Web Accessibility and Standards
What is Accessibility?
Successful access to information and use of information technology by people who have disabilities is known as "accessibility." Standard-compliant websites provide access to the disabled.
What Are Standards?
Standards exist for websites just like any other electrical equipment or machinery. These standards define how devices like a computer or cell phone access the information on the web. They also tell web authors how to code for these devices. Websites created using these industry standards are cross-browser compatible.
Why Design with Standards?
- Websites designed with standards receive higher ranking in search engines.
- Your pages load faster, so your customers stay longer.
- Maintaining the site is simple since there isn't excess markup or proprietary code.
- 1 in 5 people in the United States has some kind of disability. Can your business afford to lose 1 in 5 customers?
- You can easily change the colors and layout of your entire site by updating one small text file.
- Federal requirements are spreading throughout various industries. You could be fined if your industry is required to have accessible websites and yours is non-compliant.
Legal Requirements
The U.S. Federal Government Section 508 requires that electronic and information technology that is developed or purchased by the Federal Government is accessible by people with disabilities. Recently, this requirement has been extended to the medical industry.
