What the Shift to Mobile Means for Blind News Consumers
If a website is designed haphazardly, it doesn’t only look out of control. The user experience can be just as messy for someone who can’t see.
“News apps are just completely frustrating,” said Christopher Danielsen, spokesman for the National Federation of the Blind. "Blind people, the way we deal with this, is we share information about what apps tend to work, so I don’t tend to download something unless I have a pretty good sense that I’m going to be able to deal with it.“
The problem with much of the web—and, in particular, its newsier corners—is that it’s designed without consideration for people who aren’t navigating by sight. In many cases, the busier a website looks, the harder it is for people who use tools like audio screen-readers to get where they want to go, or even figure out where to go in the first place.
But Danielsen says design for accessibility is getting much better, albeit largely by accident. "The mobile world is taking over where the web used to be dominant,” he told me. “For blind people as well as for sighted people in many cases, that’s a good thing.”
Read more. [Image: Reuters]