Website Accessibility Rules - When will they become regulated?

Filed Under Web Accessibility | Comments Off

Surely, it’s only a matter of time until the first high-profile case hits the media?

The Times Amazon Mock-Up

At present, websites offering full interactivity for those with disabilites are rare.

The UK Disability Discrimation Act (DDA) 2005 offers only a vague statement regarding the obligations of website owners, but it’s general stance, that anyone with a disability should never be excluded, still stands strong.

It’s by no means an easy job, catering for many possibilities, such as:

  • Complete Blindness
  • Colour Blindness
  • General Poor Vision
  • Tremors/Shakes in the hands or arms
  • Hearing Impairments
  • Seizures caused by strobing/flash effects
  • Learning Difficulties e.g. dyslexia

Each of the above represents a unqiue set of challenges for web designers, web developers and online marketers.

There are several organisations that have issued detailed guidelines on web accessibility, but as yet, none have been inforced. W3C guidelines and specifications (in particular WCAG) are highly regarded as are the PAS 78 guidelines issued in 2006 by the Disablity Rights Commission.

It’s a hard expense for a business owner to justify if their industry has an extremely low percentage of disabled customers. But once the first high-profile legal case against a website is actioned, the flood gates will no doubt open?

Loading…..”Hurry Up or Cough Up” says Google

Filed Under PPC News, Search Engine News, Web News | Comments Off

Adding to the increasing complexity of the AdWords “Quality Score” algorithm, Google has announced that page loading times will soon become a key factor.

The intention is that sites runing advert-heavy pages will be penalised in an effort to improve the “user experience”. Google claims conversion rates are lower when page loading times are poor, as users abandon the site, a claim supported by many frustrated browsers.

Loading Please Wait

Losers

Flash Sites and Image-Heavy Websites - as Flash sites tend to require more image requests from the server than a typical html site, they may be penalised under the new calculations.

Poorly Hosted Websites - the jury is still out on whether cheaper hosting packages result in slower server responses, but inferior hardware undoubtedly takes its toll.

Winners

Text-Only Sites - we might see retailers using incredibly simple text-only landing pages (or maybe defaulting to the low-graphics accessibility pages?).

Google have not (and will not) release details of how much effect loading times will have on the quality score, for all we know it could be minimal, but Google are generally very commited to providing the best search results for their users. There are several conspiracy theories and there is no doubt that any changes will benefit Google’s profit margins but ultimately those who abide by the rules will be rewarded.