Accessibility is for people

A few days ago, I was asked to give my opinion regarding the accessibility level of a web site. The lead UI designer said something like “If I understand the guidelines correctly, there is no need to change the design, to comply with WCAG 2.0”.

This phrase got me thinking: the person who said it, is a person I appreciate a lot; but yet, something in this phrase didn’t sound right.

The point is, that the accessibility guidelines are meant to give the web-developer with some rules and explanations on how to make your code (and hence the resulting web page) more accessible.

The success criteria are sort of a QA check lists.

But the idea behind it is not just a badge. The idea is to allow as many people as possible, use your site, in the same manner, no matter what user-agent they are using.

The idea is people.

Some of the success criteria on level AA and AAA, are only there because they are a little bit more difficult to accomplish. Not because they are more important. Images’ contrast, as an example, is an AA criteria; but yet, many people will have difficulties reading gray text over black background.

So, next time you’re going to write an accessible page (or should I say, next time you write a page), keep in mind the people, your users, who should use this page. Make the page accessible to the highest possible level, not or the badge,but for the people.

Remember this: if a person can use your site (technically), he will! And he will come back. It’s a win-win situation, and how many of those do we have?