Just as curbcuts enable persons using wheelchairs to navigate a city, electronic curbcuts enable persons with hearing, visual and learning disabilities to navigate your web page. For example, a person with a hearing disability cannot hear a video clip if it is not captioned. Similarly, a person with visual and learning disabilities cannot navigate a web page incompatible with text browsers and screen readers.
Graphics are inaccessible to text browsers and screen readers which audibly read web site text.
For this reason it can be incredibly frustrating to know there is an image or a link but not to be able to obtain any information on what it is. There are many different ways to make a website accessible to people with disabilities, who may use special software or equipment to operate their computers and access the Internet. A problem with some of the currently available guidelines on website accessibility is that they rely on additions and extensions to HTML that have not yet been implemented, or might only apply to people with a particular disability, such as a visual impairment or motor control difficulties, and thus bring up access issues for people with other disabilities. The ideal accessible web site is one which any user can visit, whether or not he or she has a disability. Thus, when one designs a website for accessibility, one must still consider other basic design principles such as organization, balance, and readibility.