The Target/Accessibility lawsuit: what will the impact be?

I think accessibility should really be an issue, although I dont know what its going to lead to, at least we must try to get used to designing with accessibility in mind...

I would think target would want to avoid the legal fight in the first place by just changing their site. I am confused by their decision to fight it. Really seems like a potential PR nightmare. Anyhow..

Although I believe accessibility is very very important (and I design accordingly), I don't see this holding up in court and if it does, it will just be a bureaucratic statement anyhow. Target can give examples of literally millions of site which don't conform to accessibility standards. This is important because target could always appeal a guilty ruling by saying the judgment discriminates against their company. Is the justice department prepared for thousands of lawsuits filed against companies for their websites? I say no. Plus what if a site is 90% compliant? Or 50% compliant? Legally how would one judge whether a site is conforming? I don't think target will let this one go.

I guess that's my take on what will happen, unfortunate as it is.

-Jim

It would be nice if they won (the blind) as it would show how important accessibility is, but if they loose and I have a small feeling they might it will set accessibility back a long way.
In this case Target could argue the font can be made bigger (on some browsers) therefore complys. There is no disability standards as such like we have with HTML, it's all just guess work. If Target do loose, then down the line animations, images, flash movies, icons ... could be illegal as they effect a group of people (epilepsy). It's far fetched but who do you cater for? The blind or vision impaired, epilepic, amputees, A.D.D ..... Even depression is classed as a mental illness which in turn falls under a disability.
I hope they come to a mutral agreement at least or a out of court settlement.

When this issue came about, i pasted a news story about it into a forum i run and one of the members there was like, "dude i actually make those pages, i work on that site every damn day adding stuff", didn't believe him at first but he seemed genuine etc. but the point was that he (and i'm assuming all the others who work on it) didn't even know that accessibility was an issue to be addressed and he didn't know what ALT tags actually did! Shocked me a bit!

I think most companies like that would use editors like dreamweaver (probably outdated too), so knowing validation even is probably unknown.

I read a while back when this case popped up that the target site used to validate but a recent update (back then) made the site not validate, then the lawsuit came.

And jsut because it validates doesn't mean it's standards compliant. And even if its standards compliant it may not be fully accessible!

I think that even if the disabled users were to win it will still take a very long time for the majority of websites to comply. It is the law - and has been for a long time (when was s.508 passed? I'm guessing it was about 5 years ago). Very few large companies are paying attention. And look at how long it's taking for them to adopt standards!

When doing a search for a specific accessibility topic the other day I came across a lot of accessibility statements. Interesitng, but I think all of them belonged to more medium sized companies, non profits, and government agencies. Wait, here's one from GE! (check the code on that - no doctype, but almost validates. Very odd use of tables in an almost-CSS layout).

dk01 made some good points about how to decide if a site is conforming or not. There are also a wide range of disabilities to consider. If a site is accessible to the blind, for example, it could be inaccessible to people with physical disabilities who can't use a mouse.

Unfortunately, people file law suits for just about everything. If they do win, it will certainly have a big impact on how web design is done, mostly for the GIANT companies.

at the very least we are on our way to standardization... everything will fall into place once everyone understands the importance of standardization, semantic markup leading into web usability and accessibility... just dont ignore and dismiss it, on small extension to make a site accessible to a certain demographic that needs special attention is a great step already...

Here's a good blog post with some more links at 456 Berea St.:

http://www.456bereastreet.com/archive/200603/target_sued_for_refusing_to_make_their_website_accessible/#comments

The way around it: best viewed with ....

Was talking to a mate of mine in the legal field, reckons a discloser stating x browser, at x size, x time of day ... and the law suit wouldn't happen, even if the 508 law is set

Funny, the official Section 508 website does not work properly in Opera and doesn't even come close to validating!! And it's only HTML transitional!!! They need a text size switcher becuase they're using pixel sizes. Not a great example there!

(And, to answer my question, it was enacted in 1998).

Well,I can see this going a couple of ways.

First I think that it may open a lot of eyes to the fact that you should write valid code, and you should aim for acessability. Too many designers/devlopers just shrug all of that off, thinking that "why would a blind person be reading my site". They don't consider other disabilities that require screen readers.

But.......it is true, that at least in the US anyway, we are a sue happy society, and it could open the door to assanine lawsuits.

And...yes it could open the door to things like animations triggering seizures and all. Which would be something. I'm not a huge fan of Flash, but to me a lot of this is about creativity and artistic freedom. I'd hate to see anyone try to squash that because it's one of our basic rights.

My mouth dropped when I read that the Section 508 site doesn't work in Opera! My God!!!

It should prove to be interesting....

Bottom line, is that I think that everyone should strive to create work that is standards compliant and accessable, but it's should especailly be true for major retailors.

Why don't they take on Microsoft for not validating nor accessible - I dare some one

At the end of the day, it's just impossible to cater for every single person, it just can't be done. I agree that sites should be refined for screen reading, but I think that's really the only imposed change there should be. Otherwise it's just going to be mad. I mean, if you have a physical disability and can't walk, can you go and sue a store that doesn't have a ramp etc. for disabled access? You probably could, but you'd just go to a different store

Quote: if you have a physical disability and can't walk, can you go and sue a store that doesn't have a ramp etc. for disabled access?

