" 1) We don't cater to IE9, which is at 5.11% according to stat counter. IE9 is a bad choice point for this - it's the first IE that had auto-update. Everyone left. We're catering to IE8+; 8 is currently at 6.5%."
Why bother? in a few months it will be 5.5%. Next year it will be 1%. Why invest any time or attention to a browser whose market share is low and continue downwards into nothingness?
"2) You don't count the version; you count the version and all its successors. That is, we're not catering to 8, we're catering to 8+. 8+ is at almost 35% and is still the dominant aggregate browser."
That's just a sleight-of-hand obfuscation. If 9+ is 30%, why quibble over the extra 5% (and only dropping over time) that IE8 will offer. It's a diminishing return adding an older browser to the browser support list.
"5) The web solution for this is WAI-Aria, which began in mid-2012, and became a candidate recommendation three months ago."
No, WAI-ARIA became a Recommendation in March, not a Candidate Recommendation. The distinction between the two is two independent implementations.
"8) As far as I know, no single group of disabled users reaches 1% of the user base."
* Colourblindness (8% of Caucasian Men)
* Dyslexia
"9) ... Your site has no aria markup at all"
The non-presence of ARIA does not make a site inaccessible.
"12) In short, because like you, most small web authors are more comfortable writing about the problem than being part of the solution."
Unfortunately, you are presenting the opposite side of the problem. So you have a little more knowledge about accessibility issues than the OP - but not enough to pass a quick scrutiny.
Perhaps, what is needed is for you and I to stop being part of the problem of disseminating half-truths, and spend that time quietly doing our jobs properly, and showing the results of these. Invest the time to teach someone else how to build accessible websites, and encourage them to also share what they know.
In all fairness, the poster of the blogpost has a fighting chance of improving her skills. She is worth teaching, for the scales of dogma have fallen from her eyes, and she is enlightened.
Because the stakes are high enough that 5% validates the engineering effort.
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> 2) If 9+ is 30%, why quibble over the extra 5%
Same answer.
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> 5) The distinction between the two is two independent implementations.
I didn't know that. Thank you for the information. :)
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> 8 #1) Colourblindness (8% of Caucasian Men)
Jesus, really?
Luckily, my sites tend to be monochrome, so I get trapdoored on this.
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> 8 #2) Dyslexia
I wouldn't even know where to begin making a website be dyslexia-sensitive. I don't know anyone affected and don't even know what's important there. Is there a resource about this?
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> 9) The non-presence of ARIA does not make a site inaccessible.
In a question about why we invest no effort in accessibility, it is germane to point out the level of effort you have placed into accessibility.
And, respectfully, that markup.
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> Unfortunately, you are presenting the opposite side of the problem.
I'm just explaining why it isn't gotten right.
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> So you have a little more knowledge about accessibility issues than the OP - but not enough to pass a quick scrutiny.
Yeah, that was my point. My belief is that this limitation that you have correctly observed in me is the defacto case for nearly all web developers. I think it's just something most of us don't know.
Like, write a poignant guide or a learn you some consideration or something. Give people something to read, rather than to point out that they haven't read anything, you know what I mean?
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> Perhaps, what is needed is for you and I to stop being part of the problem of disseminating half-truths
I don't believe that I have done this. I did make an error in naming the kind of recommendation though.
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> spend that time quietly doing our jobs properly
I think that I actually do this. The world is full of a lot of hard, unfair choices, many of them outside my hands. I do my best to support as many people as I can within my time and budget constraints.
Perhaps we disagree on the choices, however.
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> Invest the time to teach someone else how to build accessible websites
Yes, that was my point. Easy to say; too hard, apparently, for either of us to do.
Why bother? in a few months it will be 5.5%. Next year it will be 1%. Why invest any time or attention to a browser whose market share is low and continue downwards into nothingness?
Do nothing. The IE8 problem will work itself out naturally. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lz9810Y7ZRw
"2) You don't count the version; you count the version and all its successors. That is, we're not catering to 8, we're catering to 8+. 8+ is at almost 35% and is still the dominant aggregate browser."
That's just a sleight-of-hand obfuscation. If 9+ is 30%, why quibble over the extra 5% (and only dropping over time) that IE8 will offer. It's a diminishing return adding an older browser to the browser support list.
"5) The web solution for this is WAI-Aria, which began in mid-2012, and became a candidate recommendation three months ago."
No, WAI-ARIA became a Recommendation in March, not a Candidate Recommendation. The distinction between the two is two independent implementations.
"8) As far as I know, no single group of disabled users reaches 1% of the user base."
* Colourblindness (8% of Caucasian Men) * Dyslexia
"9) ... Your site has no aria markup at all"
The non-presence of ARIA does not make a site inaccessible.
"12) In short, because like you, most small web authors are more comfortable writing about the problem than being part of the solution."
Unfortunately, you are presenting the opposite side of the problem. So you have a little more knowledge about accessibility issues than the OP - but not enough to pass a quick scrutiny.
Perhaps, what is needed is for you and I to stop being part of the problem of disseminating half-truths, and spend that time quietly doing our jobs properly, and showing the results of these. Invest the time to teach someone else how to build accessible websites, and encourage them to also share what they know.
In all fairness, the poster of the blogpost has a fighting chance of improving her skills. She is worth teaching, for the scales of dogma have fallen from her eyes, and she is enlightened.