RE: Request for review of alt and alt value for authoring or publishing tools

(Against my better judgment)

Ian Hickson wrote:
> What we really want here is:
> 
>    My First Border Crossing... Welcome to Nevada
> 
>    [UA-specific image indicator]
> 
>    Crossing from California to Nevada on the motorcycle - gotta stop
>    for the photo-op
> 
> ...which is why we need a way to flag images that are neither
> decorative nor have any useful alternative text.
> 
> 
> I'm not honestly convinced that there is _any_ alternative text that
> would be useful beyond your captions on any of these images, or,
> frankly, most images on Flickr.

alt="Me posing with my motorcycle at the border crossing, Welcome sign and
mountains in the background"

...and since we've now publicly discussed 2 of the whopping 4 images on my
public Flickr site, let's put to rest what alt text I would have provided
*IF* Flickr allowed me to do so for the other 2:

Getting Ready II - Alt="Me standing behind my motorcycle getting ready to
leave"

4th of July - alt="Me posing with three cute blondes dressed in Red, White
and Blue"

(Interesting factoid for the world - my 4 image Flickr site is apparently
important enough to be discussed on the WHATWG cabal IRC channel)

> 
> 
>> FOR THE LAST FRIGGIN' TIME, ALT TEXT IS ABOUT MORE THAN BLIND
>> PEOPLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
> 
> Of course they're not. I didn't say they were. 

You wrote:
"And if _you_, an accessibility expert who cares about blind people, don't 
bother to include descriptions of photos you upload to Flickr, how can we 
possibly expect Random Joe User, who frankly _doesn't_ care about blind 
users, to write descriptions for Flickr to include?"

I see the word "blind" twice in that sentence, so readers can draw their own
conclusions regarding what you said or did not say, meant and did not mean.

JF

Received on Wednesday, 16 April 2008 00:09:04 UTC