Justin asks us to think outside of our use case, and that not everyone uses the web the way we do.
Transcript
Nic
Hi, I’m Nic Steenhout. And you’re listening to the accessibility rules soundbite, a series of short podcasts where disabled people explain their impairment, and what barrier they encounter on the web. Today, I’m talking with Justin Yarbrough. Hey, Justin, how are you?
Justin
Doing pretty good today? How about you?
Nic
I’m quite happy. I’m quite happy. Happy to finally connect, as we were talking about in before the recording. It’s been nearly three years since we’ve been planning to do this chat. So it’s, it’s good to finally connect in front of a microphone.
Justin
Yes, yes.
Nic
So just let me start by asking you, what’s your disability or your impairment?
Justin
So I am almost completely blind. I just have a little light perception.
Nic
Okay, almost completely blind. And what would you say your greatest barrier or pet peeve on the web is?
Justin
Boy, where do I start? The one I can think of, that I’ve been kind of tinkered around on my head today was we were thinking about this is just on Twitter, which is, you know, where we kind of met know each other, is just folks not using alt text. I mean, you know, it’s such a visual medium, everyone loves all their pictures. And it’s like, I want to know what you’re talking… what you’re posting about, or, or more even, you know, the even where it really gets under my skin isn’t maybe necessarily just okay, it’s, you know, someone showing their picture of what they have for lunch, or whatever. But where it really gets me is, it’s like, politicians, news organization, something like that. And they, they’re that trend, they just love taking that screenshot of their statement, or whatever, and just posting that thing without any alt text. So that, you know, if I see something firm, I will just give you an example, like the mayor of Phoenix, early in the pandemic, you know, she was all the time posting updates like that, and those never had alt text on them. So I had no idea what the mayor was, you know, tweeting about at that, at that time, you know, what, what are we trying to find out and you know, early in the pandemic, stuff coming from folks like them, it was kind of important.
Nic
It sounds like, from what I’m seeing a lot of is more and more organizations are moving to social media to pass on some critical information around emergency messaging, and nine times out of 10. It’s through an image of text, and there’s no alt text. So folks, like you who rely on alt texts are really up the creek without a paddle.
Justin
Yeah, yeah, that’s a really, that’s a great way to describe it. You know, it’s, I need this information too, hello, it’s important enough that you’re sharing it, share it, so everyone can take advantage.
Nic
What I find interesting is, I’ve been talking about the importance of alternate text on the web, since the mid 1990s. And I just feel like I never managed to reach everyone that needs to be reached, do you have any ideas how we can expand the reach and make sure that the people that need to hear about it, a hear about it and be start implementing these, these habits of making images accessible to all?
Justin
I think that, you know, a lot of a lot of the times with it, if you know, we have groups like this maybe you know, political candidates or folks who are in office or government organizations or stuff like that, what I’ve been doing a lot is I just say, you know, I just have been posting kind of a simple reply, hey, kind of like just going like, hey, blind guy here. Next time, could you please include alt text just so that I can understand what’s going on here too. And then I throw in a link to the article actually up on my own website that I’d written about using alt texts on social media a few years ago. And does it get the attention? Sometimes it actually, you know, sometimes it kind of gets ignored and, you know, whatever. But, uh, you know, occasionally I’ve had some areas that are really receptive to and like, oh my gosh, I didn’t know about that. And they, you know, they learn and then start working on it and getting into the habit. And in so much really, especially on like a social media platform like Twitter or something. What I tell a lot of people with it is, especially when they find out about, I think it’s cool, they really want to do it. So much I emphasize what it’s really is just getting in the habit of doing it and remembering to do it. I mean, it’s getting a little easier now with Twitter’s you know, started to roll out that reminder feature to some people, you know, that’s gonna, I think that’s going to help make a difference, especially for, at least for those people who really do want to, but just aren’t in that habit, you just need to build that muscle memory.
Nic
Yeah, I like that concept, build your muscle memory about adding alt text. So what we’ve been talking about really is around the end users doing their bit for, for making sure the content they publish is accessible. What would be one message you’d have for designers or developers around web accessibility?
Justin
You you’d think I’d have a lot for this, considering that I work with him every day. But you know, this is another one of those just pinning it down to one thing is tough, but I guess maybe not so much related, just specifically to just what we’ve been talking about with all text and social media and stuff, but it’s just, just in general, it’s just to remember to think not everyone, remember, just not everyone uses the web like you do. And then to think about to think about those kinds of things. So think about your screen, you’re using your keyboard only users, your folks with cognitive disabilities, you’re all all those kinds of things. So just to just think outside of think outside of your use case. And that it’s open Beyond Good. Because believe me, I, I understand, it’s easy to think, Oh, well, you know, what my use case? This is? What would do? I mean, I would say I’ve probably been guilty of it myself at times. You Yeah, I mean, as a, you know, as a blind screener to us. I mean, granted, you know, I wasn’t always so, but I didn’t really go. I wasn’t doing any, like, web development or accessibility work or anything like that when I was when I was in that case. And it was it was something I would have never thought about. Prior to losing my sight of how a screener user might go do something I probably, I think I was aware that screen readers existed. But that was pretty much all I knew.
Nic
Yeah. Justin, thank you very much. I like this, this idea of not everybody uses the web the way we do. To think about that to just expand a little bit our horizons as that’s fantastic. Thank you for being a guest and sharing one of your pet peeves. I’m sure I’m sure we might record another one at some point. Maybe not in three years from now, maybe sooner, but I’ll give you a little bit of time to come down with another with another one that really irks.
Justin
Certainly, certainly I’ll be in touch and be thinking about and thanks for having me.
Nic
Thanks for coming on board. Justin. See you around on the web.
Justin
All right. You’re welcome. Thank you.
Nic
Cheers.
Justin
Take care.