[warning26]

You're getting downvoted, but honestly I feel like this is the elephant in the room of accessibility efforts.

A lot of them just feel like they're catering to a tiny slice of the user base that would probably be better served in some other way. In some cases, they arguably make things worse for everyone else, like WCAG 1.4.1, mandating that your links have ugly underlines just because some people might have trouble reading them. Fun fact: HackerNews's links are noncompliant, and could get them sued in Canada.

[fredleblanc]

I mean, that’s one solution to WCAG 1.4.1, but not the only one. Per WebAIM’s recommendations[1] on the matter:

- Color is not used as the sole method of conveying content or distinguishing visual elements.

- Color alone is not used to distinguish links from surrounding text unless the contrast ratio between the link and the surrounding text is at least 3:1 and an additional distinction (e.g., it becomes underlined) is provided when the link is hovered over and receives focus.

Lots of options in there besides just slapping underlines on things. Could be bold where other text isn’t. Could just be a color that stands out enough against your text. Etc.

[1]: https://webaim.org/standards/wcag/checklist

[warning26]

Contrast ratio between the link and the surrounding text is at least 3:1 sounds easy to achieve, but in practice it rules out almost every color, so it's a nonstarter in almost every case; WebAIM actually has a good article showing how few colors actually can hit a 3:1 ratio: https://webaim.org/blog/wcag-2-0-and-link-colors/.

Sure, you could make links bold, but no one does that for a reason: it looks ridiculous.

The thing that I find particularly egregious about that rule about it is how this doesn't even seem like it helps that many people. A screen reader user would necessarily know that an element was a link regardless of color, and even colorblind users are likely to be able to see that the text is lighter, even if they cannot make out the specific color, particularly if the color used isn't red or green.

[izacus]

"Tiny part" in reality usually ends up being as much as quarter (1/4, 25%) of user population. Just because people aren't completely blind/deaf/disabled doesn't mean they don't benefit from accessibility features.

[antasvara]

I think there's a massive difference between having accessibility options and hard-coded accessibility options. I don't like subtitles on my English language TV shows; however, having the option to turn them on doesn't affect my experience at all. Adding text to speech doesn't impact my gameplay either, provided I have the option to turn it off.

[warning26]

Oh I completely agree, I love accessibility options -- what I don't like is when the pursuit of accessibility ends up making the experience worse for users with the default settings.

[simion314]

>mandating that your links have ugly underlines just because some people might have trouble reading them

I hare designers that chose terrible font sizes and terrible color contrast, do you designers use some extra special screens where light gray on white looks readable?

I am wondering if a site with such fancy designs that look smooth and cool could do an experiment and offer a high contrast, big fonts, no animations version then let the user decides. Maybe we could get some data and see what people that use them able sites use, liek Gmail , do people chose themes with low contrast, many animations and cool looking links?

I hope good designers will prevail in the end and get rid of the form over function crowd, where you need perfect vision and some super expensive screen to be able to proeprly use a web page.

[tomc1985]

> do you designers use some extra special screens where light gray on white looks readable?

Not a designer but I am a photo nerd, and yes these screens exist

[simion314]

The super expensive make sense if you are a "print" designer, if you do web you should test your stuff on regular devices.

[alexfrydl]

I will always be amazed at how many people can type “because this group is a minority, meeting their needs is unimportant and shouldn't impact the majority” and think they've contributed a novel thought. Your elephant in the room is just basic everyday ableism. You can't even stomach a link being underlined for someone else's benefit lol.