Re:This smacks of bullshit... (Score 0)

You're not talking about something as simple as adding an entrance to a building. Regardless of embedded media, the Internet works based upon a principal that *requires* vision in order to access it, you're suggesting that we then revolutionize the very foundation of the Internet to accommodate a very select group of people.

And no, the solution isn't as simple as conforming to a new web standard or design element, and anyone who over-simplifies this argument into "can't you just do $x" obviously has never built a website. TTS (Text-to-Speech) technology is far from perfect and in some cases isn't feasible as it requires standard ASCII and doesn't take into account things such as Flash, Images, etc. Not only that, but talk about a slippery slope... are you seriously suggesting that every web site be accessible by the blind? What about Geocities, Angelfire, and the like? And why should the blind get preferential treatment over the deaf? Lets demand that every video or audio clip that gets uploaded to YouTube, Google Video, etc have a transcript or signer.

Get pragmatic here. Should I lose my vision there is an insurmountable mass of things that are going to be higher priority on my day-to-day list than "surf teh intarwebs". I would need to accept the realization that I won't be able to play video games or surf the Internet like I used to. Should *EASILY IMPLEMENTABLE* means of changing that come 'round, groovy, if not I recognize that I'm at a disadvantage to everyone else and may need to find alternative things to do with my life. But this is an issue for Web Developers and Programmers ONLY. If you don't professionally design web sites, maintain servers that run web applications, or code with an emphasis on web development, GTFO of this conversation, because your input is invalid and irrelevant.

But since I'm all for compromise how about we just use the UTF encoding for Braille?