While it's easy to say the site must legally be 'accessible', the problem I've encountered is that there is apparently no legal standard for 'accessible'. Section 508, WCAG, etc. do not have US caselaw behind them that actually identifies them as such.
From a practitioner's viewpoint, it might make perfect sense to target WCAG, and possibly consider anything less 'unaccessible'. However, from a legal viewpoint - which typically doesn't acknowledge any obligation or liability without precedent - it's a very different situation.
I'm curious if these tort cases can set that precedent, and clarify things for the lawyers.
Yeah, I concluded that after scanning and seeing the "Some Job Killer" graph that essentially shows that the population in Seattle has increased since 1990.
>Bloomberg reports that the 800MW Vineyard Wind project – a yet-to-be-built joint effort of Avangrid and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners – is expected to provide electricity and renewable energy credits for 6.5 cents a kilowatt-hour (8.5c/kWh AUD) over the life of its 20-year contract.
Seems maybe a little premature to call it successful.
"State employees in the past accepted lower salaries in exchange for this future benefit."
Isn't this the public sector equivalent of letting a startup pay you in equity? While it may have been characterized as more secure than personal investment, agreeing to this compensation scheme doesn't remove the burden of risk, particularly when the 'startup' offering to pay you later is state government.
A few years ago I went to a dinner party at an anthropology professor's home. He was a big game hunter, and an entire floor of his house was full of taxidermied animals of all types and sizes, from all over the world.
The idea of sport hunting (i.e. killing things for fun) still troubles me, but I have to admit it was fascinating to get to see those animals up close (much closer than I would at a zoo). Presumably those dead animals will still be providing that opportunity long after their zoo counterparts have been replaced by a new generation of captives.
I definitely see the potential for cost savings in some areas, but there are whole sectors of technology activity in a contemporary university that aren't offsetting some pre-digital expense; they're just a reflection of the increased technical cost of instruction and lifestyle.
The typical comparison of college to today to that from 20 or 30 years ago is just poorly considered. "Where does the money go?" Consider the things that didn't exist at many colleges 30 years ago:
- IT
- Any type of student welfare services.
- Title IX and any other regulatory offices.
- Diversity offices and other efforts.
- Disability services.
- Dedicated police departments.
- Advising, Counseling, and Academic support (because more and lower-qualified students than ever are going to college).
- In the case of state schools, typically significant budget cuts from the state.
I'm not saying these rationally explain the increase in cost, but it's a significant expansion in responsibility and functionality that brought with it administration and bureaucracy.
By structural, you mean regulatory. I agree that data stewardship should be much better-regulated than it is now.
But right now I can install any number of tools on Google's own browser that mitigate most common tracking/privacy concerns. I don't necessarily agree that we need to increase government regulation to address a concern that a Chrome extension is already serving.
I'm not crazy about the current state of internet privacy, but I think it's a missed opportunity if we don't teach the general public just how much control they have over it. Most tracking being done can be prevented by a few modifications to web browser configuration. At the end of the day, we are sending Facebook our ID to be tracked. This is avoidable for a user with some knowledge and agency.
From a practitioner's viewpoint, it might make perfect sense to target WCAG, and possibly consider anything less 'unaccessible'. However, from a legal viewpoint - which typically doesn't acknowledge any obligation or liability without precedent - it's a very different situation.
I'm curious if these tort cases can set that precedent, and clarify things for the lawyers.