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I am astounded at the ignorance and selfish attitude of some of the half-witted respondents to this issue. Since when should blind people, or people with any disability be denied access to services on the internet. Because that's what you are suggesting by taking a stand against alt text or other remedial actions which would enable people with disabilities to use the web in the samw way you do. Forget about pollution and otehr excuses. This is about all people having the same rights. And what harm does it cause you to have braille on your drive-in ATM. Who says bloind people wont use that? They can sit in cars, and if they can sit in cars, they can get to the drive-in ATM. As to should you be sued for not providing alt text, or making your website or for that matter, any product usable by people with disabilities. Yes! Yes, please God! Punish these selfish, arrogant, ignoramuses! Make them pay for their attitude to others who would benefit from these very small changes.

If the NFB was turly interested in making Target accessible and not in blackmail, then they could have helped them make the site accessible in a few days, but their agenda along with the Trial Lawyers and the California District court is several fold. 

One, they hate capitalists as a whole, they have no problem stealing and blackmailing the stock holders, the employees and the cusomers of Target, which is what they just did.

The ADA meant well but after attending the Trial Lawyers Association meeting on it, they saw it as just a lever to shake down well meaning companies legally.

None of the above parties were truly interested in helping Blind people or other with disabilites as a whole.  If so, they would have initiitives to be coming up with specific solutions for companies to help be in compliance rather than doing what they did. i.e. black mailing them just to get money or given them a chance to fix it.

This was just a plain theft in the name of a good cause.  And you wonder why companies are moving out of California and America as a whole......

I don't.....

I sell motorcycle gear. My site isn't readable by the blind. I wonder how long it will be before they come after me? Hopefully they will go after Harley Davidson for not building a motorcycle for the blind first.

What in the hell is an alt tag?

Does WEb Pro News have the correct coding to prevent a lawsuit from  the NFB ?

If I'm too lame to solve the CAPTHA math questions who should I sue ?

Why stop at the missing alt tags for the blind?  I say that every rich man in this country sues Walmart for their prices being too cheap.  I'll sue Mcdonalds cuz my wife got fat from their Big Macs.  Lets sue every musician in this country because the deaf people cant hear them.  Or what about suing CompUsa for not properly training me on how to use my computer?  We can sue the perfume manufacturers because those without the sense of smell can't enjoy the aroma.  Lets Sue Mercedes Benz because I can't afford their cars on my meager salary.  We should sue the NFL for not letting me play quarterback.  Or we should sue Calvin Klein because they didn't make me their jeans model this year.  Hell, let's sue the US Government because we can't all be president. 

This is just another classic example of the socialist disease that has crept into our American way of life.  Doesn't anyone in this country remember what freedom is?  Oh yea I forgot, we were too busy feeling left out or inferior.  The American people have gone soft, and we'll suffer the consequences in a big way.  Any person who is defending the NFB shoud have their head examined, And then we can sue the hospital because they didn't make the x-rays in braille.    Wow, I'm sacred for our future. 

E-Commerce businesses are growing fast and more people are heading online to do their shopping & research. I think it’s important that everyone has the ability and opportunity available to them to do so. I don’t agree to the suing part but it definitely sends a message out to all websites to add this to their website usability checklist.

Wow, the ignorance displayed by the users of this site (most of those commenting) really is astounding!

Thats a joke, shouldn't they be asking them to overhall their site, or figuring out a solution. NO they just after the cash!

I couldn't resist this one:

So should art galleries display a braille footnote for each piece of art, explaining what the picture is about?  Otherwise, how could the blind possibly enjoy "looking" at the artwork?

Do guns for sale in stores carry braile labeling?

As a business owner I have rights. One of those rights is to target my wares to a specific demographic.

I would suggest that if I wanted to sell clothing, I would target customers both online and in store, however, I would not waste valuable marketing dollars trying to display my wares online to someone who cannot see. How could they possibly make a proper choice unless my alt tags were miles long? Even if they were, I cannot guarantee to be able to make my product descriptions completely understood by each individual with their own interpretive capabilities. At least in store merchandise can be touched (although this still does not fix blind people's physical deficienies).

I wonder if anyone has thought of suing the NFB for not having a total cure for blindness as I am certain, enough money has been raised over the years to invest in coming up with a cure. Sounds like a ridiculous statement, doesn't it ?  Of course it is. Remember, no guarantees. That said, the lawsuit and the settlement are just as ridiculous.

I guess the same could be said about cancer and the organizations making excessive dollars off of it as well.

I believe rights should be honored in a reasonable way, provided they do not completely detract from the rights of others. After all, who has more right than the next person and why should their rights be more or less important. Compromise is a good thing, but one would have to logically consider the value of the result along with the cost and it's necessity.

