What's the Web Like If You Can't See It?
Chieko Asakawa · 2005 · Proceedings of the 2005 International Cross-Disciplinary Workshop on Web Accessibility (W4A) · doi:10.1145/1061811.1061813
Summary
This landmark paper by Chieko Asakawa of IBM Japan traces the evolution of non-visual web access from the early 1990s through 2005, drawing extensively on the author's own experience as a blind researcher and developer. Asakawa chronicles the development of voice browsing technology, from early text-based access via Lynx and BBS services to the creation of IBM's Home Page Reader (HPR), the first standalone self-talking web browser designed to give blind users an intuitive browsing experience comparable to what sighted users enjoyed. The paper documents a shift in how screen readers worked: rather than simply reading displayed text left-to-right (which broke down with tables, frames, and forms), HPR analyzed HTML tags to present content logically and structurally, synchronizing with Netscape Navigator to handle plugins. Asakawa then examines the state of web accessibility compliance across real-world sites, using longitudinal data from 11 websites tracked over nine years (1997-2005). She analyzes two critical accessibility features — alternative text for images and skip-navigation links — to assess whether the growing awareness driven by WCAG 1.0 and Section 508 was translating into genuinely usable pages. The paper also introduces IBM's aDesigner tool, a disability simulator that visualizes reaching time across a page using color gradation, allowing sighted developers to understand the non-visual browsing experience without needing to learn assistive technology.
Key findings
The longitudinal analysis revealed that while the number of images per page quadrupled between 1997 and 2005, the ratio of images missing alternative text dropped dramatically — from 38% in 2000 to just 7% in 2005. Section 508's enactment in 2001 had a measurable impact, with all five tested federal agency sites achieving full alt text coverage that year. Skip-navigation links also increased, with eight of twelve major news sites providing them by 2005, up from just two in 2004. However, Asakawa found significant quality problems: 5-6% of skip-navigation links on accessibility-conscious sites were broken due to missing destination anchors, anchor name mismatches, missing hash symbols, or missing readable link text. Many alt texts were inappropriate — descriptions like 'spacer gif', 'shadow', or 'click here' that technically satisfied compliance checks but actively interfered with blind users' browsing. The average time to reach main content on news sites dropped significantly between 2004 and 2005 as sites adopted heading tags and skip links, with some sites improving from over 160 seconds to under 20 seconds.
Relevance
This paper established a foundational argument that remains central to accessibility practice today: compliance alone does not equal usability. Asakawa's distinction between pages that pass automated checks and pages that are genuinely usable by disabled people anticipated debates that continue two decades later as organizations chase WCAG conformance without user testing. Her advocacy for 'disability experience' — having developers use assistive technology to understand the impact of their design choices — prefigured modern practices like screen reader testing in QA workflows. The aDesigner reaching-time visualization concept influenced subsequent accessibility evaluation tools. For practitioners, the paper's catalog of broken skip-navigation patterns and inappropriate alt text remains a practical reference for common mistakes that automated tools miss.
Tags: screen readers · voice browsers · alternative text · skip navigation · blindness · non-visual web access · disability simulation · web accessibility evaluation · compliance versus usability
Standards referenced: WCAG 1.0 · Section 508