Lawsuit against retailer's website

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Lawsuit against retailer's website

Is your site accessible to blind?

farmboy

7:21 pm on Oct 2, 2006 (gmt 0)

The National Federation for the Blind previously sued a major U.S. retailer on behalf of a blind man claiming the retailer's site is not accessible and is in violation of the American's with Disabilities Act.

A judge recently ruled the suit can proceed and now the NFB is threatening to go after other sites.

I don't know how something like this would affect other webmasters in the future, but it's something to keep in mind.

FarmBoy

Car_Guy

7:25 pm on Oct 2, 2006 (gmt 0)

If it's the same case, it was discussed here a few weeks ago:

Federal Judge Sustains Discrimination Claims Against Target.com website
[webmasterworld.com...]

monkeythumpa

11:59 pm on Oct 2, 2006 (gmt 0)

I wonder if a site about motorcycling would be subject to a lawsuit given the subject. . .

Essex_boy

6:50 am on Oct 4, 2006 (gmt 0)

I find this kind of lawsuit surreal, if he was blind then he cant see the site. Surely.

Or are they saying that he is partially sighted and had problems reading the text due to the font size and colour used?

Like a feature in the Daily Telegraph said 'Soon its going to be illegal discriminate against people based on ability to do a job, sowhat if someone cant do the job, your going to have to give it to them'

Beagle

3:23 pm on Oct 4, 2006 (gmt 0)

...if he was blind then he cant see the site. Surely.

He was using a text reader, like the vast majority of blind people who access the internet, and the site wasn't set up so it was accessible to text readers. BTW, search engines (and most mobile devices) also use text readers, so having your site set up so it's accessible to them is not a bad thing.

There's a detailed thread about this in the accessibility and usability forum, if you want to get into the specific issues involved.