ACCESS TO ALL

Browser-independent Site Information

Access to All Rationale

(You are encouraged to download and use the above icon, if you wish, to indicate that your site is a free access site. There is also an excellent site discussing this issue further, with additional graphics, at http://server.berkeley.edu/~cdaveb/anybrowser.html. The site includes links to tutorials and information that can help web designers create non-browser specific tables and other effects.

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Date: Wed, 26 Mar 1997 11:57:46 -0800 (PST)
From: "Julie K. Petersen" 
To: webmaster@eff.org
Bcc: jrs@abiogenesis.com
Subject: Letter to the EFF regarding Web Site Access to All
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A Letter to the EFF regarding Promotion of Web Site Access to All

March 26th, 1997

Web Site Access to All:
How Product Favoritism Inhibits
and Endangers Freedom of Information
and What We Can Do to Improve Access
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by Julie K. Petersen

     This is an informal letter.  I have not taken the time to write it up
as a formal article, due to time constraints.  Nevertheless, I hope that
by introducing these issues, they will be discussed further, and
individuals will take action to guard and promote access to all through
web sites on the internet.

     I want to bring up the issue of browser favoritism and its effect on
freedom of information access.  Sometimes the most damaging prohibitions
on our electronic society come not from government regulation, but from
naive enthusiasm for new features in a particular software product, or
from uninformed, or self-interested corporate pressure from management. 

     The Web provides an unprecedented opportunity for discussion, access
to information and furthering the positive evolution of our society.
However, this is *only possible* if *all* people can see and download the
information.

     Unfortunately, due to a variety of factors, web site designers have
been creating sites that exclude a significant number of users.  By
catering to a particular browser, or non-standard markup extensions, they
create, in effect, a 'white-out' to anyone visiting their site with
another software tool.

     This is unnecessary.  As a designer of more than half a dozen
professional sites for a variety of businesses, I know that it is possible
to design superior, attractive and ergonomic web sites with standard HTML. 

     It is our job as web masters to promote unprejudiced access and
freedom of choice to users to purchase whichever browser best meets their
needs.  We do ourselves an injustice, and long-term harm, by forcing
consumers to support a particular product, not because of its quality, or
fitness for a particular purpose, but because of its familiarity.  We can
do better than that. 

     By supporting a particular browser, or company, we discourage
competition, and concentrate too much power in the hands of that
particular company.  Although the company may be responsible, history has
shown that corporate interests take precedence over the interests of
society in general, and we cannot count on a corporation to continue to
develop these important communications mediums for the good of society
rather than for profit.


Raising Awareness and Promoting Change

-    I believe that there are a significant number of web masters who
*are* willing to change the design and construction of their sites to
promote open access, if they are made more aware of the issues involved,
and the long-term consequences of their actions. 

-    I believe that corporate pressure on web masters to use non-standard
extensions *can be reduced* by informing these corporate managers that
they are excluding an important segment of their customer base, and that
excellence in a web site is not based on extensions, but on good design
and marketing concepts.

-    I believe that it is possible to raise awareness, and effect change,
by providing information, and distributing an icon promoting Access to
All, which webmasters can attach to their sites as part of the Blue Ribbon
campaign.  We have created an icon for this purpose and provide it to the
community as a freely destributable web graphic.  It is included with this
letter as a file attachment, and is also downloadable from
http://www.abiogenesis.com/ (at the bottom of the home page).


What Can Do As Webmasters?

    Let's stop promoting sites as being powered by a particular browser. 
A site should be powered by its ability to provide good information,
products and services.  Why give the customer the implicit message that
it's the browser that's important?  It should be the customer, and the
customer's choice and access that takes priority.  THis is both good
business, and good citizenship.

    Let's make web users aware that our sites are Access to All sites.
These are sites that work not only with the well-known browsers, but also
with more than a dozen other graphical and text browsers that are used
regularly on the web.

    Let's take a look at the long term consequences of letting one or two
major corporations determine the 'look and feel' of the web, and its
direction and accessibility.  These consequences go directly against the
tenets of freedom of speech and information access.

Summary

     I hope by raising these issues, and contributing a visual symbol of
our goal of Access to All, that we can further the cause of maintaining
the internet as a free communications medium now *and* in the future.  I
look forward to seeing other solutions and shows of support from the
online community committed to preserving our rights and freedoms.

Sincerely,

Julie K. Petersen

HTML is an application conforming to International Standard ISO 8879 -- Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML). SGML is a system for defining structured document types, and markup languages to represent instances of those document types. The SGML declaration for HTML is given in SGML Declaration for HTML. It is implicit among WWW implementations.

In the event of any apparent conflict between HTML and SGML standards, the SGML standard is definitive.

We support freedom of speech, and feel that government legislation against free communication is not an appropriate way to try to protect adults or children. In fact, the long term consequences of these actions may be harmful to children and their future as informed, responsible adults, and we support those who work hard to protect our rights. Read about this at http://www.vtw.org/speech/.

Topics: freedom of speech freedom of information access browser-independence