Are Australia's web developers failing to deliver accessible websites?

In a recent story in ITNews, Accessibility checker surfaces errors, John Hibbert claimed that a new Mental Health website, www.mindhealthconnect.org.au, operated by the National Health Call Centre Network and funded by the Department of Health and Ageing, didn't meet the Australian Government's minimum web standards.

Based on a review using the ACheck tool for the minimum WCAG 2.0 'A' level of compliance, John reported that the checker:

highlighted two known problems, 245 "potential problems", 20 HTML validation errors and 115 cascading style sheet problems on the site.

I tend to always take the results of these tools with a grain of salt. Many of the reported validation errors and style sheet issues are often repeats of one single issue, or are not really issues at all, and the two known problems would take a couple of minutes to fix and do not pose direct accessibility risks at all.

However this article does highlight a concern I've had for several years - whether Web Developers, contracted to produce these sites for government, always have the appropriate skills and knowledge to develop accessible websites.

I've seen this type of issue repeated a number of times. A policy or program area, possibly with support from a central communication or IT area, goes out to tender for a website. Web Developers respond, get assessed and the successful tenderer goes about creating the site.

A few months later the site is complete with days to spare before the Ministerial launch - but fails accessibility testing by the agency.

"We didn't understand how important accessibility was to you" says the Web Developer. Note that I was in the room when these exact words were said to an agency by a reputable web developer regarding a website which was developed iteratively and we'd been giving them feedback about accessibility for a number of weeks.

So what happens next?

If accessibility was not explicit mentioned in the contract, the Web Developer asks for more cash to meet the requirement, even though it is a baseline requirement for all government websites across Australia, and says it won't be ready for launch.

If an accessibility level was explicitly agreed to in the contract, the Web Developer grudgingly assigns a junior developer to 'sort it out' - with a vague promise that it will be done in a few weeks or months.

The agency is left having to launch a website which doesn't meet the minimum and fix it as soon as possible afterwards - all because the Web Developer didn't recognise and act on the legal requirement for accessibility.

Of course there's many examples where Web Developers have done exceptional accessibility work for agencies, however I have seen and heard too many issues where professional Web Developers didn't understand the accessibility requirements of governments.

Delivering an inaccessible website to a government agency will cause that agency to break the law and expose it to enormous risks of legal damages. No vendor should ever put their client in this type of position knowingly, particularly where it is so easily avoidable.

My view is that any Web Developer that doesn't deliver a government website to at least the minimum accessible standards (unless otherwise explicitly agreed to by the agency in question) should not receive any payment until they have addressed all accessibility issues.

They should also lose their right to bid for other government business until they can prove they have fully trained their staff on accessible web design.

These may be harsh and strong measures, and I doubt they will be considered due to contractual and practical issues.

However if a vendor contracted to sell a government agency a car that turned out to not be street legal or rent them a building that turned out to not meet the building code, government would walk away without paying and ask for damages, plus be very cautious about working with that vendor again.

Why should it be any different with illegal websites?

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Australian government Twitter list expanded to 553 accounts

I've been working away in my (copious) spare time to update the list of Australian government Twitter accounts - representing all levels of government.

It has now reached 553 accounts - which has also forced me to start a new Twitter list due to their 500 follower limit.

You can view the spreadsheet embedded below, or access it at: http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0Ap1exl80wB8OdHNKVmQ5RVlvQWpibDAxNHkzcU1nV2c&hl=en

You can subscribe to the listed australian government accounts using my Twitter lists:
Australian-gov-tweets (500 accounts)
Australian-gov-tweets2 (my new 'overflow' list)

I haven't yet created by level or by state lists yet - but will do so when I have time.

If you're aware of any Australian government Twitter accounts I've missed, or if your agency starts a new account, please update the list directly, or let me know so I can update it (my main issue in maintaining the list's currency is that government agencies are poor at telling people about their new social media accounts).

Please look at the Stats and By population tabs in the spreadsheet for the list to see how many accounts there are by category, state and government level, how long the average Twitter account name is, when accounts were started and the most popular months for starting accounts, plus the ratio of Twitter accounts to population at state and national levels.

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What should agencies do when social media channels close down?

Last week I received the following email:

Dear Hashable Users,

We regret to inform you that the Hashable mobile apps and Hashable.com will be shutting down on July 25th. The service will be unavailable after this date.

While we are still very passionate about making better connections and meeting new people, the time has come for us to focus our energy elsewhere.  

