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Thanks to the Israeli accessibility law, I have to delete my websites

lifemichael.com

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Re: Thanks to the Israeli accessibility law, I have to delete my websites

#411

Post by ad404b8a372f2b9 »

db48x wrote: post #304
ad404b8a372f2b9 wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a load-bearing sign, either way not important to the allegory I don't know anyone who would defend options 2 or 3 under any circumstances. In this scenario you also have 27 years to amortize the costs, enroll 40000 students every year who pay tuition and are ready to do free labour, receive 100 million dollars worth of donations every year, and over the course of these years completed a 2 billion, then a 3 billi…

Your straw–man situation isn’t relevant, and it doesn’t matter which option bystanders like us think is “right”. What matters is what is observed after the fact. If we observe that things with value are destroyed because of an accessibility law, then the law is a bad one. Just three or four years ago one of the best restaurants in my town was shut down because the restrooms weren’t accessible. The restaurant owner ha…

It's not a straw-man, the ADA was passed 32 years ago, and Berkeley's financial situation is exactly as I described it. The only difference is that we talked about race instead of disability, and it's less socially acceptable to discriminate on that basis.

Do you know why she didn't have a single wheelchair-bound customer? Because disabled people can't go out to most restaurants due to lack of accessibility. If you think it's the broken-window fallacy, buy a 30$ wheelchair off craigslist and try to go have a date at a restaurant, make sure to call beforehand or you'll be stuck at the door, if you're lucky the accessible entrance won't be in the back-alley by the garbage bins. It's what I've been doing for 30 years and I didn't imagine it along with every other disabled person who relates the same exact experience. Also I assume she didn't complain about having to follow the health and safety code and the many stipulations it has with regards to her kitchen installation and the room it's built in. Maybe she should have made sure to rent a building that enables her business to follow the law, especially those passed years ago, rather than put her hands up when the landlord told her he'd do nothing.

Re: Thanks to the Israeli accessibility law, I have to delete my websites

#412

Post by altairprime »

tssva wrote: post #347
JCharante wrote: post #343

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I kinda agree. If the restaurant rents then the landlord renting out their space as restaurant space should be liable

The restaurant owners chose to rent a property with knowledge that they were going to operate a restaurant on the property, and they also knew or should have known the accessibility requirements for restaurants. Why shouldn't they be liable.

If ADA ramps are mandatory for all businesses, which in theory they ought to be due to non-discrimination being a universal need — then the property is unfit for renting if it doesn’t have an ADA-accessible ramp, and penalizing the tenant allows the landlord to re-lease it over and over as each tenant gets shut down.

Penalizing the landlord is the only way to ensure that the lawsuit leads to curative action to the property rather than a tenant change without action.

Re: Thanks to the Israeli accessibility law, I have to delete my websites

#413

Post by abigail95 »

robocat wrote: post #332
angst_ridden wrote: post #65

There's a firm in Southern California that's suing restaurants / small theaters / community organizations / etc after bulk-scanning web sites for embedded video that lack links to caption files. It's all ADA abuse, lawsuits in the $5k-$7k range. A huge percentage of those sued don't have the means to fight back, and settle. The company that's suing people had some incompetent coder write their scanner, so it only par…

How is the law firm profiting? As a New Zealander, I think only the government can enforce similar laws. I am unsure whether a private citizen could get representation here, or whether there could be any civil penalties.

The NZ Human Rights Act provides the same mechanism for people to sue private companies that don't provide accessible services.

Re: Thanks to the Israeli accessibility law, I have to delete my websites

#414

Post by unethical_ban »

roenxi wrote: post #254
angst_ridden wrote: post #65

There's a firm in Southern California that's suing restaurants / small theaters / community organizations / etc after bulk-scanning web sites for embedded video that lack links to caption files. It's all ADA abuse, lawsuits in the $5k-$7k range. A huge percentage of those sued don't have the means to fight back, and settle. The company that's suing people had some incompetent coder write their scanner, so it only par…

> It's all ADA abuse... The HN gestalt confuses me on this one. The other week the EU had that charger standardisation law and the mood on HN was undeniably positive. Now we have a comment that Californian web accessibility laws are being enforced and the top voted comment is decidedly negative. These laws are remarkably similar in intent and likely outcome. What is different here? Is it the same people but you're al…

Personally, the ethics of law enforcement and our expectations of compliance scale with size. In many realms of law and regulation, this is recognized.

I expect Walmart to pay people a "living wage" more than I expect that of a small business owner with three employees.

I expect a clean kitchen with sanitization stations from McDonalds more than I do from a kid selling lemonade.

I expect a trillion dollar company, or a bank, to have an accessible website more than I expect it from an individual running a blog.

Re: Thanks to the Israeli accessibility law, I have to delete my websites

#415

Post by unethical_ban »

roenxi wrote: post #333
yucky wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You think it's weird that people expect random website owners with limited resources not to be held to the same accessibility standards as multi-billion dollar manufactures? Why?