What problems we create for each other in this world !  Want a little extra cash? Don't try to make unreasonable claims in an effort to steal it from someone who has worked for it. And yes, people with physical disabilities can argue accessibility all they want. What about arguing that people of average intelligence not having that great job available to them because they are incapable of the intellect required to properly perform the job duties? Is that smart peoples' fault too?

Wake up and smell the coffee people ! ( I know you can as it has been proven that sense of smell is heightened with vision impairment). That's not fair to me by the way; I cannot smell that threat of poisonous gas coming at me as quickly as you can. Should I sue you? After all, my access is impaired moreso than yours.

One more thing. People with little extra cash to spend on the things they want cannot even buy certain merchandise. The high price makes it inaccessible to them. Maybe all the financially impaired poeple should hire that law firm listed in other posts (pro-bono of course) in an effort to form a class action suit against any product being more than a dollar !

Economics, intelligence, strength, demographics, etc etc etc...... All factors of REALITY. Get out your crying towels everyone because all of your tears need to be collected for the greater good of the lawyers (and to strengthen our ability to be stupid)  I can't stand idiocy !

What a bunch of leeches!

It costs nothing to make a web site right in the first place and with a little effort you can dramatically increase your audience and customer base as well as make everyone users experience on your site better and oh yea - probably get better SE rankings.

Shame on some of you for the ridiculously callous and immature statements. Wait until you get older or watch one of your relatives or dear friends become or be born with a handicap.

In case you don’t know almost 10% of the US male population has some for of color blindness. Did you take that into account when you built you sites and your clients’ sites?

How interesting it will be if one of your clients gets sued for this and in turn they sue you for negligence considering this issue has be common knowledge for many years.

Any web master who has any responsibility toward their customers best interest and social responsibility would have been building sites with this in mind for years.

Building a web site that is not accessible is pathetic given that fact there is virtually no extra cost or time involved and will only potentially get you more paying customers.

I am ashamed to be associated with some of you given these comments.

First note,

blindshopping.com EXISTS!!.. Given, it has practically no use to the Legally Blind (Unless of course, you are venetian.)

This has to be a typical example of what lawsuits are becoming, the madness has spread from the US, over the Atlantic and into the UK, some say even Germany suffers from this plague of company-disintegrating locusts.

Real Lawyers have a consistent black mark against their name because of the ambulance chasers of (the fictional) Frick, Ulff, Clott & Kant (thank you, "OMFG") and their real world equivalents.

I'm not a Lawyer, nor am I legally (or otherwise) blind. I do However live in a society where this type of Lawsuit would be immediately thrown out of court and a charge made against the Plaintiff for an innumerable waste of official's time.

If you fall over in the street, If you fall off of a stool in a bar, if you walk out into the road without looking and get run over by a rogue deer crossing. Then start LOOKING where you are going, use the common sense that was generously integrated into your conciousness by God/Evolution/Aliens. And DO NOT attempt to sue said divine entity for not giving you enough......

Live life to the full. If not, the saying "One Third of your life is spent in bed." will soon become "One Third of your life is spent in Bed, One Third in Court and One third looking for things to sue for."

A Happy Canarian with unsmooth Sidewalks.

 

We have whats called a "Stupid Law" that prevents people from suing about stupid things, waisting the courts time for more important things. Ooops, I just spilt my cold cup of coffee in my lap. I better find someone to sue...

WTF!  OMFG!

I have had it with the legal system.  If you can't beat them then join them. 

Lawyers of America UNITE!  Let us all sue every retail company for not having brail labels!

I want brail price tags at every grocery store and every retail store!

I want brail menus at every food chain!

Where are the brail MSRP papers for a new car?  Especially Cadillac or European automakers because I will own a limo from them afterward!  I may not be able to drive, but I will have enough money to buy the damn cars!

We need everything everywhere (where money is involved) to be in brail!  Better yet ... SUE THE GOVERNMENT FOR NOT TEACHING BRAIL IN THE SCHOOLS!  WHO NEEDS VISIBLE LETTERS?  TEACH ALL KIDS TO READ BRAIL AND USE IT AS THE COMMON WRITTEN LANGUAGE FORM!

Call my law firm if you want to be a part of this ... it is Frick, Ulff, Clott & Kant!  We want any and all lawyers that want to be a part of this to join in and we can get the clients later!  Also ... make sure that your company is blind accessible and all documents are written in brail ... we don't want to get sued by some common shmoe that just figured out we could get sued for the same things we are suing Target and others for ....

OMFG!  WTF!