Some of you have stored valuable information in Hashable, and we want to give you the opportunity to save that data for your own records.  If you’d like to receive a file with your complete history, please log onto Hashable.com, navigate to the "Profile" tab, then to the “Your History” section on that page. You can download the file by clicking “Export full history to .csv” and accepting the dialog that pops up.

We are incredibly grateful for all the people we have met through Hashable.   Thank you for all your support, and we hope to connect with you again in the future. 

All the best,

The Hashable Team

It made me think about the situation that faces organisations when the social media tools they use close down.

How does the organisation tell people interacting with them via the service? Where will they move the community to? Can they extract and reuse any data they or their community have entered into the service? Who else will be able to access and reuse this data?

With the thousands of social media tools that now exist it is inevitable that a proportion of them will close down. In fact I've been surprised at how few have done so - largely because of the low cost of keeping them running.

Where agencies are using these services, what is their recourse? It's hard to hold a company to a service level, or sue, if you're paying next to nothing for access and the service is domiciled in another country with no local presence.


The key is to prepare and risk-manage before beginning to use these types of services.

Define why and how you'll use a social media service, what data you will be providing into the service and what data you wish to collect (and in what timeframes and formats).

Ensure you've carefully scrutinised the privacy policy and terms of use, both for your sake and for your audience - you may have an obligation to point out differences between your privacy policy and the policy of the service.

Check that the service allows you to extract your data if necessary and, if required, also confirm whether you can delete your account and purge all data.

Devise written exit plans for likely future scenarios. These should, at minimum, include:

• The social media service closing down in an orderly fashion,
• the social media service closing down suddenly and unexpectedly (for a short time or permanently),
• the social media service being bought and integrated into the offering of another company, or
• your program ending and needing to be closed down, even when the social media services you are using are still going strong.

These plans provide a framework to help you, your management and your successors to manage any shut-down in a measured way. They also form part of your governance and risk-mitigation strategy.

It's also important to put in place a regular back-up and review strategy. Back-up data from your account by downloading it every month (or if the service doesn't support this, reconsider if you're happy using it).

Also periodically review whether your stated purpose for using the service still reflects how you, and your audience are using it, and whether you need to adjust your approach or your data management policies. This review should include checking whether the service's privacy policy or terms of use have changed - avoiding the risk of the 'slippery slope' where you create your agency's account under a strict privacy policy, but find that your rights have eroded over time.

Together with the above, keep an eye on emerging services that might build on the tools you already use. I don't recommend switching horses regularly, however if a social media service important to you and your stakeholders is closing, knowing where you can move the community to maintain the conversation is important to have at hand.

As is often quoted, failing to plan means you're planning to fail.

This is as true for social media as for any other channel or project. So prepare yourself for the future by planning and keep a watchful eye on the services you use and how and why you're using them.

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Transforming public engagement though social media (almost live from Singapore)

This morning I presented at the Reading Room Digital Conversations forum to a group of Singaporean government officials on the topic of Transforming public engagement through social media.

I talked through how connected Australia had become, and pointed out that the goals of public engagement have not really changed (using the IAP2 model to illustrate), only our tools.

My presentation then went through a range of different engagement examples across the IAP2 spectrum, from Inform to Empower, and then pointed out that governments weren't necessarily the driving force behind Gov 2.0 - illustrating several Gov 2.0 initiatives created outside of government.

I concluded with Zombies (as all good presentations do) - demonstrating how governments can be more playful without being unprofessional, using popular culture and memes to stimulate public engagement with hard to reach audiences.


I've embedded my presentation below - enjoy!

View more presentations from Craig Thomler.

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Guest post: Public engagement: more customer service than comms

Today I'm featuring a guest post from Pia Waugh, former IT Advisor to Senator Lundy, convenor of the recent Canberra GovCamp and GovHack and one of the luminaries of the Australian Gov 2.0 scene.

As she plans to continue to update this post, for the latest version visit her blog at http://pipka.org/public-engagement-more-customer-service-than-comms/

Public engagement: more customer service than comms

I’ve been involved in online communities for many years. I’ve seen and been in projects that span every possible traditional barrier to collaboration (location, culture, language, politics, religion, gender, etc, etc). This experience combined with my time in government has given me some useful insights about the key elements that make for a constructive online community.

What I came to learn was the art and craft of community development and management. This skill is common in the technology world, particularly in large successful open source projects where projects either evolve to have good social infrastructure or they fail. There are of course a few exceptions to the rule where bad behaviour is part of the culture of a project, but by and large, a project that is socially inclusive and that empowers individuals to contribute meaningfully will do better than one that is not.

