I'm kind of concerned about the culture surrounding usability
Of course, nothing on this forum. I don't think we're even known by the usability community.
Anyways, I've been trying to branch out and gain more support and drumming for my game and I've kind of noticed a few worrying trends in these communities:
1. They seem more interested in forcing developers to follow standards rather than actually achieving those standards. I think this is the wrong approach. As more and more developers are able to jump on board with development, the ability to actually educate these people on proper accessibility standards is reduced. Combined with point #3 I think this is a recipe for wasted resources.
2. The movement seems pretty damn broiled in left-wing politics, which not only I think alienates many people who would benefit from accessibility, but is completely unnecessary to most issues regarding accessibility. Most accessibility issues, in my opinion, should be treated as technical issues, because oftenti mes there's very little that politics can do to help the problem. in the case of the ADA for example, it unintentionally caused other problems, such as the wheelchair/blind competition problem, so politics is at best a risky choice that should only be implemented if it's likely the laws will improve the situation, such as ramp building codes.
3. Moral parading seems to be a major issue as well. More people seem interested in denouncing developers who can't implement accessibility and limit their assistance of these developers to special talks. Furthermore, often embarrassing suggestions such as this are presented by actual professionals. By the way, "Always On" is a terrible idea because it pushes away non-disabled users. A better solution would just be an accessibility toggle.
4. Way too much focus on "inclusivity". While I personally feel that disabled people should be included, just going around spamming about how much better you are than others because you're "inclusive" comes off as arrogant and makes you look like you look down at other developers, who are already often overworked. The issue is more objectively rooted in a social utility problem - disabled people are seen as "useless" and accessibility helps make them "useful". It's a lot harsher and a lot less appealing to morals, but it gives a proper solution to actually help in the problem outside of pointing fingers at "bad people". Furthermore, the inclusive label to outsiders is very reminiscent of the 90's fad of having disabled people appear in cartoons as an obligation for the network, implying that disabled people are "the third wheel", and I think that this "accessibility stench" shows.
5. Lots of focus on word policing. Listen, I know I have a harsh mouth and I know it's a cruel thing to call so meone who's mentally handicapped a "retard", but going and telling people that certain words shouldn't be used is, for lack of better words. FUCKING RETARDED. It doesn't actually achieve anything, and people will still be nasty either way, so you're not even teaching disabled people how to deal with these problems. This "unconscious verbage" shit seems like an excuse to ignore doing more tangible work.
Furthermore, I'm really tired of hearing the complaining over the use of the word "disabled". Disability literally means inability to do something. I know it's not a fun word but it's literally what is happening in the situation of the blind - blind people are "software disabled" in many cases. Accessibility's goal should be to bypass the disability with technology, effectively REMOVING the difference, and therefore the disability is no longer a "disability" in that sense.
6. The comm unity as a whole only seems interested in implementing standards, rather than reworking them for modern computing.
In my opinion, the correct approach to modern accessibility is to produce more relevant modern standards, and actually provide toolkits that other developers can easily use to implement accessibility seamlessly. The problem with spotty accessibility is clearly due to difficult to learn/implement standards that are often not relevant for modern day programs and web apps. Some areas are better than others, but I think this is a far more reasonable and workable explanation for these problems than "PEOPLE JUST DUN WANT ICKY DISABLED PEOPLE". Jesus h Christ.
While some devs do provide tools like this (there is actually an asset on Unity that allows you to implement screenreader support for mobile games!) it's pretty minimal and most development seems restricted to a single independent project. Furthermore, I think some more advanced changes to curr ent accessibility models should be implemented (such as encouraging a branching tree model instead of focus order, which is linear). Politics should be avoided at all costs since disabled people represent a wide variety of political beliefs.
I should note that it's not like the whole community is like this, but these problems seem to be very prevalent.
I mean, it's not just me being an insensitive prick is it? I know I'm not perfect but what the hell. Did I just miss some memo or something? I genuinely feel extremely concerned that my game's success and the implementation of new, more useful standards might be affected by these honestly backwards-seeming practices. It's like we need a paradigm shift or something.
_______________________________________________ Audiogames-reflector mailing list Audiogames-reflector@sabahattin-gucukoglu.com https://sabahattin-gucukoglu.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/audiogames-reflector
