Much Web content ignores accessibility

A recent study by Simpleweb, a UK-based Web design and development firm, analyzed local Web design companies' Web sites for their accessibility for visually impaired or people with disabilities and found more than 75% to be inaccessible.

A United Nations-sponsored survey in 2006 had similar findings, showing that only three in 100 Web sites studied internationally had minimum accessibility standards for people with disabilities.

And in June 2007, TV Week reported the growing accessibility problems with so much TV content online -- it is not being closed captioned for deaf and hearing impaired viewers. The article explained, "The major broadcast networks have launched state-of-the-art online video players -- that do not include captions. Apple has revolutionized TV viewing by making shows available for download on iTunes -- without captions."

FCC regulations about closed captioning have not yet caught up with the current trend of watching TV online.

"Although the Federal Communications Commission requires captions for broadcast and cable content, the rules do not cover Internet streaming or digital downloads," TV Week reported. "That makes extending closed captioning to those media more a matter of corporate responsibility than regulation. The FCC rules do cover high-definition and video-on-demand delivery, but experts complain that, between companies not complying with regulations and a lack of consumer awareness, many viewers still feel chained to their traditional analog sets."

Experts in media accessibility say the technology to caption TV content online is simple to implement; there just needs to be a willingness on the part of the networks to make it happen.

This whole issue is poised to become a crisis in online accessibility. I know many young people these days who watch all their TV content online, and with the writers' strike, some new TV series may begin exclusively online. I hope the broadcast networks will step up and right this wrong.