[GabrielF00]

> using the law as a bludgeon to force people into obeying arbitrary design policies

They're not arbitrary design policies at all. They're standards that exist for a reason. For instance, if you have some text, display it as text, not as an image of text, because a screen reader won't be able to read it.

> The inevitable effect of this kind of legislation is that technology gets worse for everyone, rather than better for a small group.

Actually, complying with accessibility standards makes the web better for everyone. Here's an example. The giant green table on this website used to just be an image[1]. That made the page useless for screen readers, but it also meant that you couldn't copy the data in the table, couldn't resize the text, etc. A common sense change to display this table as text made the page more useful for everyone.

https://www.boston.gov/cityscore

[13years]

Yes, but I believe the previous point is that standards are typically adhered to by consent. Not by government force.

Allowing government to fine or shutdown sites not complying with some set of standards is a very chilling path to go down.

[GabrielF00]

I think his point is that standards are inherently arbitrary and inflexible and that these specific standards are only beneficial to a "small group". My point is that these standards aren't arbitrary, but well-reasoned, and that they are broadly beneficial (see my post elsewhere for some more examples).

Some standards are enforced by law - fire codes for instance, or food handling standards. Do accessibility standards merit similar treatment? I'd argue that most people now need to use the Internet for basic functions in their lives. For instance, you can't even get a job at a chain grocery store around here without filling out an online application. Given that, there's a strong social interest in making sure that everyone has access. That interest has to be balanced against other interests - costs to businesses for instance. I'm not necessarily suggesting that we should treat WCAG the same way we would treat a fire code (which a government agency enforces) or as we treat ADA building compliance (where customers can sue to force compliance), but I do think that a debate on this issue should look at what these standards actually do, and try to balance the interests. I don't think the parent is doing that.

[DanBC]

> standards are typically adhered to by consent. Not by government force.

I'm not sure how you can say this when HN is full of articles about regulatory actions on some industry or other, or some bad actor in that industry.

[13years]

The distinction intended was in standards which are done by consent for example browser standards vs. regulation imposed by government.