WAI Interest Group (WAI IG)

Introduction

The Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) Interest Group (IG) promotes awareness of, and engagement in, accessibility work throughout the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). More details are in About WAI IG below.

Other Interest Group Pages:

• Charter
• Discussion E-mail List Archives
• Announcements E-mail List Archives

Mailing Lists

There are two mailing lists:

1. Announcements list (public-wai-announce) — for WAI announcements only.
2. Discussion list (w3c-wai-ig) — for WAI announcements and public discussion. All e-mails sent to the Announcements list will also go to this Discussion list, so you don’t need to subscribe to both lists. If you want to send messages to the list, you must send them from an e-mail address that is subscribed to the list.

Details are below.

Announcements List - Subscribing and Unsubscribing

• To subscribe, send e-mail to public-wai-announce-request@w3.org with subject: “subscribe”.
• To unsubscribe, send e-mail to public-wai-announce-request@w3.org with subject: “unsubscribe”.

You can also see the Announcements List Archives.

Using the Discussion List

Discussion List Archives are useful for searching for past messages and getting a feel for the list.

• E-mail messages should contribute to a comfortable, constructive exchange of ideas to advance web accessibility. Before you send an e-mail, think about how it will come across to the people around the world who are on the list and who can read your publicly-archived message.
  • Be respectful. Be positive. Be open to different perspectives.
  • Provide constructive information. Focus on developing potential solutions, rather than just complaining.
  • Focus on ideas, not participants. Avoid personal attacks, naming calling, and such.
  • Explain the issue clearly. Provide sufficient background information.
  • See additional guidancce in W3C’s Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct: Positive Work Environment at W3C: Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct
• Make sure e-mails are related web accessibility and are appropriate for the WAI IG list.
  • If you have questions about whether or not a message is appropriate for the WAI IG list, contact Shawn.
  • When your comments are not useful for the entire list, reply off-list — that is, reply directly to the sender and do not send the message to the list.
  • No soliciting.
• Formatting messages:
  • Use a Subject line that describes the topic well. If you change topics, change the Subject. This is usually handled as follows:
    New Topic XYZ [was: Old Topic]
  • Keep your reply comments near the top of a message, and only quote essential parts of a previous message at the top — so there are few quote markings for readers to wade through.
  • If you use a vacation auto-responder, exclude responses to mail with w3c-wai-ig@w3.org in any header.
    
• Send any questions about the WAI IG mailing list to shawn@w3.org, not to the whole list.

Subscribing and Unsubscribing to the Discussion List

• To subscribe to the list, send e-mail to w3c-wai-ig-request@w3.org with subject: “subscribe”.
• To unsubscribe from the list, send e-mail to w3c-wai-ig-request@w3.org with subject: “unsubscribe”.

Please note: The subscription e-mail addresses are different from the e-mail address to send an e-mail message, which is in the next section.

To subscribe to the email digest with compiled messages, send e-mail to w3c-wai-ig-d-request@w3.org with “subscribe” as the subject. To unsubscribe from the digest, send e-mail to w3c-wai-ig-d-request@w3.org with “unsubscribe” as the subject.

Sending Messages to the Discussion List

To send a message to the list, first subscribe to the list (instructions above), then send your message to w3c-wai-ig@w3.org

The first time you send a message to a public W3C mailing list, you will get a reply e-mail asking if you will give permission for your message to be distributed to the list and thus go into the public archive. There is an option to do this once and then you don’t have to do it again in the future.

About WAI IG

The mission of the WAI Interest Group (WAI IG) is to provide a forum for reviewing, discussing, and providing input into deliverables being developed by WAI Working Groups, including accessibility aspects of specification reviews, research topics identified during accessibility reviews, and educational materials development; also for exploring web accessibility issues and solutions, and sharing information about web accessibility activities around the world.
The scope of the WAI IG includes:

• reviewing and discussing deliverables being developed by WAI Working Groups
• providing input into specification reviews, research topics, and educational materials development
• exploring web accessibility issues and solutions
• sharing information and exchanging ideas about web accessibility activities around the world.
  

Work of the WAI IG is in accordance with the W3C Process. WAI IG work is funded in part by the WAI-Core Project and WAI Sponsors.

Chair and Contacts

• The WAI IG Chair is Ashley Abaragu (Knowbility)
• The W3C Staff Contact is Shawn Lawton Henry

Charter

• WAI IG Charter

Past WAI IG Meetings

• March 19, 2005, Los Angeles, California, USA
• March 19, 2004, Los Angeles, California, USA
• March 22, 2003, Los Angeles, California, USA
• March 25, 2002, Los Angeles, California, USA
• November 14, 2001, Melbourne, Australia
• March 24, 2001, Los Angeles, California, USA
• March 25, 2000, Los Angeles, California, USA
• July 19, 1999, Sophia, France
• May 15 1999, Toronto Canada
• March 20, 1999
• July, 1998, Peterborough, UK
• April, 1998, Brisbane, Australia
• March, 1998, Los Angeles, California, USA
• November, 1997, Austin, Texas, USA
• August, 1997, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
• May, 1997, Nice, France