Well, I believe you're wrong on both counts, in terms of what AFB supports and in terms of what's good for blind people. Proprietary formats that work sometimes, and don't work often are not good for blind people. For example, when it comes to inaccessible documents, such as the forms mentioned in an earlier message, an accomondation can reasonably be enforced under the ADA. I speak here of the most restrictive circumstance such that of employment where, as you pointed out, there are defined company standards. There are other examples. You have, however, apparently narrowed the scope of this discussion to file sharing within some kind of organizational entity--a company, a school. The issue goes beyond that. When the situation is a proprietary format to someone outside of an organizational entity, the entity is on even weaker ground. They have no basis in law to compel someone to spend money on devices they would otherwise not purchase in order to read something they're entitled to read. An excellent example of this circumstance are Sec. 508 (and I daresay 504). When the government chooses to publish forms on the web, they are now required to be accessible forms. And, they must be accessible to a wider variety of individuals with a wider variety of technologies. They cannot, for example, say "Word is accessible, so we can publish Word," because it's arguably only accessible to those with that kind of technology. The public service must serve the greater public, not just that majority that may have chosen Word somehow. On Sun, 13 Jan 2002, Kirk Wood wrote: > I hope for the sake of blind people Janina speaks for herself and not the > AFB. Reality strike here. Many people use their computer for primarily > business reasons. And as such they are stuck with the arrogant rules of a > business. For some stupid reason us sighted folks prefer text that is > formatted. And no Janina, html and text don't give the level of formatting > that word does. Sorry, but does not computer. Will not compute. > > ======= > Kirk Wood > Cpt.Kirk at 1tree.net > > Nowlan's Theory: > He who hesitates is not only lost, but several miles from > the next freeway exit. > > > > _______________________________________________ > Speakup mailing list > Speakup at braille.uwo.ca > http://speech.braille.uwo.ca/mailman/listinfo/speakup > -- Janina Sajka, Director Technology Research and Development Governmental Relations Group American Foundation for the Blind (AFB) Email: janina at afb.net Phone: (202) 408-8175 Chair, Accessibility SIG Open Electronic Book Forum (OEBF) http://www.openebook.org
