's smart, involved with the community, loud. And she's also made invisible by Ian Lloyd's question. Don't get me wrong, I think Ian Lloyd has done amazing, important work. But... yeah. Well. Disabled people are Other Than Us, in that question.

My problem with the discussion on that list is that I read several people (not everyone!) as saying "The publishers suck; they won't change; there's nothing we can do about it; oh well." Which might be true, but it's not encouraging.

[cavlec.livejournal.com]

Yeah, Ian Lloyd needs a codswalloping and an application of the clue bat, no argument there.

The publishers do suck. I as a repository manager have no leverage to stop them sucking. (Les Carr invoked King Canute.) Doesn't mean I can't do anything -- just means that I have to act as a citizen rather than a repo-rat. What's going on with textbooks right now is encouraging.