Because that would be treating the value of an individual as dependent on the power of the entity they are interacting with, which is a bit weird. It isn't really a defensible position to say that you have an interaction with someone and to work out how they ought behave you need to go and do a tally of their assets and mull over their balance sheets. It'd be tantamount to saying we'd need to know what Haim Michael's…

It is entirely defensible to have different expectations of the amount of effort and money a provider of services can put into accessibility and regulatory compliance based on how much money they make.

I assert that it is rational to expect a large bank or city government to have accessibility standards and at the same time, not expect Hacker News or a personal blog to have the same.

Re: Thanks to the Israeli accessibility law, I have to delete my websites

#416

Post by ok_dad »

themitigating wrote: post #393
ok_dad wrote: post #383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And now no one can use it. Perhaps there’s a way to provide access to those who need it but not sue a person for making a hobby site?

You're assuming the only outcome is the website is shutdown. That's what happened here.

No, I’m saying that the law actually reduced access for this set of lessons, and perhaps we should figure out ways to make things accessible for everyone other than putting the onus on the little guy. Maybe if you’re just one person, then there could be a program where larger companies are required to pay a small tax or donate developer time (in lieu of tax) to help you make your site accessible. That way, the larger companies who can afford to make their site accessible follow the law and do so, and then they also take some of the profits they made off of the public to do a public good.

Re: Thanks to the Israeli accessibility law, I have to delete my websites

#417

Post by tasuki »

Arainach wrote: post #369
tasuki wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disclosing allergens is a different thing though: that's akin to "disclosing" that the restaurant isn't wheelchair accessible. Should all restaurants also be required to serve food for whatever combination of allergies one might have? My mother has several food allergies, there are restaurants where she can't eat any meal. Would you welcome a law mandating each and every restaurant to start serving meals she can eat?

Again, allergies aren't a protected class.

I'm not from the US and had to look up what "protected class" meant. It seems to be a well-intentioned yet somewhat arbitrary list. It appears to be regularly amended. Perhaps allergies will be on the list one day too?

Re: Thanks to the Israeli accessibility law, I have to delete my websites

#418

Post by db48x »

ad404b8a372f2b9 wrote: post #411
db48x wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your straw–man situation isn’t relevant, and it doesn’t matter which option bystanders like us think is “right”. What matters is what is observed after the fact. If we observe that things with value are destroyed because of an accessibility law, then the law is a bad one. Just three or four years ago one of the best restaurants in my town was shut down because the restrooms weren’t accessible. The restaurant owner ha…

It's not a straw-man, the ADA was passed 32 years ago, and Berkeley's financial situation is exactly as I described it. The only difference is that we talked about race instead of disability, and it's less socially acceptable to discriminate on that basis. Do you know why she didn't have a single wheelchair-bound customer? Because disabled people can't go out to most restaurants due to lack of accessibility. If you t…

Nah, she’s always had a door opener that someone in a wheelchair could easily use to get in the building. It was probably installed by the prior tenant after the ADA was passed.

In fact, the problem wasn’t even the ADA. The ADA is a Federal law, but California also has a similar accessibility law (the name of which I have forgotten). But while the ADA exempts old buildings from most of its requirements, the California law does not. This definitely makes the California law worse than the ADA; it destroys (and has destroyed) more valuable things than the ADA does.

> Maybe she should have made sure to rent a building that enables her business to follow the law

She thought she was! The building is decades older than the ADA, so she thought it was exempt. She wanted larger, more accessible restrooms, but if she had tried to remodel before opening the restaurant it would have bankrupted her. I’m surprised the recent remodel didn’t bankrupt the restaurant; I’m sure she had to take out a loan to cover it. Either way it’s destroyed at lot of value.

Going back to the subject of Berkeley briefly, it doesn’t matter how much money they have. What matters is that they had a collection of educational videos that they were making available for free, but they had to take it down because they couldn’t make it accessible. It doesn’t matter why they were incapable of it; it could be internal politics, budgeting problems, or simply a lack of manpower in that department. What matters is that they couldn’t get it done. That’s a destruction of value that could have been avoided if the law had been better written.

Re: Thanks to the Israeli accessibility law, I have to delete my websites

#419

Post by Nexxxeh »

ekianjo wrote: post #406
Nexxxeh wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree with your rhetorical question, as people without arms absolutely can enjoy the same video games I do. I don't know about Sony and Nintendo, but Microsoft and 3rd parties on PC have absolutely ploughed resources into making sure that's the case. Notable examples include the Xbox Adaptive Controller [1] which greatly simplifies making custom setups for the specific needs of gamers with limited motor control…

> I don't know about Sony and Nintendo, but Microsoft and 3rd parties on PC have absolutely ploughed resources into making sure that's the case. Hence proving my point that this is the stuff of big companies. If you had to develop solutions as a small manufacturer because it is "mandated" you would go bankrupt before accomplishing anything > I think you're completely wrong on this. Gaming should be accessible and the…

>Hence proving my point that this is the stuff of big companies.