It turns out these skills are not as widespread as I expected. This is problematic as we are now seeing a horde of “social media experts” who often give shallow and unsustainable advice to government and companies alike, advice that is not rooted in the principles of community engagement.

The fact is that social media tools are part of a broader story. A story that sees “traditional” communications turned upside down. The skills to best navigate this space and have a meaningful outcome are not based in the outdated premise that a media office is the single source of communications due to the media being the primary mechanism to get information out to the general public. There will continue to be, I believe, a part for the media to play (we could all use professional analysis and unbiased news coverage, please). However, as governments in particular, we will have a far more meaningful and mutually beneficial relationship with citizens where we genuinely and directly engage with them on matters of policy, service delivery, democratic participation and ways that government can facilitate public and private innovation.

You might be lucky and have some media people who have adapted well to the new world order, but any social media strategy limited to the media office will have limitations in delivery that starts to chafe after a while.

It is when you get your customer service and policy people engaged online that you will start to see genuine engagement, genuine community building and the possibility to leverage crowdsourcing. It is when you start to get people skilled in community engagement involved to work alongside your media people and in collaboration with the broader organisation that you will be able to best identify sustainable and constructive ways your organisation can apply social media, or indeed, whatever comes next.

Below are some vital skills I would recommend you identify, hire or upskill in your organisation. Outsourcing can be useful but ideally, to do this stuff well, you need the skills within your organisation. Your own people who know the domain space and can engage with imprimatur on behalf of your organisation.

I’ll continue to build this post up as I have time, and would love your feedback

Herding Cats

In my time in online communities I came to understand the subtleties in what we in the geek world refer to as “herding cats”. That is, working with a large number of individuals who have each their own itch to scratch, skills, interests and indeed, vices. Individuals who have a lot to contribute and are motivated for myriad reasons to get involved.

I learnt how to get the best out of people by creating a compelling narrative, having a meaningful goal, uniting people over what we have in common rather than squabbling over what is different.

Herding cats is about genuinely wanting people to get involved, recognising you can’t “control” the conversation or outcomes, but you can encourage a constructive dialogue. Herding cats ends up being about leadership, building respect, being an active part of a live conversation, setting and encouraging a constructive tone, managing community expectations and being a constant presence that people can turn to and rely upon. Cat herding is about building community.

Finally, herding cats is about managing trolls in a constructive way. Sometimes trolls are just passionate people who have been burnt and feel frustrated. They can sometimes become your greatest contributors because they often care about the topic. If you always engage with trolls in a helpful and constructive way, you won’t miss the opportunities to connect with those who genuinely have something meaningful to contribute.

Community and Topic Research

You need to know the communities of interest. The thought leaders, where they are having their discussions, what one-to-many points (technical, social, events) can you tap into to encourage participation and to get your finger on the pulse of what the community really thinks. Community research is about knowing a little about the history and context of the communities involved, about the right (and wrong) language, about if and how they have engaged before and getting the information you need to build a community of interest.

Topic research means your community engagement person needs to know enough about the domain area to be able to engage intelligently with communities of interest. Your organisation is effectively represented by these people so you need them to be smart, informed, genuine, socially and emotionally intelligent, “customer service” oriented and able to say when they don’t know, but be able to follow it up.

Collaboration & Co-design

This skillset is about intuitively trying to include others in a process. Trying to connect the dots on communities, perspectives, skills and interests to draw people from industry, academia and any other relevant groups into the co-design of your project. By getting knowledgable, clever and connected people in the tent, you achieve both a better plan and a community of (possible influential) people who will hopefully want to see your initiative succeed. Co-design isn’t just about creating something and asking people’s opinion, but engaging them in the process of developing the idea in the first place.

A little thanks goes a long way. By publicly recognising the efforts of contributors you also encourage them to continue to contribute but whatever you are engaging on needs to be meaningful, and have tangible outcomes people can see and get behind.

Real outcomes of your online engagement are key in managing public expectations.

Monitoring, Analysis & Feedback Mechanisms

It is vital that you have internally the skills to monitor what is happening online, analyse both the content generated and the context around the content created (the community, individuals, location, related news, basically all the metadata that helps you understand what the data means).

By constantly monitoring and analysing, you should be able to identify iterative improvements to your online engagement strategy, your project, policy or “product”. Most people focus on one of these three (usually the latest toy with pretty but meaningless graphs spruiked by some slick salesperson), but it is by turning the data into knowledge and finally into actions or iterative improvements that you will be able to respond in a timely and appropriate manner to new opportunities and challenges.

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