Don’t get me wrong, I’m not against usability. Sites, and more importantly RIAs, need to have a no-nonsense, keep-it-simple approach, which is exactly what I do. But accessibility and usability should not be confused, though they are similar. However, I don’t think doubling your efforts to make your site work without JS is a reasonable or productive way to do this.
People that are colorblind, dyslexic, newbs or just have no idea what they are doing are going to have the same problems without JS as with. The MAIN group of people who have problems with JS are blind users using a screen reader.
But, if you are requiring the user to pay for a subscription for your service or RIA, I don’t believe it is unreasonable to require them to use JavaScript. As I’ve said before, things like Wiki, Google, Target, Yahoo, to name a few, which are made for the general population, without registration, should probably cater to the folks with disabilities.
It is neither productive, beneficial or profitable for me to build my RIA twice (or close to it), for a small fraction of users who can’t use JS. It IS productive, beneficial and profitable for me to build it in a way that makes sense, is clear and understandable, and is easy to use. It just so happens, that JS allows me to do things that make the RIA 10-times easier to use.
It’s like that old saying, “if you can’t take the heat, get out of the kitchen.” If you’re not willing or able to use JavaScript, than my site is not for you.
It’s an approach that has worked very, very well for me for several years, and - as long as it is profitable - I’ll continue to use it.