Re: [CODE4LIB] Accessible reCaptcha Was: Bookmarking web links - authoritativeness or focused searching
Kyle Banerjee wrote: ...Like it or not, many webmasters who insist on using visual CAPTCHAs (often in combination with JavaScript) are turning away customers. .. And not just visually impaired people. I screw these up all the time and my vision is fine. It may also be worth considering that accessibility doesn't just mean making a web site accessible to the visually impaired. According to the WHO, Globally about 314 million people are visually impaired, 45 million of them are blind. According to the most recent Unesco Institute for Statistics data, there are an estimated 774 million illiterate adults in the world. How many web sites are designed to be accessible the functionally illiterate?
Re: [CODE4LIB] Accessible reCaptcha Was: Bookmarking web links - authoritativeness or focused searching
On Thu, Oct 1, 2009 at 8:39 AM, MJ Ray m...@phonecoop.coop wrote: Eric Hellman wrote: Are you arguing that reCaptcha cannot be accessible or that it is incorrectly implemented on this site? Primarily that it is incorrectly implemented. However, I've yet to see an implementation of recaptcha that is accessible and does not needlessly insult users with impaired vision. Even the one on recaptcha.net includes the fully-abled=human insults. The space shuttle is not wheelchair-accessible. Is that a reason not to go to the moon? Are non-astronauts less than human? People in foreign countries who don't speak English are not discriminating against you by not speaking English. Fancy restaurants don't have picture menus. People who don't have the internet can't query google via snail mail. Do you consider yourself more human than people who don't have internet access or don't know how to read? Captcha isn't meant as a judgment about whether you happen to have a soul or something, so there's no need to take it personally. It's meant to keep the bots out, period. It's easy to not understand the importance of that if you've never had to deal with your site getting spammed. No business owner in their right mind wants to exclude potential customers if they don't have to. If the site itself is not accessible, maybe it's better they use ReCaptcha and screen people they're unable to serve out before they even try to sign up...
Re: [CODE4LIB] Accessible reCaptcha Was: Bookmarking web links - authoritativeness or focused searching
Casey Durfee wrote: The space shuttle is not wheelchair-accessible. Is that a reason not to go to the moon? Umm... perhaps I missed something, but the last time I checked, the space shuttle had never been to the moon. Hey, it's Friday. cheers, - mt -- * Marc Truitt Associate University Librarian, Bibliographic and Information Voice : 780-492-4770 Technology Services e-mail : marc.tru...@ualberta.ca University of Alberta Libraries fax: 780-492-9243 Cameron Library cell : 780-217-0356 Edmonton, AB T6G 2J8 I should have known better with a girl like you That I would love everything that you do And I do, hey, hey, hey, and I do. -- Lennon/McCartney (1964) * signature.asc Description: OpenPGP digital signature
Re: [CODE4LIB] Accessible reCaptcha Was: Bookmarking web links - authoritativeness or focused searching
On 10/02/2009 03:53 PM, Casey Durfee wrote: On Thu, Oct 1, 2009 at 8:39 AM, MJ Ray m...@phonecoop.coop wrote: ...However, I've yet to see an implementation of recaptcha that is accessible and does not needlessly insult users with impaired vision. Even the one on recaptcha.net includes the fully-abled=human insults. The space shuttle is not wheelchair-accessible. Is that a reason not to go to the moon? Are non-astronauts less than human? If the shuttle's door were the only barrier to wheelchair-bound astronauts, I'd certainly expect NASA to redesign it. If your captcha is the only barrier to letting vision-impaired users access your site, I expect you to redesign it. -- Thomas Dowling tdowl...@ohiolink.edu
Re: [CODE4LIB] Accessible reCaptcha Was: Bookmarking web links - authoritativeness or focused searching
Casey, I've had many conversations on the subject of CAPTCHAs with consultants in our Talking Book division. Like it or not, many webmasters who insist on using visual CAPTCHAs (often in combination with JavaScript) are turning away customers. One consultant, who is blind herself and who is NOT technologically illiterate by any means, has had to have a sighted co-worker sign up for her for anything Yahoo! related. When I looked at Yahoo!'s code a while back, they present the CAPTCHA, with a link (encoded as JavaScript popup) for folks who can't read the CAPTCHA. JAWS, the screen-reader program we have installed here, just would not recognize that link. (Note: I just looked again, and they've improved things considerably -- see below for code). Jim Thatcher, who is a major voice in the accessibility world, has an article about some of the difficulties posed by CAPTCHA and its ilk: http://jimthatcher.com/captchas.htm There are lots of other ways to minimize bot problems that don't (ahem!) violate the law, for those of us who work for institutions subject to section 508 and similar rules. There's a very nice (though slightly dated) article at http://www.w3.org/TR/turingtest/ on the subject. Logic puzzles, presented as simple text, are the approach we use most commonly, although Google's apparent ability to solve some of these does have us a little concerned. I'm not sure it's ever good a good idea to insult your users, or your colleagues. I know that I've seen CAPTCHA's with the message that boils down to to help us make sure you're really a human, please fill this out. I'm not disabled, but I am insulted by these messages! -- Danielle Cunniff Plumer, Coordinator Texas Heritage Digitization Initiative Texas State Library and Archives Commission 512.463.5852 (phone) / 512.936.2306 (fax) dplu...@tsl.state.tx.us dcplu...