The role of accessibility in a universal web
"Universal design" is the process of creating products that are usable by people with the widest possible range of abilities, operating within the widest possible range of situations; whereas "accessibility" primarily refers to design for people with disabilities. While the focus...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | en_US |
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Association for Computing Machinery
2014
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| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/88013 |
| _version_ | 1811096036859445248 |
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| author | Henry, Shawn Lawton Abou-Zahra, Shadi Brewer, Judy |
| author2 | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory |
| author_facet | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory Henry, Shawn Lawton Abou-Zahra, Shadi Brewer, Judy |
| author_sort | Henry, Shawn Lawton |
| collection | MIT |
| description | "Universal design" is the process of creating products that are usable by people with the widest possible range of abilities, operating within the widest possible range of situations; whereas "accessibility" primarily refers to design for people with disabilities. While the focus of accessibility is disabilities, research and development in accessibility brings benefits to everyone, particularly users with situational limitations, including device limitations and environmental limitations. Awareness and understanding of the benefits of web accessibility to users without disabilities is growing in some areas with the rapid increase of web-enabled devices such as mobile phones, tablets, televisions, and more; with the increasing focus on the growing number of older web users; and with wider web reach in areas with high incidence of low literacy, low bandwidth, older technology, etc. Although there is significant overlap between designing for accessibility and designing for situational limitations, addressing one set of needs does not necessarily provide sufficient solutions for other needs. Keeping accessibility focused on disabilities encourages research and development on meeting the specific needs of people with disabilities. This communications paper explains the importance of "accessibility" continuing to focus on people with disabilities, while further integrating accessibility with web design, development, and research in other areas, including those covered under universal design and design for all. It also describes how the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) and Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) are working to address accessibility and related user needs throughout the technologies of the Web, and invites all interested parties to participate in research and development to further integrate accessibility for people with disabilities in ways that benefit all. |
| first_indexed | 2024-09-23T16:37:20Z |
| format | Article |
| id | mit-1721.1/88013 |
| institution | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| language | en_US |
| last_indexed | 2024-09-23T16:37:20Z |
| publishDate | 2014 |
| publisher | Association for Computing Machinery |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | mit-1721.1/880132022-09-29T20:21:50Z The role of accessibility in a universal web Henry, Shawn Lawton Abou-Zahra, Shadi Brewer, Judy Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory Henry, Shawn Lawton Henry, Shawn Lawton Brewer, Judy "Universal design" is the process of creating products that are usable by people with the widest possible range of abilities, operating within the widest possible range of situations; whereas "accessibility" primarily refers to design for people with disabilities. While the focus of accessibility is disabilities, research and development in accessibility brings benefits to everyone, particularly users with situational limitations, including device limitations and environmental limitations. Awareness and understanding of the benefits of web accessibility to users without disabilities is growing in some areas with the rapid increase of web-enabled devices such as mobile phones, tablets, televisions, and more; with the increasing focus on the growing number of older web users; and with wider web reach in areas with high incidence of low literacy, low bandwidth, older technology, etc. Although there is significant overlap between designing for accessibility and designing for situational limitations, addressing one set of needs does not necessarily provide sufficient solutions for other needs. Keeping accessibility focused on disabilities encourages research and development on meeting the specific needs of people with disabilities. This communications paper explains the importance of "accessibility" continuing to focus on people with disabilities, while further integrating accessibility with web design, development, and research in other areas, including those covered under universal design and design for all. It also describes how the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) and Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) are working to address accessibility and related user needs throughout the technologies of the Web, and invites all interested parties to participate in research and development to further integrate accessibility for people with disabilities in ways that benefit all. 2014-06-17T15:30:38Z 2014-06-17T15:30:38Z 2014-04 Article http://purl.org/eprint/type/ConferencePaper 9781450326513 http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/88013 Henry, Shawn Lawton, Shadi Abou-Zahra, and Judy Brewer. “The Role of Accessibility in a Universal Web.” Proceedings of the 11th Web for All Conference on - W4A ’14 (2014), Seoul, Republic of Korea, April 7-9, 2014. en_US http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2596695.2596719 Proceedings of the 11th Web for All Conference on - W4A '14 Article is made available in accordance with the publisher's policy and may be subject to US copyright law. Please refer to the publisher's site for terms of use. application/pdf Association for Computing Machinery Henry |
| spellingShingle | Henry, Shawn Lawton Abou-Zahra, Shadi Brewer, Judy The role of accessibility in a universal web |
| title | The role of accessibility in a universal web |
| title_full | The role of accessibility in a universal web |
| title_fullStr | The role of accessibility in a universal web |
| title_full_unstemmed | The role of accessibility in a universal web |
| title_short | The role of accessibility in a universal web |
| title_sort | role of accessibility in a universal web |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/88013 |
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