No, it doesn't and no it isn't. Your rhetorical question is fundamentally wrong, and I gave you examples to prove it.

And I'm not talking generally, I've destroyed the specific example you gave.

>Soon you will apply the same standard for video games too? After all, why can't people without arms enjoy the same video games as you do?

Yes. Yes they can.

But to address the other stuff you're saying...

Just because even big companies are doing it now, doesn't mean it is necessarily difficult or expensive. Microsoft went big and hard on it not because it needed massive investment, but because it warranted it and is a subject they're passionate about.

Accessibility is and deserves to be expected. There's no excuse for lacking it in the gaming space.

They did it at Microsoft scale and made a product that's effectively a standard now.

And disabled gamers represents more potential revenue. Win win.

(It wasn't immediate clear if you were arguing about the first or second part of the sentence. I'm assuming second, but in case it was the first "Sony and Nintendo" bit:

I didn't know the specifics of non-MS consoles because not owned a Nintendo console newer than a Wii, and have no reason to have a Playstation. Especially as many of the Sony exclusives are coming to PC anyway.

A quick look at PS4/PS5 accessibility features, they include RT transcription for squad comms in addition to standard closed captions, controller remapping, visual accessibility features. First game I picked to look at was TLoU Part 2 has a LOT of accessibility features with sensible presets for physical and cognitive disability.

And you possibly need an adapter, but you can use the Xbox Accessibility Controller with PS4/PS5 as well.)

All the controller-level stuff could literally be done by hobbyists and was done by hobbyists and small companies, and big companies.

A quick Google will show you stuff like the [Thomas] Controller from 2013.[1] AbleGamers have been going since mid-2000.

Big companies have started bringing economies of scale to help drive adoption. You are wrong with your fundamental premise, and I'm proving you wrong with the specific rhetorical question you posed.

And at the software level we're mostly talking about features that aren't expensive to implement. They're as close to free as you can get. Even solo devs can do the majority of it because it's largely stuff you'll have in for ease of debugging, localisation and QA.

With the possible exception of high-end new stuff like comms transcription, slap 'em under the right menu headers, add some sensible presets, GOOD TO GO.

It's basically a modern cheat menu.

[1] https://hackaday.com/2013/06/20/building-custom-game-control...

>"should"'s are meaningless.

No they aren't.

>Resources are limited and you can't expect to serve all the needs out there when you make a product.

Agreed.

>Making choices matter, and that's precisely why you cannot make a product for "everyone".

I'm not disputing that. But you're fundamentally wrong about accessibility. "Should" does matter, and the very example you used demonstrates why.

People without arms DO enjoy the same video games as I do. Just as it should be.

Edit: I forgot physical-level stuff with Nintendo. HORI (who aren't even Nintendo-sized, although not tiny either, have a similar product to the XAC for the Switch, the HORI Flex controller. [2] But you can use the XAC with the Switch anyway with adapters, possibly without adapters via BT.)

But while looking that up, I spotted a new line of Microsoft accessibility products ("Adaptive Accessories") that are hopefully dropping in a few days. Nice.

[2] https://www.flex-controller.com/product

Re: Thanks to the Israeli accessibility law, I have to delete my websites

#420

Post by MrJohz »

kylehotchkiss wrote: post #378
cush wrote: post #241

Any sort of regulation around web accessibility is so much more nuanced than building a ramp up to a restaurant, having the right clearance under a sink, or offering braille menus. It's orders of magnitude more complex in scale and requirements. I'm positive that, in general, the web needs to do so much better when it comes to web accessibility, but we might not be ready for regulation without a lot of guardrail arou…

I was surprised to find how easily https://accessibe.com/ can add some accessibility options to an existing site this week. I was half expecting it to break the site styles when toggling through the options but it did a really fine job while keeping the character of the site intact. It was a one-line script include. Sure, it’s complex to build that all from scratch but thankfully we have services coming in to help.

My understanding is that most of these "just as a script" type tools are of minimal value to people with real disabilities. Most of the options they offer are already available as browser settings or external tools in the first place, and any additional support could be more effectively done by just making the right choices in the first place: proper accessibility tags on things like images and icons, text over iconography (or better yet text with iconography), proper semantic markup, etc. For more complicated things you need to start working more with aria tags, but in my experience they're a lot less complicated than they seem. And in card where interaction is involved (e.g. drop-down search bars) are usually better handled by either the browser, or an external library that will also handle the accessibility aspects. (This is true for pretty much all users - I use a lot of websites where their custom widgets are really hard to navigate if I'm using the keyboard. Doing this properly benefits pretty much everyone.)

The other way of thinking about it is this: if these drop-in scripts were sufficient, why aren't people with disabilities using them via some sort of browser extension, thus negating any need for the law in the first place? After all, if it works so well, people with disabilities should have no issues browsing any site on their own... In practice, these scripts tend to oversell their benefits and be targeted at able-bodied people who don't have as good an idea of the full set of needs (and tools) that people with different disabilities have.

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