- From: Benjamin Hawkes-Lewis <bhawkeslewis@googlemail.com>
- Date: Wed, 1 Aug 2012 03:03:58 +0100
- To: "Michael[tm] Smith" <mike@w3.org>, public-html@w3.org, "Edward O'Connor" <eoconnor@apple.com>
On Wed, Aug 1, 2012 at 2:36 AM, Janina Sajka <janina@rednote.net> wrote: > Well, perhaps not. PF does not accept this use case as valid, neither > did the WAI Ad Hoc that provided guidance on alt three years ago, nor > has the TF agreed this use case is valid. > > Quoting from Ted's CP: > > "The spec currently allows conformance checkers to waive alt="" > conformance requirements on pages with <meta name=generator> present. > This feature is intended to allow sites like Flickr (which accept bulk > photo uploads from their users and can't reasonably require their users > to provide alternative text) to check the conformance of their Web > applications without being inundated with warnings or errors that the > site developers can't do anything about. If we don't allow such sites to > do this, they have and will add bogus alt="" text to their pages simply > to pass in popular conformance checkers, thus harming the accessibility > of their pages." > > This paragraph contains three false assertions: > > 1.) The 2009 guidance document from the WAI Ad Hoc provided a solution that > that site developers could adopt which would satisfy alt concerns when > individual authors failed to provide individualized alt text. > http://www.w3.org/2009/06/Text-Alternatives-in-HTML5.html > > The assertion that large site developers are hapless victims is false. > Repeating this false assertion will not make it true. > > 2.) It is asserted that developers would fill alt with bogus text. > But, no evidence has yet been provided in support of this claim. This > assertion is also false, and repeating it will also not make it true. > > 3.) If bogus text were inserted, it is asserted this would cause > harm to a11y? But, what harm? This has never been demonstrated and is, > in fact, also a false assertion whose repetition will not make it true. > > This use case is a bogus, red herring. FWIW what Flickr are doing _today_ when they don't have text appears to be just setting alt="photo". Photo page of latest upload on Flickr at time of writing has <img id="liquid-photo" alt="photo" aria-describedby="title_div" width="640" height="427" src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8005/7688297284_4a72f82f25_z.jpg" style="visibility: visible; "> <h1 id="title_div" property="dc:title" class="photo-title">IMG_7354.jpg</h1> https://secure.flickr.com/photos/sarahannward/7688297284/ They link to that page with: <img src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8005/7688297284_4a72f82f25_t.jpg" width="100" height="67" alt="IMG_7354.jpg by sarahannward" class="pc_img" border="0"> https://secure.flickr.com/photos/ -- Benjamin Hawkes-Lewis
Received on Wednesday, 1 August 2012 02:04:40 UTC