Twitter is Adding a Neat Feature to Help Blind People

Twitter is making itself more accessible to the visually impaired.

The social network is in the middle of a big shift to more multimedia messages: More and more images, GIFs, videos and other embedded content are appearing in tweets.

But this makes it more difficult to people who have sight problems and rely on accessibility tools like braille displays or screen readers.

How can a computer know what’s in a Vine video if the description isn’t helpful?

Twitter announced on Tuesday that it is adding the option to add accompanying descriptions to images uploaded via its iOS and Android apps. Once the feature is turned on (in the Accessibility Settings) you can add up to 420 characters describing and explaining an image.

Here’s an example that Twitter included in its Tuesday blog post showing how the feature works. The user adds some descriptive text that assistive technology will be able to make sense of.

Source: Business Insider

  Blind, Digital, Innovation, Social Media, Twitter, Visually Impaired