Re: Flickr and alt

I disagree.  if they can upload images through a web browser, they can write 
an alt.  Now, the issue is and I agree it is an edge case that many of the 
photos are transmitted via different means.  Are they still accompanied by 
text which explains or can be used to replace them?  Why build a ramp to the 
building if I can't fit through the door?

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Eric Eggert" <w3c@yatil.de>
To: "David Poehlman" <david.poehlman@handsontechnologeyes.com>
Cc: "Jon Barnett" <jonbarnett@gmail.com>; "Philip TAYLOR (Ret'd)" 
<P.Taylor@rhul.ac.uk>; "Anne van Kesteren" <annevk@opera.com>; "James 
Graham" <jg307@cam.ac.uk>; "Steven Faulkner" <faulkner.steve@gmail.com>; 
"Ian Hickson" <ian@hixie.ch>; "W3C WAI-XTECH" <wai-xtech@w3.org>; 
<public-html@w3.org>
Sent: Monday, August 18, 2008 1:46 PM
Subject: Re: Flickr and alt


What confuses me about that whole alternative text on flickr issue is
that flickr is an edge case, not a typical use case for alternative
text. Images on flickr are not part of the content, they are the
content and there are some administration options (and a social
network) built around that content.

The flickr users do a lot to make their images accessible and describe
them. There are tags, there’s the description, the title, comments.
Each piece of information is worth nothing, neither to a search engine
nor to a screen reader software. But as a whole those informations can
drae quite a good picture of the image, quite frankly a better picture
than the most alt texts give in the web at the moment.

What we really need is imo not yet another sub use of the alt
attribute but a way to connect those informations to the image and
indicating that there is an image in the page even if the alt text is
not present.

I’m a huge fan of <figure> and <legend> for these use cases.

I agree that it has to be our goal to make the web more accessible but
forcing users, many without a tech background, to enter an abstract
alternative text and a description is too much. Flickr has to depend
on their users to enter descriptions that make sense.

If flickr would out of the blue require description and/or alternative
text, one would find a lot of garbage descriptions there which is the
counter effect of what we want to achieve.


Eric Eggert

David Poehlman wrote:

>
> accessibility is right not privilige.
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Jon Barnett" <jonbarnett@gmail.com>
> To: "Philip TAYLOR (Ret'd)" <P.Taylor@rhul.ac.uk>
> Cc: "Anne van Kesteren" <annevk@opera.com>; "David Poehlman"
> <david.poehlman@handsontechnologeyes.com>; "James Graham" <jg307@cam.ac.uk
> >;
> "Steven Faulkner" <faulkner.steve@gmail.com>; "Ian Hickson" <ian@hixie.ch
> >;
> "W3C WAI-XTECH" <wai-xtech@w3.org>; <public-html@w3.org>
> Sent: Monday, August 18, 2008 1:12 PM
> Subject: Re: Flickr and alt
>
>
> On Mon, Aug 18, 2008 at 8:25 AM, Philip TAYLOR (Ret'd)
> <P.Taylor@rhul.ac.uk>wrote:
>
>>
>> Anne van Kesteren wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> [...]I was trying to point out that Flickr cannot start requiring
>>> users to <perform some task> as that will simply kill their
>>> business.
>>>
>>
>> Exactly the same argument was adduced about requiring
>> public houses to require their customers to either
>> refrain from smoking completely, or to smoke outside.
>>
>> The pubs /didn't/ go out of business, and most of their
>> customers came to accept that -- by following the rules --
>> they were improving the environment for everybody.
>>
>> Philip TAYLOR
>>
>
>
> Forcing content on a user-generated content web site, by law, to
> meet a set
> of accessibility standards is asinine and frightening at the same
> time.
> There are plenty of countries that would never go for such a thing.
>
> Smoking laws are a poor analogy.  A better analogy would be fining a
> restaurant for not forcing everyone in a restaurant to use sign
> language
> while they talk.
>
> There is absolutely NO chance I would ever upload 100 photos to a
> web site
> and write a sentence of text for each picture only to have that
> sentence be
> invisible to 99% of the public.  If I'm going to write 100 sentences,
> they're going to be captions viewable alongside a photo and not
> alternate
> text for a photo.  For this reason, I see Flickr as a silly use case
> for
> @alt as I can only ever foresee Flickr using this:
>
> <figure>
> <img src="image.jpg" whatever-markup-goes-here>
> <legend>My wife and myself in front of the Niagra Falls, a proper
> description of this image</legend>
> </figure>
>
> As this would be silly (it's redundant):
>
> <figure>
> <img src="image.jpg" alt="My wife and myself in front of the Niagra
> Falls, a
> proper description of this image">
> <legend>My wife and myself in front of the Niagra Falls, a proper
> description of this image</legend>
> </figure>
>
> And this would never happen:
>
> <figure>
> <img src="image.jpg" alt="Proper alternate text I'm going to write
> for 100
> images but is only presented when the image is not visible">
> <legend>My wife and myself in front of the Niagra Falls, a proper
> description of this image</legend>
> </figure>
>
> I'm also sure at least 50 of those images wouldn't get captioned at
> all
> because I simply don't have the time.  If Flickr suddenly required
> me to
> caption all 50 of those images, I would just insert junk into the
> textbox
> for the caption or I would find a photo sharing site without such a
> silly
> requirement for me, as the user.
>
> -- 
> Jon Barnett
>

Received on Monday, 18 August 2008 17:52:38 UTC