[ale] (Advocacy) looking for opinions

[Kenneth W Cochran]

Hi,

I was once a sys/netadmin for an Agency of the State of
Alabama & co-chaired (miss a meeting, get "volunteered" :)
1-2 of the State's Web/e-commerce advisory committees.

We had almost these exact discussions & (more or less) came to
the following conclusions with regard to these kinds of practices:

1.  "Best viewed with" (& especially "Get ...") *any* kind
    of browser was indeed considered advertising, and in
    this case, forbidden by State (& maybe Federal) Laws.
    (Sorry, no citation, but we all thought it would be the
    Right Thing To (not) Do.)

2.  Coding to *any* specific browser ran risks of being
    *not* compatible with other browsers, especially
    text-mode browsers.  This has some implications &
    for public accessibility, especially with
    handicapped-access.

    a.  By both Federal & State Law(s) & Regulation(s)
	(IIRC/IIUC), *all* government agencies
	(Federal/State/Local) are *required* to make their
	information, especially "public" information,
	available in vendor-neutral methods/manners.

    b.  IIRC/IIUC practices such as this run some risks of
	non-compliance with things like the Americans with
	Disabilities Act, aka the ADA.

An upshot of all this was at least for a while, we managed
to get Web developers to "think" about the ramifications of
what they were doing & to consider issues such as these
while designing & implementing sites.  As you (& "they")
could see, there are both "carrots" & "sticks" involved...

Related resources such as http://www.anybrowser.org have
seemed helpful too.

I suppose if you *really* wanted to press them, you
probably Know What To Do...

-kc

>From owner-ale at ale.org  Thu Feb  8 07:58:29 2001
>Date: Thu, 08 Feb 2001 07:56:00 -0500
>From: Wandered Inn <esoteric at denali.atlnet.com>
>Subject: [ale] (Advocacy) looking for opinions
>
>I noticed that the GPSC web site (
>http://www.psc.state.ga.us/ ) has a 'get Microsoft IE'
>link.  I personally have a problem with this and consider
>it free adv. for Microsoft.  I sent email to the GPSC
>requesting them to remove the adv.  I received a response
>saying it was not an adv. and it would not be removed.
>They also told me that their site was 'best viewed with IE
>and some functions of the site do not work with Netcape.'
>
>What do folks think?  I don't believe that a site that is
>paid for with tax payers money should show such bias.
>Also, since it is a public site, paid for by tax payers
>money, it should work for, at least, the two major
>browsers, although I did not have a problem viewing
>anything on the site with Netscape.
>
>If anyone else would like to respond, here is the email
>address of the GPSC:
>
>gapsc at psc.state.ga.us
>
>And further, here is the phone number for the person who
>told me that the link would not be removed. (she/he gave me
>the number in the email response) 404-656-2756
>
>--
>Until later: Geoffrey		esoteric at denali.atlnet.com
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