[Bug 13400] New: Audio: Change note on accessibility for the audio element

http://www.w3.org/Bugs/Public/show_bug.cgi?id=13400

           Summary: Audio: Change note on accessibility for the audio
                    element
           Product: HTML WG
           Version: unspecified
          Platform: PC
        OS/Version: All
            Status: NEW
          Severity: normal
          Priority: P2
         Component: HTML5 spec (editor: Ian Hickson)
        AssignedTo: ian@hixie.ch
        ReportedBy: silviapfeiffer1@gmail.com
         QAContact: public-html-bugzilla@w3.org
                CC: mike@w3.org, public-html-wg-issue-tracking@w3.org,
                    public-html@w3.org


http://www.w3.org/TR/2011/WD-html5-20110525/the-iframe-element.html#the-audio-element

Currently, the audio element states about accessibility:

"Note: In particular, this content is not intended to address accessibility
concerns. To make audio content accessible to the deaf or to those with other
physical or cognitive disabilities, authors are expected to provide alternative
media streams and/or to embed accessibility aids (such as transcriptions) into
their media streams."

This is a somewhat incomplete and unsatisfactory statement, probably because it
was written long before we had sorted all the video accessibility issues.
Namely: when alternative media streams for an audio resource are provided for
the deaf, they would naturally need to be visual, such as sign language tracks
or captions. Thus, they introduce a visual component into an otherwise
audio-only resource.

I can see the following means of providing accessibility for <audio>:

(1) When providing sign language or captions as embedded tracks (or through
<track>) with the audio resource and intending to have them displayed by
default, we require the Web author to publish the resource in a <video> element
instead of <audio>.

(2) When a sign language track is provided in a separate <video> element, we
need to group them together with the multitrack API
http://www.w3.org/TR/2011/WD-html5-20110525/the-iframe-element.html#synchronising-multiple-media-elements
.

(3) When providing a non-time-aligned text-only replacement for an audio
element such as a transcript (or transcription), we should either link to it
on-page with an aria-describedby attribute, provide a link underneath the
<audio> element, or use the newly suggested @transcript attribute (see bug
12964) if we don't want it displayed on the page.

I suggest we add a more complete description of the accessibility capabilities
of the <audio> element to this section with recommendations on what to do in
which situation.

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Received on Thursday, 28 July 2011 03:19:59 UTC