Why I’m pledging off quickly Sharing those great images with embedded text on Facebook.
Most of us have probably done it. We see a great quote or other statement embedded in a photo on Facebook, Google+, or other social networking site. Maybe it’s political, maybe it’s insightful, maybe made us Laugh Out Loud. A quick click of the Share button and all our friends can read it…well, most of them. Maybe we have a friend with poor or no vision. This friend may not be able to join us in our appreciation of this statement. We didn’t intend to exclude them, we just didn’t stop to think about it. We often don’t think about visually disabled people using the web–it’s such a visual experience for us. But with screen-readers and other assistive technology, the internet has opened up the world to visually disabled people, perhaps even more than the internet has opened it up to “the rest of us.”
But sharing these images is so valuable you might say. I don’t want to give it up.
Well, there is a way to share them and still let everyone read them. Here’s how:
When you hit that Share button, you can add a comment. Take a few minutes to type in the text from the image into the Comment section. Yes, I know this will slow down your sharing, but it may also make you stop and ask yourself, “Is this really important enough to share?” (Come on, face it, you know you probably spend too much time on Facebook, much of it reading these quotes.)
Like most accessibility adaptations, we will all benefit from this (when was the last time you pushed a stroller/cart up a ‘wheelchair’ ramp, or used you butt to push the door opener when your arms were full?). Initally, typing in the comment may take us more time but, as we do it more, our Wall will probably end up less crowded. And, after a while, some will already have the text typed in by the previous person who shared it! Our Shares will also will be ‘higher quality,’ since we’ve already filtered out those not worth spending the time to type in the text.
So, perhaps make this one of your new year’s resolutions.
Oh, and while you’re at it, if it seems amazing, try Snopes to confirm it’s not an ‘urban legend’ (but that’s fodder for another post).
Happy networking,
Lee
