The National Federation of the Blind (NFB) recently held its annual convention virtually. One of their sponsorships was a company that provides a supposed drop-in solution for screen-reader accessibility. The solution is being widely adopted and does a very poor job fixing all but the most basic and predictable accessibility fails--and it discourages big companies from doing real work to make their products better and promote accessibility as part of their culture. There have been attempts by various accessibility professionals to engage the company, but their concerns were all dismissed and the company continues to make claims that simply are not true. The NFB investigated the company and its product, decided both it and its marketing were harmful to blind people and revoked the sponsorship.My point--and I may be spitballing a bit here, but I think it's valid--is that CSUN made the choice to take money from a company that didn't do any real accessibility work. That reflects badly on CSUN just as much as it does anyone else, and from what I know of CSUN, a company like the one you're describing shouldn't have ever been represented.
mwcampbell|4 years ago
https://nfb.org/about-us/press-room/national-convention-spon...
I was unaware of this particular incident, but AccessiBe has had a bad reputation in the blind community for several months at least. Incidentally, I helped develop a browser extension to block AccessiBe and similar "accessibility overlays".
mst|4 years ago
"But why did you do that?" "We'll display your logo to the same level of comprehensibility as your software provides to our users. Feel free to get back to us as it improves."