Blind people not allowed into the Carnival?
Not long ago I wrote a post discussing how ironic it was that I was unable to submit an article to a Blog Carnival.
Description of a Blog Carnival from their site…
We think blog carnivals are a great way for bloggers to recognize each other’s efforts, organize blog posts around important topics, and improve the overall level of conversation in the blogosphere. Carnivals come in edited "editions", just like magazines or journals. The fact that carnivals are edited (and usually annotated) collections of links lets them serve as "magazines" within the blogosphere, and carnival hosts can earn their readership by providing high quality collections.
I sent a note to the folks at BC informing them that there use of a visual only CAPTCHA excludes visually impaired and blind people from independently offering submissions to the site.
While many Carnival hosts offer multiple ways of submitting entries , the team at BC should be aware of the issue and take action to make the site usable for all.
I recently checked the site to see if anything has been done about the problem.
Nope! In fact, the site now requires users submitting feedback to the administrators or even customer support, to complete a visual CAPTCHA.
For the record, I in no way believe CAPTCHA’s should be removed, it’s important to reduce spam. However, there are alternatives to visual only tests to prove the submission is not initiated by a botnet.
Thanks to Darrell Shandrow over at the Blind Access Journal for pointing out another accessible CAPTCHA solution known as ReCAPTCHA.
I hope to hear back from the folks at the Blog Carnival soon.
Oh and again with the irony, this time the carnival topic – Access Technology.
After a couple of days, I have not yet learned of one single response to the notes sent to Blog Carnival by several blind / visually impaired people. Since there now exist audio playback options in a turnkey format, I expect these matters to be resolved very promptly upon notification in order to avoid being classified as deliberate discrimination against us. I urge all blind and visually impaired people, as well as those colleagues, friends and relatives who care about what happens to us, to write a note to support@blogcarnival.com asking them to correct their ways by making available a CAPTCHA that reasonably accomodates us.
I wanted to thank you for submitting your comment on my website about how BC is dropping the ball on providing submission access on their site to the blind. I am in full agreement that it should be accessible. I also want to point out that The Blog Carnival sponsor site is completely seperate from those of us doing blog carnivals. Our assistive technology blog carnival is not written or maintained by the blog carnival site- we are just a group of bloggers who want to share with each other on AT. I have responded to the comment on my site by offering submissions to the AT blog carnival via my email at: lonthornburg@nolimits2learning.com
I am also putting a link on my sidebars for folks to email BC and send their thoughts and comments to them on this issue.
Thanks…
Lon
I’ve been developing a series of solutions using the reputation property of proof of work systems. if folks want to discuss it, feel free to email me at esj@harvee.org
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