Practical web accessibility

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The ghost of accessibility past - the rise of specialist screen reader solutions

In a WCAG 2.0 world, it’s easy to forget sometimes how large the leap was from the previous standard to the current one. While I’m sure that for many of the people who worked on WCAG 2.0 during the seven year process of creating it, it must have seemed like a lifetime, but for most practitioners WCAG 2.0 has only been with us for four short years.

Yet a recent project by the New York Times suggests that perhaps WCAG 1.0 still lurks in the shadows, and its implications remain a hot topic of discussion.


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US Government sets assistive app challenge

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A challenge announced last week by the Department of Labor’s Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP) could see a suite of apps developed to help boost employment opportunities for people with disabilities.

The goal of the app challenge is to increase employment levels for people with disabilities by promoting resources using accessible mobile technology to assist both employers and job seekers. 

Each app submitted to the challenge should achieve at least one of the following goals:

Digital media and technology: 

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Spotify’s accessibility: so close but so far

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Apps that are accessible to people who have a disability are few and far between. So when an app qualifies as accessible, it’s a cause for celebration. The music streaming service Spotify launched in Australia yesterday, and while it has been commended by many in the accessibility world for its consideration of the needs of disabled users, its integration with Facebook still presents a significant barrier for potential users.

Through its smartphone, tablet and desktop apps, Spotify gives access to a “world of music”, allowing users to stream tracks and albums from millions of international artists. Its integration with social media is central to the experience of using the app, with user activity such as songs, albums and playlists users have listened to being posted automatically to Facebook.


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