Social Media Accessibility: Alt Text and Closed Captioning

The Internet is a very visual place, especially when it comes to social media. We’re constantly sharing tweets, posts, videos and beautifully designed websites across every platform. We work hard to pair images with appropriate text in a compelling way to share Notre Dame and our stories with the world.

But up until very recently the platforms where we tell these stories have left a portion of the populations out by being inaccessible to users who are hearing or visually impaired.

That’s changing, though, as Instagram rolled out a straight forward option to add Alt Text for those using the platform with screen readers in late 2018. Facebook and Twitter also have the option to add Alt Text to images but you have to dig a little deeper to find it.

And while the option to add Closed Captioning or Subtitles to YouTube, Facebook and Twitter videos isn’t new, it’s just as important to help make all our visual content accessible to those who may be hearing impaired. (Not to mention the 85% of social media users who watch videos with the sound off.)

Here’s how to make our content accessible to the hearing and visually impaired: Continue reading Social Media Accessibility: Alt Text and Closed Captioning