@gmail.com Yahoo's code: p class=vi-note Attention Blind or Visually Impaired Users: To complete this form you must enter a word that is part of an image. If you can't read the image, Yahoo is happy to help you create your account. A representative from customer care will need to contact you. To request assistance with registration, please read the Yahoo! Terms of Service located at a href=http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ view-source:http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms//a. Once you have reviewed our policies, please provide your phone number and email address and send your request by visiting this URL - a href=http://add.yahoo.com/fast/help/us/edit/cgi_access view-source:http://add.yahoo.com/fast/help/us/edit/cgi_accesshttp://add.yahoo.com/fast/help/us/edit/cgi_access/a /p div id=captchaDiv class=ymemformfield input type=text name=cword id=cword value= size=10 maxlength=10 class= tabindex=20 autocomplete=off a id=captchaSwitchButton input type=button tabindex=21 id=caswitchurl value=Need audio assistance ?/a span class=smalla href= id=lnk_captcha_moreinfo title=More info about verifying your account target=ppMore infohttp://l.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/i/nt/ic/ut/alt1/hlp12_1.gif/a/span pThis helps Yahoo! prevent automated registrations./p div id=captchaCanvas noscript img src=https://ab.login.yahoo.com/img/BxyGIOJZFella6xwSlXbkqFfauXMpUvn05N.dhNnnHEoyBQnkGBIpanJ3vmeY0cv3vwOyGLipg6zZQZhvCIFqwZNvoeeAc2B21gVBw--.jpg; width=290 height=80 alt= border=2 id=cimg class=cimg /noscript a id=captchaRefreshAnchorinput type=button tabindex=22 id=captchaShuffleLink value=Try a new code /a /div /div On Fri, Oct 2, 2009 at 2:53 PM, Casey Durfee ca...@librarything.com wrote: On Thu, Oct 1, 2009 at 8:39 AM, MJ Ray m...@phonecoop.coop wrote: Eric Hellman wrote: Are you arguing that reCaptcha cannot be accessible or that it is incorrectly implemented on this site? Primarily that it is incorrectly implemented. However, I've yet to see an implementation of recaptcha that is accessible and does not needlessly insult users with impaired vision. Even the one on recaptcha.net includes the fully-abled=human insults. The space shuttle is not wheelchair-accessible. Is that a reason not to go to the moon? Are non-astronauts less than human? People in foreign countries who don't speak English are not discriminating against you by not speaking English. Fancy restaurants don't have picture menus. People who don't have the internet can't query google via snail mail. Do you consider yourself more human than people who don't have internet access or don't know how to read? Captcha isn't meant as a judgment about whether you happen to have a soul or something, so there's no need to take it personally. It's meant to keep the bots out, period. It's easy to not understand the importance of that if you've never had to deal with your site getting spammed. No business owner in their right mind wants to exclude potential customers if they don't have to. If the site itself is not accessible, maybe it's better they use
Re: [CODE4LIB] Accessible reCaptcha Was: Bookmarking web links - authoritativeness or focused searching
...Like it or not, many webmasters who insist on using visual CAPTCHAs (often in combination with JavaScript) are turning away customers. .. And not just visually impaired people. I screw these up all the time and my vision is fine. Logic puzzles, presented as simple text, are the approach we use most commonly, although Google's apparent ability to solve some of these does have us a little concerned. These are no silver bullet either since language and comprehension abilities start coming into play. The reality is that any test designed to weed out the machines is going to week out a few humans as well. The trick is to figure out how to minimize that number and then identify who gets locked out so you can find another way to help them. I'm not sure it's ever good a good idea to insult your users, or your colleagues. I know that I've seen CAPTCHA's with the message that boils down to to help us make sure you're really a human, please fill this out. I'm not disabled, but I am insulted by these messages! Yer too sensitive. May as well be insulted that rocks are too hard. Bots are a real threat to services. Once they get out of control, systems can become overwhelmed, legitimate users get flooded with garbage, and attacks can get launched which can get your site blacklisted. Then all your users are hosed. It is easier than most people think for pretty rotten scenarios to emerge. kyle
Re: [CODE4LIB] Accessible reCaptcha Was: Bookmarking web links - authoritativeness or focused searching
Eric Hellman wrote: Are you arguing that reCaptcha cannot be accessible or that it is incorrectly implemented on this site? Primarily that it is incorrectly implemented. However, I've yet to see an implementation of recaptcha that is accessible and does not needlessly insult users with impaired vision. Even the one on recaptcha.net includes the fully-abled=human insults. Usually recaptcha is a good example of a robot blocker that is accessible to print-disabled users. My impairments are quite mild (short-sighted with some contrast/light problems - the photo on my website is a few years old, before I had to wear my glasses all the time - oh vanity and laziness; and hearing problems in one ear) but still recaptcha is a pain in the eye. Maybe it's worse for impaired users, than print-disabled ones like you? The notion that javascript cannot be used in an accessible website is obsolete (it's not 2000 any more). There are javascript techniques that make sites inaccessible, just as there are html techniques that make the site accessible. There are javascript techniques that INCREASE accessibility. Of course there are, but surely even the most enthusiastic javascript advocate accepts that the sites using javascript in ways that harm accessibility far outweigh the numbers using it well today? So, it's reasonable if script execution permission defaults to denied and is enabled site-by-site for now. However, I wasn't complaining about the javascript use, just noting that you might find it easier to start seeing the check you're a human nastiness by switching javascript off. View Source might work just as well, depending on how it has been implemented. I've recently been learning about accessibility issues [...] Thank you. I wish everyone did. I've been learning about accessibility issues since my eyesight started to deteriorate and my hearing was damaged. This isn't an add-on issue for me. It's vital for web use. Regards, -- MJ Ray (slef) LMS developer and webmaster at | software www.software.coop http://mjr.towers.org.uk| co IMO only: see http://mjr.towers.org.uk/email.html | op
