Geoff,
Great post.
Nope, I'm not in an ivory tower. Just an old guy. Anyone that wants to
participate can. Like Geoff pointed out you do not need to make the
teleconferences. However, if you wish to use IRC you can and save yourself
a long distance phone charge. Many people outside the USA use IRC.
Lee Roberts
-Original Message-
From: Geoff Deering [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Thursday, July 08, 2004 2:37 PM
To: WebStandardsGroup
Subject: [WSG] (Understandable) Myths about the W3C WAI
Hi,
I'd just like to try and dispel a few commonly held myths about the
processes of standards and the groups that form them at the W3C, and in
particular, the W3C WAI Web Content Accessibility Guidelines Working Group.
I raise these issues, because it is quite understandable that many people
come to certain conclusions about the W3C WAI process, such as the views
Scott Barnes expresses here
(http://www.mail-archive.com/wsg%40webstandardsgroup.org/msg06709.html). So
I'd just like to put forward these points.
1. It may appear that groups like the W3C WAI Web Content Accessibility
Guidelines Working Group are some group of elite people in an ivory tower
somewhere, but actually it is an open group, and you can join it today, if
you want. There are three types of people on that group; 1) members that
are placed there by companies that are sponsors of the W3C, 2) invited
experts 3) people who want to get involved in the process. The third group
make up the majority of WAI, and there are a number of such people on that
group from Melbourne. They are the little people (hobbits), like the rest
of us.
If this is something you really want to contribute too, and make your voice
heard, as a developer, whatever, here is the charter, the guide to
participation and the How to Join.
http://www.w3.org/WAI/GL/new-charter-2000.html#participants
http://www.w3.org/WAI/GL/howto-join-wg.html
You don't have to attend the Face to Face meetings, and it is not compulsory
to attend the weekly teleconferences (but you are required to email a
Regret Cannot Attend).
If you are concerned about the direction of WAI and the work on WCAG2
(http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG20/) you should note in that document that it is a
working draft. Being a working draft it is open to public comment. The
group definitely wants your feedback and concerns, they do not want to it to
get to Recommendation and there be oversights. They really do work hard at
try to make these recommendations none restrictive on developers. Just look
at the discussion list for WAI-GL to verify this.
The fifth paragraph of Status of this Document states;
quote
The Working Group welcomes comments on this document at
[EMAIL PROTECTED] The archives for this list are publicly
available. Archives of the WCAG WG mailing list discussions are also
publicly available.
/quote
So you can get involved and provide feedback without having to join the W3C
WAI GL.
Does the W3C WAI GL work with the manufactures of User Agents (browsers)?
They certainly do (http://www.w3.org/WAI/UA/). And they have a set of
guidelines that User Agents are *meant* to comply with
(http://www.w3.org/TR/UAAG10/). Here is a list of participants
(http://www.w3.org/WAI/UA/wai-ua-members.html).
If you feel some companies on this list are asleep at the wheel, then raise
that issue with them and ask them what the hell are they doing if they are
on that list and not working on trying to comply with those standards.
There is also the UAAG FAQ http://www.w3.org/2002/10/uaag10-faq/ You can
evaluate user agents conformance http://www.w3.org/WAI/UA/2002/08/eval.
You can also get involved with the Authoring Tool Accessibility Guidelines
Working Group (http://www.w3.org/WAI/AU/) and their working draft of ATAG2
(http://www.w3.org/TR/ATAG20/). This too is open for public comment. You
can help by doing Authoring Tool Evaluations
(http://www.w3.org/WAI/AU/2002/tools).
quote
Please send comments about this document to the public mailing list:
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (public archives). Please note that this document may
contain typographical errors. It was published as soon as possible since
review of the content itself is important, although noting typographical
errors is also helpful.
/quote
Also see
http://www.w3.org/WAI/PF/Overview.html
Another way to get involved in the whole process is to work as a group to
put pressure on User Agent and Authoring Tools developers to meet the
standards. One way of doing this would be to review UAs and ATs and apply
the test criteria as set down in these standards and publish them on the web
site associated with this list or the Web Standards Project (or your own
blog), whatever.
If you really want to find out more about the W3C and WAI, how it works, how
it interacts, about the standards, blah, blah, blah, the Melbourne Group
could invite Charles McCathieNevile (http://www.w3.org/People/Charles/) to
one of their meetings when he is in Melbourne.
Another Australian W3C
