Re: [MACCAWS] Bobby gets mean and stingy

Tim Beadle <[email protected]> wrote:
> On Thursday 03 Oct 2002 10:48 pm, Tony Crockford wrote:
>> So, how do we set up an alternative?
> Just found this:
> http://www.joeclark.org/accessiblog/ab-testing.html

There's no forever-free alternative there, is there?  Standards are too
important to be left to unauditable commercial verification tools.  "If you
want to make your site comply with this standard, you have to buy one of
these tools and believe its publisher that it works correctly" is *not* a
good sales pitch, IMO.

Taking a look at A-Prompt... do Canadians really use "Insuring" there?  We'd
use "Ensuring" in the UK, I think.  lang="en" indeed ;-)

In other news, my exploratory work is complete.  Sorry it took so long, but
this stuff gets slotted in around other work.  Then again, from list
traffic, it looks like hardly anyone on the MACCAWS list is interested in a
forever-free accessibility testing tool.  Is that right?  If so, I'll send
further details off-list to the few interested people who have emailed me. 
The bottom line: even working at a *very* discounted rate, the US$1000 first
guess was depressingly accurate. :-(

People contributing to the tool will be listed on the credits screen, as
sponsors (if you pay) or contributors (if you help test or develop), or
both.  I'm also investigating other possible funding sources, including the
UK Association For Free Software and the Royal National Institute for the
Blind.  Any other suggestions for who to approach would be welcomed.

For "retail" sales, I'm looking at e-gold as a good way to be able to hold
money from MACCAWS members and others until the target is released, while
being able to return it if we don't reach the target.  Handling credit cards
from the UK will incur too much loss through currency conversions if we have
to return money.  I'd like to be an optimist and go ahead anyway, assuming
that we will meet the target, but I have to cover our backs.

Our local Paypal-like system, NOCHEX, has just introduced a silly "99 pound
max balance" rule and they were restrictive at handling non-UK payments
anyway.  Does anyone have experience with e-gold that they can share, or
recommendations for other electronic payment systems?

Thanks for your time and advice.

MJR