Trenton Moss at WebCredible provides his opinion of the future of accessibility. In doing so, he gives a good overview of new technologies and their impact on accessibility.
Trenton provides a good explanation of AJAX and accessibility. The increased usability and dynamic nature of this technology also makes an accessible alternative much more dofficult. New technologies are widening the divide between dynamic usability features and accessibility. New Web2.0 applications provide an easy way for users to interact in feature-rich environments. However, accessibility is not able to keep up with the amount and the diversity of user generated content.
One prediction he gives I would like to explore in more detail. Trenton feels that the once frowned upon separate accessible versions may have to make a come-back, as interactive interfaces do not often allow full accessibility.
I agree that other routes should be researched, but at what point does creating a featureless, accessible, text based interface become more appealing? A development firm may find that the option of creating simple interface is much more affordable than re-creating or dual-development of a system that offers full features and accessibility.
In theory, they are following the letter of accessibility law (which barely exists anyway), but will users accept that as an alternative? Or would users rather have a simple interface that is understandable and gets the job done?
[...] Trenton Moss wrote up his thoughts on the future of accessibility (via Accessibility Blog), and the general accessibility implications of some new technologies. [...]
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