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The Justice Department announced the release of its “Section 508 report to the President and Congress: “Accessibility of Federal Electronic and Information Technology.” The report provides findings based on a survey of federal agencies on the accessibility of their electronic and information technology (EIT) and the procedures used to implement the requirements of Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973.

Section 508 requires federal agencies to ensure that their EIT is accessible to people with disabilities, unless certain exceptions apply. EIT includes telecommunications products (such as telephones), information kiosks and transaction machines, websites, multimedia and office equipment, such as copiers and fax machines, computers, software, firmware and similar products and services. Specifically, Section 508 requires federal agencies to ensure that EIT they develop, procure, maintain, or use allows employees with disabilities and members of the public seeking information or services to have access to and use of information and data that is comparable to that available to people who do not have disabilities. Section 508 also requires the attorney general to report and offer recommendations periodically on the state of federal agency compliance with Section 508, including actions regarding individual complaints.

The report finds that most agency components have general Section 508 policies (over 50 percent), as well as Section 508 Coordinators (nearly 70 percent). Most components (over 90 percent) incorporate Section 508 requirements into their procurements for EIT in some way. Few agencies have received Section 508 complaints. Most components (70 percent) have accessibility policies in place for websites and a majority (nearly 58 percent) perform some type of evaluation and remediation on their websites. Agencies reported facing challenges in ensuring accessibility of software or multimedia they develop, in providing training and support for all staff who need information about Section 508 compliance, and in identifying specific Section 508 requirements, as opposed to general standardized language, to be incorporated in their procurements. They also face challenges ensuring their testing of products and websites is complete and robust.
The report recommends, among other things, that agencies establish and publish Section 508 and web accessibility policies and procedures, appoint Section 508 Coordinators and establish Section 508 programs, provide more Section 508 training to personnel, ensure accessibility of EIT used in federally funded programs, develop procurement policies and specific solicitation language for Section 508 requirements, perform accessibility testing of EIT products and web pages, establish specific Section 508 complaint processes including alternative dispute resolution, and improve inter-agency coordination on Section 508 compliance.

Local advertising by retailers will grow their online share of marketing -- as well as on TV, radio and local cable by 2016 -- while direct response and newspaper budgets will continue to decline.

BIA/Kelsey says retailers will spend $4.2 billion this year in online marketing -- including mobile -- a 13% share out of an estimated $26.8 billion in all local TV advertising spent by retailers. This will climb to a 16% share in three years. Local TV broadcast's share will rise to 8.4% from 7.9% in 2013 for retailers; radio going to 10.8% from 10.2%; and local cable TV, to 2.6% from 2.5%; and out-of-home, 2.9% from 2.6%. Mobile advertising will more than double to 2.1% share from 1% by the end of 2013.

[Commentary] What's wrong with nipping a nefarious scheme in the bud, especially if the result is that Amazon.com, which was the supposed target of the alleged conspiracy, is liberated to resume selling e-books to you at the rock-bottom price of $9.99? Plenty, if that price is designed to drive off all of Amazon's e-book competition — and kill off the last remaining brick-and-mortar bookstores too — so it can set its own prices as it wishes down the line.

Technology is confronting publishers with plenty of tsoris. Finding an audience for unfamiliar new literary voices is immeasurably harder online than in the aisles of a physical bookstore. People may read more after buying a Kindle, but buyers of the iPad and the multimedia Kindle Fire may not. Games, video, Facebook, Twitter, all compete with books for the customer's attention. The last thing publishing needed was to compound all that with the resurgent threat of a single domineering retail behemoth. Yet with this settlement, that's what they're getting.

The House Commerce Committee’s Subcommittee on Commerce, Manufacturing, and Trade examined how to maintain job growth in the mobile app market and create a supportive environment for mobile app developers to flourish.

At the hearing, subcommittee chairwoman Rep. Mary Bono Mack (R-CA) noted that the booming mobile app marketplace has helped spur the launch of several new small businesses. She said that roughly one-third of apps are developed by entrepreneurs or businesses with fewer than five employees. "Through American innovation and ingenuity, we're rapidly becoming a world where there's literally an app for everything," she said. During the hearing, lawmakers heard time and again from industry representatives on the witness panel that mobile app companies -- both large and small -- struggle to recruit workers with the skill set needed to fill their open developer positions.