rework of wai web site

The question of how much the opening page holds besides links seems to
be a first order decision.  On the proposed page at:
	http://www.w3.org/WAI/EO/Drafts/WAI-home
the design philosophy is to have two items (Headlines, Mission) fully
contained on the opening page with the others (resources, participation,
about WAI) consisting entirely of links. The current site probably has a
little more explanatory stuff on the main page and in neither case is
the choice of what are to be the "level 1" divisions very intuitive. As
in the QuickTips card, there is the prospect of a long discussion of how
the pie is divided, how much goes on the first page, etc. How many
clicks to get to the phone number for the next telecon; where are the
minutes from the most recent meeting; how deep are the archives buried;
how many guidelines/checklists/charters are at one's fingertips. Also
this site will be the model for the sites of the various groups and the
lack of consistency amongst them is at times galling.

A lot of changes are before us now in part because of two big factors:
our guidelines may be referred to in regulations throughout the world;
we have been into "everything, everyone connected" and Jonathan Chetwynd
has tweaked our hypocrisy button since a significant proportion of PWDs
is made up of people for whom "illiterate", "stupid", "retard", and
other terms are pejoratives as counterproductive and hurtful as those
for "crips", "blinks", and "dummies". For our purposes to date, the
present rather "academic" setup and attitude are functional and
productive but we should at least begin to pay some attention to *ALL*
persons with disabilities and this may be a good opportunity to do so.
The re-design of the site must be symbolic as well as functional and I
don't know how to start except with this message.
-- 
Love.
            ACCESSIBILITY IS RIGHT - NOT PRIVILEGE
http://dicomp.pair.com

Received on Sunday, 18 July 1999 19:29:42 UTC