An idiot writes...

Here's what I mean when I refer to people who think accessibility in design is unimportant as "idiots":

apcmag.com: The World Wide Web is not enough: "Standards cronies have now latched on to the disabled - the starving African children of high technology - for leverage. Spend time reading A List Apart, and you'll soon get the impression that accessibility is bigger than cancer, and we're all about to go blind and lose our mouse-bearing limbs. The solution? Web standards! ... But now I'm fed up. I want the browser wars back. I want to use Flash and PDF (you know, technologies that work) without being accused of bourgeois elitism. Is it really so important to make our Web sites phone-compatible? PDA-compatible? Safe for the flat-footed? No. All that matters is the desire to communicate, and the ability to steal any good thing that gets invented. "

How can you make a claim to be passionate about communication if you also defend the right to place barriers between the person sending the message and the people hearing it? In Emberton's world (and heaven knows in other respects I have nothing but admiration for the guy) if you choose to use a PDA to surf the web (as will undoubtedly happen soon, especially when you consider that some UK universities are considering giving wireless PDAs to students to help them access online materials) you won't hear what he has to say. If you're blind, you won't get it. If you can't use a mouse because you have crippling arthritis, you're out of luck. If you're colour blind, or dyslexic, what a shame.

For heaven's sake, designers are designers because they should be able to overcome the physical and mental impairments that prevent communication from working, not add to them. Anyone who does that is not a designer, they are a semi-detached egotist who only cares about themselves, not the message.