Jeff:" it seems to me there are a lot of people actively working in a manner that pulls us away from accessible design, which has many benefits for all of us. For the most part, I think it's because they don't understand it"...."This is a choice Google made, and it's their choice to make, and as a private enterprise they are entitled to all the above. And in so doing, they deny their service to people who might benefit, but those people can go elsewhere."
Yes! could not agree more. I'm happy to see the discussion focus on good design practices going forward, not an XOR switch that will degrade gracefully to html only interfaces as what appears to be the thinking behind current accessibility standards alongside argument from development that costs are too high to justify the statistically small market. My perspective on addressing accessibility needs; A person with reduced eyesight or limited motor control is still a unique human just like everyone else. Yes there's a few extra 'requirements' here and there but I dislike the 'special needs' kind of thinking, I feel its condescending. I would restate the issue you describe as too much design effort on creating delight, part of the 'essential' granted but, at the cost of defining the core goals. This results in feature creep in my view (and gmail is well down that road now). Poor analogy time: I can sit in a chair with wheels on it, my friend Paul with CP can sit in my Herman miller, the core design goal of the chair is universal, the requirements are added on to give him a practical variant with mobility and I a chair that is more delightful, our individual needs are addressed with the core function inter-usable. While a herman miller on wheels is some theoretical ideal, its too impractical in reality. I think there's a middle approach between meeting accessibility requirements and unified access for all in a single UI. You elude to a methodology/thinking that could be the path forward, Exogeny: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exogenous (look to nature, it will never fail you!) So, as I see that approach, the core design "should be as simple as is possible, but not more simple"- Einstein, and the accessibility requirement be addressed with an optional add-on, the more gui intensive variant for me if I want it on a fast connection. And all the product segments inbetween addressed as they are needed. I'm thinking Greasemonkey control but produced inhouse by the development team. See the Lifehacker extension better gmail as an example that meets the needs of power users. Gmail should -not- have a degraded version, thats a design loop-hole past the accessibility requirements frankly. Why not an accessibility 'extension'? The Exogeny design approach focuses the core design on the essential, the core set of requirements, not the largest marketshare. Instead of chasing the 'focus group' or marketing driving target userbase you work off all people being equal. Pull out the common requirements from all your personas, build, then add in individual considerations. Regards - pauric . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Posted from the new ixda.org http://gamma.ixda.org/discuss?post=23821 ________________________________________________________________ *Come to IxDA Interaction08 | Savannah* February 8-10, 2008 in Savannah, GA, USA Register today: http://interaction08.ixda.org/ ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help
