A recent exchange on Twitter has motivated me to write about the contribution published surveys on web site accessibility make towards understanding and addressing the problems that hold back web accessibility. I’ve read, and continue to read, many, many papers presenting the results of surveys of web sites, and I think we need surveys to look beyond just the data and instead delve more deeply into why the results are as they are. We’ve gone way beyond the point where a paper simply reporting that a study of x web sites from y sector revealed ‘disappointing’ levels of accessibility provides anything more than a minor contribution. Surveys need to look at process not product.
November 15, 2009
Web accessibility surveys – results are frequently disappointing
Posted by David Sloan under Accessibility and Usability | Tags: accessibility, evaluation, research, surveys, web |[5] Comments
September 5, 2009
HCI 2009: an on-the-train-home review
Posted by David Sloan under Accessibility and Usability | Tags: conference, culture, design, HCI, hci2009, ICT, review |Leave a Comment
HCI 2009, the 23rd annual British Computer Society conference on Human Computer Interaction, took place this week at Cambridge University’s Churchill College . It started and finished with two provocative and inspiring keynote talks, and in between were some interesting presentations and discussions. I was there to give a paper on the user research work we’ve been doing as part of the Usable Image project, but I was also wearing my accessibility hat, and while there wasn’t a huge amount of coverage of accessibility or inclusive design there were plenty of other presentations that were definitely of relevance.
