[Ansteorra] websites

[Childers, Jeff]

The following is merely my opinions based solely on my experiences,
individual mileage my vary and could all very well ALL be a lie. 

The internet and websites in general is moved and turned by business.
They expect to deliver their content for the least amount of expense.
Because of this motivating factor many solid companies have gone under
because of their dedication to delivering "content for all". The
"internet" originally was to provide a method of information exchange
but with the intrusion of advertisers trying make a buck. They learned
from the big .com bubble bursting that the internet wasn't like any
other form of advertising. They now pay $$$ for data mining and browser
history gleaning to get a demographic to make products more appealing to
a particular website audiences.

The people who buy, website based services, only see the price point and
what they see and hear. I worked on a site that spent 1.3 million for
the development of its website and ecommerce package but didn't want to
spend the extra 20k to provide text based services. It is a fact that
the web is moving from information exchange to a multimedia TV like
product. It is becoming many things. Take youtube for example it is a
very popular website that a few years ago would not have been possible.
Networking sites like facebook and myspace are basically forums. With
the inclusion of games, music and messaging like capabilities to these
sites they will only become more popular.

But I guess I am slightly off topic. I guess the point I am trying to
make that it isn't developers who are to blame necessarily but the
forces that drive the internet. These forces being development houses,
users, browsers, operating systems, servers, server OSes and the biggest
TIME. All play a role in content development. If a developer isn't paid
to learn and implement the different ways to bring content to the
disabled it lends to hap-hazard learning in a vacuum.

CMS systems tend to leave a bad taste in my mouth. I have migrated from
one system to the next 4 or 5 times that ended up being quite the
headache here at the university. 4 years ago we implemented luminous by
sungard. The not having to learn html is true as long as you don't try
and get fancy. Nonetheless I take about 20 calls a week on this 'hands
free' approach lol. I have done video tutorials, walk thurs, and pdf
training manuals but I still have to baby sit the users. Then when
writing specialized packages/libraries/tools that have to be changed to
some degree upon each deployment is a pain. Instead of a couple days to
modify the code of a standalone web application it ends up be 2 or 3
times that. Most developers really don't have the time to dedicate to
learning a new proprietary language. A few of the amenities such a
rollbacks, page management and rss feeds are nice but not for small
sites. Now if the issue is merely to provide the content to the disabled
a cms product doesn't insure this and is like using a atomic bomb to
kill a gnat. A far less demanding way is to provide the content as
text-only.

Here in the year 2009 providing content to users with disabilities is
still in its infancy. There is a big push to use css in SCA websites but
it carries no better a guarantee than html itself. It boils down to
experience and realizing that website design is as much a art as it is a
science.

Now how much can be asked of a person who is donating his/her time doing
something that they might not have the knowledge base to accomplish
isn't my call. If we should move to text only pages isn't my call as
well. I DO think having a well developed site tends to give the
impression of legitimacy to our groups. I also don't think most SCAians
realize the work involved in bringing this convenience to everyone. I
over the last 3 weeks have put in about 90 hours on the 30th year
website plus a full time job and helping out at our local event. Reality
is we do the best we can. And a thanks every once in a while is nice.

Garreth Silverthane
Ansteorrian Virtual Scribe err.. Webminister