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Hope You Don't Need any Old Manuals Online


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Just talked to the owner of a company whose web site has thousands of user manuals, service manuals, videos, technical papers, and more online, most of it from decades ago. It's being hosted as a public service, no one has to pay to access.

 

Now it's being threatened with a class-action suit from some lawyer because the material isn't ADA-compliant. WTF? Sure, whenever possible, it's important to eliminate additional barriers to people already facing barriers. On my web site, which was started after the ADA became law, I do what I can - alt text, large/high-contrast images, etc.

 

But the company has two choices: Spend all their resources trying to get everything ADA-compliant, and probably go out of business, or just say "screw it" and take everything down. Who benefits from that? Either people lose their jobs and/or the majority of the population loses access to a valuable resource, and neither option does anything to help people with disabilities.

 

If I was a judge and that case came before me, I'd do three things:

 

1. Chastise the attorney for trying to exploit a well-intentioned law for personal gain.

2. Tell the company that going forward, to make their very best efforts for ADA compatibility, but they're off the hook for archived material.

3. Award zero damages, and move on to the next case.

 

Seriously...WTF?

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I can't understand what the motive behind this would be or why some old PDF files would even qualify as an issue?

 

Maybe it's because the lawyer is late on the payment for an Audi. Or maybe he owes alimony to a former trophy wife.

 

The basic idea in most of these kinds of situations is you find a target with deep pockets, come up with some reason to launch a lawsuit, and hope the defendant will offer a settlement so you'll go away. I certainly don't recall any mass protests from people with disabilities, claiming damages and demanding justice, because they couldn't find a machine-readable service manual for a 1978 JVC camcorder..

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Maybe it's because the lawyer is late on the payment for an Audi. Or maybe he owes alimony to a former trophy wife..

 

As a skeptical person with a measurable skepticism enhanced by a humorous but frightening (but justifiable! :)) sense of humor, this is congruent with some of my blips.

It took a chunk of my life to get here and I am still not sure where "here" is.
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What on earth? Good to know though when I get the archive site up and running.

Yamaha: Motif XF8, MODX7, YS200, CVP-305, CLP-130, YPG-235, PSR-295, PSS-470 | Roland: Fantom 7, JV-1000

Kurzweil: PC3-76, PC4 (88) | Hammond: SK Pro 73 | Korg: Triton LE 76, N1R, X5DR | Emu: Proteus/1 | Casio: CT-370 | Novation: Launchkey 37 MK3 | Technics: WSA1R

Former: Emu Proformance Plus & Mo'Phatt, Korg Krome 61, Roland Fantom XR & JV-1010, Yamaha MX61, Behringer CAT

Assorted electric & acoustic guitars and electric basses | Roland TD-17 KVX | Alesis SamplePad Pro | Assorted organs, accordions, other instruments

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In my view/opinion there are certain ideas whose time have come. I'd say end of life humanely assisted suicide, composting as an option for our dead carcass, and replacing our arcane and archaic legal justice system with some sort of algorithmic replacement. Get rid of the highly educated good old boy system.

 

I think you may have stumbled on the ultimate application for machine learning and artificial intelligence!

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I don't know what this ADA law is, but I do know that the US Constitution explicitly forbids ex post facto laws, in other words it is illegal to create any punitive law that applies retroactively. I'd tell that lawyer to shove it.

 

That was what I thought, except unfortunatley, ex post facto refers specifically to activities that were legal before a law was passed, and thereafter, became illegal. The ADA was signed into law in 1990, so anything posted in the last 31 years would not be covered under ex post facto, because it happened after the activity was considered illegal.

 

If you want to know more, I found this web site that goes into some detail about what it takes to be ADA compliant. However, the whole topic appears to be somewhat of a moving target. As that page points out, "A number of courts have ruled that commercial websites are places of public accommodation and are thus subject to ADA rules. However, uncertainty remains concerning business"s legal obligations to bring their websites into following ADA compliant website requirements."

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As you stated... WTF?

 

However...I do still have at least some faith in the legal system. When a judge is presented with "okay, we'll just get rid of all this so no one can have it, and that way we don't go bankrupt," I can't imagine any judge worth his/her salt not saying "Look, it hasn't been that well-defined, so just do your best going forward." Also, judges are becoming increasingly punitive regarding frivolous lawsuits and patent trolls, so that might be a factor.

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Hmmm...if the operating system has accessibility/readability capabilities, and the pdf software also has the same, perhaps a case for "no demonstrable hindrance" or something (I just made that up :) could be made.

 

Also - isn't every library in existence therefore also in non-compliance?

 

Maybe the social-warrior/opportunist attorney will only pick a few pockets before losing in court? The case for non-compliance feels thinnish to me - but this ain't nothing I know anything about, really.

 

nat

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