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Disability Pride month and yeah, it’s me again. That one guy who will not shut the fuck up about alt text. I honestly wouldn’t do it if more people just went to their settings and made alt text required. A lot of people haven’t and it’s easy to tell because the pictures ain’t got alt. Go flick it on

Pardon me if you’ve already seen this. For anyone struggling with how to write alt-text effectively, this advice is helpful. cloudfour.com/thinks/write...

Write Alt Text Like You’re Talking To A Friendcloudfour.com “There was this dog wearing safety glasses, surrounded by chemistry equipment, saying ‘I have no idea what I’m doing.’”

I loved reading this! Helpful and thoughtfully written. 10/10!

And alt text can be fun!

This is a good point! I used to think I had to be didactic with my alt text, but then thought about the way I use images. There’s already a cultural shorthand for images, letting the alt text reflect that intention expands access to cultural communication.

These guys are my alt-text inspiration

Tweet by @USCPSCtwitter.com “Mission Possible. Report. Search. Protect. https://t.co/qFWdMF6Xk0”

And the dude who makes these is here! @josephgalbo.bsky.social - give him a follow

Fr they are genii

Yes - if there's a certain vibe, I try to capture it in the alt text. Is the image clearly trying to evoke dark and gritty? Silly? "Even though the subject matter is not erotic I need to emphasize that the setup of the photo IS definitely meant to evoke eroticism."

I've decide on mischief. What is the handsome boy's name? He's perfect!

Miggy!

What a great name! Give Miggy a chin scratch for me.

I deleted a post today because I forgot to do the alt text. Then I reposted it with the alt text. You're a good influence.

You’re a good influence on your followers.

Thank you. That means a lot to me.

So happy that I turned it on. But I do yell at it sometimes when I forget lol. It’s great how it won’t let you post.

Yes! I routinely include alt text but on the rare occasion I forget, this setting has made sure I include it

I keep forgetting I turned it on and smiling when I realize I have it on :3

😇😇😇.

plus it helps me be more creative with my descriptions of things, so like... it's a win win

This is disability pride ☺️ (People are always asking me what that means. Instead of trying to define it, I like to point it out 🤟🏻)

Wheels up. ♿️♿️♿️

As a fellow disabled person, fully agreed ^^

My trick for alt text when posting from my phone: someone once said "think of describing the picture to someone over the phone", and with text-to-speech, you can do exactly that.

this feature rules I wish it was a default requirement. I'm glad I was immediately prompted to switch it on the first time I tried to post a photo, putting these features front and centre helps a lot.

agreed. also, mine toggled off randomly? i set it back to "required" but: odd

You have to do it for each client. So if you switch between app and mobile and desktop you have to turn it on each place.

oh! thank you <3

I didn’t realize it was opt-in until this skeet! I changed my settings. I still wish this were editable after the fact though.

Don’t we all.

Thank you for spreading the awareness, I’m new to Bluesky and I didn’t know this feature existed. Instantly enabled.

This is a setting that should absolutely be turned on by default!

I mostly think I agree but I also think we have to be careful of making it the default because not everyone knows how to write accessible alt text. Which is why I think there should be an accessibility FAQ.

For me, an accessibility FAQ would be very helpful. Especially if it is easy to locate. Just talking about grandma using new technology here.

I like how GreySky does it — it tells you “hey you oughta put some alt text on that image; it would help some folks and you’d be a super hoopy frood for doing it,” but even so there is still a “post image anyway” option.

really, really wish this was on by default!

Now Sam, that means considering disabled ppl right from the planning phase. Why do that when they can keep with the tradition of making us an afterthought

You're right, strongly encouraging a reasonable accommodation would break with tradition. I'm really happy the feature is here at all because I'm so forgetful. It just frustrates me that they were afraid to turn it on by default when they added it, even though it could be easily disabled.

hey smart people reading this reply section: Would it be possible to somehow bake alt-text into an image's metadata so that it would come pre-packaged and would automatically be entered in?

It should be possible, but it depends on the image format and if they have a dedicated Metadata spot to store the alt text. A lot of formats support arbitrary values but having it defined in the standard would make it easier to support. It might already in the standards. If not it should be

I don't have time dig into it right now but I came across this https://iptc.org/news/iptc-announces-new-properties-in-photo-metadata-to-make-images-more-accessible/ It looks like some people are already working on alt-text being in the standards

I didn't realize that was a thing we could do - thank you for the public service announcement! Yes, I DO want my posts to be accessible and I WOULD like to be protected from my own mistakes!

and ever there’s a good reason for algos and custom feeds to downrank content inaccessibility would be it

Disability Pride month? I didn't know we got our own month. Yay us!

Yuhps.

Why and How to Celebrate Disability Pride Month 2023 - The Arcthearc.org Disability Pride Month is celebrated every July and is an opportunity to honor the history, achievements, experiences, and struggles of the disability community.

Is this still a good overall guide of what and what not to do? https://accessibility.huit.harvard.edu/describe-content-images?cmdf=best+practices+for+alt+text

Write good Alt Text to describe imagesaccessibility.huit.harvard.edu Alternative (Alt) Text is meant to convey the “why” of the image as it relates to the content of a document or webpage. It is read aloud to users by screen reader software, and it is indexed by se...

Yuhps.

Thanks. I wish they had more guidance on things like screenshots of conversations.

I did this because I've forgotten a few times and while I don't think all of my alt text is super great, I'm hoping it helps a little at least 🥲💕

💚.

This is an AMAZING feature! Thank you for letting me know it exists, I forget way too often and hate deleting and reposting