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Change Proposal for not including longdesc=""
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Summary
The longdesc="" attribute does not improve accessibility in practice and should not be included in the language.
Rationale
Several studies (listed in the references) have been performed. They have shown that:
- longdesc is extremely rarely used (on the order of 0.1% in one study). [1]
- when used, longdesc is extremely rarely used correctly (on the order of 1% in a study that only excluded obvious errors; below the threshold of statistical significance on one that examined each longdesc="" by hand). [1] [2]
- AT users don't know that longdesc="" exists. [3]
- most users (more than 90%) don't want the interaction model that longdesc="" implies. [4]
Details
No change to the spec.
Impact
Positive Effects
- Stops authors from spending time trying to use a feature that they don't understand and that users don't want.
- Encourages authors to include suitable information in an alternative form that is more likely to be accurate.
- Results in better overall accessibility on the long term.
Negative Effects
- ?
Conformance Classes Changes
No change to spec.
Risks
- ?