Museum of Art Fort Lauderdale (MOAFL) : Website accessibility:

It is important for websites to be available to all. Just as it can be easy to assume that everyone is seeing your website using the same device, platform and browser as you are, with the same default and selected settings, it can also be easy to assume that all users are alike. Websites should be accessible as possible to people with handicaps - those with visual or physical handicaps have the most difficulty with badly-designed websites.

In fact, Americans with disabilities spend twice as much time online as those without. Handicaps range from mild (such as color-blindness, which affects 12% of males and greatly affects web design decisions) to severe (such as the physically handicapped who cannot use a mouse to browse the web). Chances are that these people - who range from children and teenagers to baby boomers and the elderly - are still your potential viewers.

In the early days of the web, accessibility was an issue primarily because of the handicapped and this is still extremely important. However, with the increase in wireless availability many people are choosing to use the web without images if, for example, the signal is weak in their hotel room, yacht or airport.

When Tangled Spider Design Group built the website for MOAFL, a secondary, text-only website was created at the same time. The good hit rate of this section showed how much it was appreciated by site users.


Notice how the website works for people who are visually handicapped and who are using a screenreader. A screenreader literally reads out the text on a webpage. You will see that the screenshot above has the initial copy 'skip navigation'. When the user clicks on this, they are taken directly to the copy so that the devise will not read out the navigation links on every page.

An accessible website also makes good business sense. Barriers to websites restrict access to information for over *550 million people with disabilities worldwide, representing over *$176 billion in discretionary income.

* Figures correct at the time of writing.

Full graphics website :
Branding : Advertising : Website : Print : Signage : Exhibition Branding : Exhibition banners : Email marketing :