Social media is evolving to become more accessible for users with disabilities

Gabriella Pinos/ Staff Writer

For many social media users who have disabilities, scrolling through our feeds isn’t so simple, and secondary websites and apps must come in and fill in the gaps

After years of using social media apps, doing so may seem like second nature to us. We glance at the images on our Instagram and skim through the likes and retweets on Twitter, normally with little interest.

Thankfully, with the advancement of technology, social media has evolved to offer more accessibility to people with disabilities.

One of the simplest ways to do so can be done right through the platform’s website or mobile app. On Twitter, for instance, users can turn on the “alternative text” setting for images, which is used to describe the content in an image. This is especially useful toward visually impaired users, who may also benefit from larger text sizes on these platforms.

For those who may want something more streamlined, using the mobile website of social media apps can provide extra accessibility, according to an online review by Media Access Australia, since its interface is more simplified and optimized for people with disabilities.

When it comes to video sharing platforms like YouTube or Facebook, closed captions are an essential part in providing accessibility for the hearing impaired or deaf. Users on YouTube can contribute their own subtitles to a video in the same or different language and submit them for review. Different contributors can also pick off where one user left off, according to the YouTube Help Center.

Facebook posts allow users to insert closed captioning in their posts, whether it’s a photo or video. And, like alternative text, the black bars and bold text surrounding the borders of viral videos can be important in giving visually impaired users context.

These features, however, come with a downside. While YouTube automatically generates captions in multiple languages, their accuracy leaves a lot to be desired. We’ve all laughed and pointed out the errors of automated captions in a YouTube video at least once, but they do more harm than good when it comes to users with disabilities.

This can also be a problem on platforms such as Instagram and Snapchat, which are focused on visual media. Unlike alternative text, the captions that we add to pictures on these platforms don’t necessarily describe its content. Instagram also does not provide users the option to add alternative text, according to Media Access Australia, limiting accessibility to visually impaired users and leaving many others out of luck.

In these cases, posting multimedia on platforms that not only includes captions, but clear audio and alternative text can be helpful in increasing access to users of all abilities. Instant messengers such as iMessage and WhatsApp can be helpful, in this respect, by giving users the option to respond to messages through text or audio recordings.

Of course, if the platforms we use can’t provide us with a way to make that happen, then we’ll have to do in ourselves with the things we post or on other websites. Networks like My Disability Matters Club provide an alternative for people with disabilities who want to form their own community away from the large social media platforms.

The information we consume through social media has become essential part in our daily lives, and a disability should not stand in the way of that. We often take for granted how lucky we are to take part in a technological revolution, and we forget that all of us are a part of that world. Transforming the digital landscape into one where everyone can participate in it won’t be easy, but it’s worth a try for all our sakes.

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Photo by MySign AG from Flickr