You certainly can! It is law most everywhere that not only do entraces and exits need to be accessable, but so do bathrooms.

Ever try to push a wheelchair with an oxygen tank into a narrow doorway, or heft it up over steps with a 200 pound women in it? I have.

Quote: if you have a physical disability and can't walk, can you go and sue a store that doesn't have a ramp etc. for disabled access?

That is indeed the law, in the UK too. It's all part of showing 'due dilligence'. Now this may start lots of people shouting extremes about poor shop owners. This isn't the case.

If you have a listed building and widening doors is impossible, or the shop door opens onto a sliver of pavement (then a road) and a ramp will not fit, the law would not apply. If the shop owner has shown due diligence and catered for disabled people, where possible, then there is nothing to worry about.

The Target Lawsuit
The NFB asked Target to make their site conform to accessibility laws 10 months ago. Target completely ignored that request, they didn't attempt to rectify the problems or open a dialogue on the subject:

NFB wrote: The website is no more accessible today than it was in May of last year, when we first complained to Target.

(from: http://www.webstandards.org/2006/02/09/taking-aim-at-targetcom/ )

Target have not shown due diligence. They will lose the lawsuit and the Internet will become a better place for it, Web Designers that work to standards will now have substantial leverage with clients.

Tell a client they can't have a scrolling marquee because it hinders accessibility to the site for blind people, and they'll probably ignore you. Tell them someone just got sued for breaking the guideline they're asking you to break and they'll listen.

This is widening the market for designers who use standards... As long as Target lose the case.

Animation/Flash Worries
I don't think Flash animation is a problem. Section 508 says:

Section 508 wrote: When animation is displayed, the information shall be displayable in at least one non-animated presentation mode at the option of the user.

Meaning that when creating a Flash site, an HTML equivalent is required. A flash intro is fine (apart from being annoying) as it rarely conveys any information that is not available on the rest of the site. The other constraint discussed here is the refresh rate/flicker rate of animation:

Section 508 wrote: (j) Pages shall be designed to avoid causing the screen to flicker with a frequency greater than 2 Hz and lower than 55 Hz.

I don't think this applies to Flash. It might be slow, but I've never seen a flash animation flicker (unless the author actually wanted it to - that doesn't mean the technology shouldn't be used). In real terms this means that and should both be avoided.

On and The WAI say:

W3C WAI wrote: Note. The BLINK and MARQUEE elements are not defined in any W3C HTML specification and should not be used. Refer also to guideline 11.

Pretty unequivocal.

That Evil 508 Site

Winston Churchill wrote: You can always rely on America to do the right thing, once it has exhausted the alternatives.

I'm being mean, but at least they're trying. In their defense, accessibility doesn't really say they have to write valid code, just something that doesn't break their rules. These rules are pretty specific and, as far as I know, don't refer to any W3C Recommendations.

Also remember that the 508 Guidelines aren't applicable to every US site, only Government sites.

Another good question that I was pondering over the last few years...

The web is made of millions and millions of sites, but if you look around and ask how many of them are really complient or built with accessibilty in mind? and why did the web get so big in such a time? then you probably will come to the same conclusion that I have.

Nowadays anybody with a scanner and someway of uplaoding it can be called a web designer (I have actually seen them around). I suppose thats the plus side of it that anybody can get a website and display some sort of information going pretty easily, although some are expert in thier own fields and publish valuable information from thier own time and effort but do not wish to spend any more further time or money,
but this goes back to the question of whos at fault, the browser makers or the people making the pages?

If I was to say hey guess what, all web browers from now on will only display pages with complient codes and accessibilities in mind, what would happen then? a lot of sites disappears maybe, a lot of would be web designers be discourage to publish thier sites because its such a pain possibly ... you can work this one out.

Yeah, it would be great if it was the law because this would make life a lot easier for people like myself who livelyhood depends on it, but I cannot see this happening, simply because you cannot have one rule for the rich(large companies) and one rule for the not so rich (small businesses and personal sites).

But hey I ve seen stranger things happening before, you never know, all the browser makers like MS and Nutscrape etc might decide to sit down on the same table drinking beers and discussing how to make the cyber world a better place.

I better stop blabbering

one thing I like about the internet is that its a great balancer... a small business can compete with a big business on the net... now if you have a 100% share of people with accessibility issues and your site or business can cater for them, the better it is... dont you think???

As mentioned you can't please 100% no matter what.

Say you have a shop, it has stairs, you put in a ramp. You have made it accessible for wheel chairs etc but in some cases made it worse or other types of disabilites. Some people without a leg, or bung knees etc find it easier to do stairs than ramps (depends on the incline). So you please some, disappoint others. If you can cater for stairs and ramp then bonus but not everyone has that big of a shop.

They won't win this case, it's way too rediculous. What's next? Sue publishers for books that are not available in braille?

As a target employee I can no longer discuss this case