Today I have seen the idea of poisoning image alt text with lies or other nonsense to make data scraping harder. I have little doubt about it working, sounds like something that would prove effective.

However, I will refuse to engage in this behaviour. To me, the function of alt text is not to train AI models. True, it may be a side effect of it. But were I to begin fighting that, I'd lose the main function; I would no longer be providing assistance to the genuine people behind the screen that rely on alt text, for any reason from a list too long to enumerate in this post. Or new ones I hadn't even considered, but should have seen coming.

By all means, fight the good fight. But please remember the people you are doing it for while you are at it. Alt text may not be the medium to take.

#Accessibility #AltText #AI #Countermeasures

People: 'I hate AI!'
Also people: 'Image with no description'
Know what that means? one of two things in my case.
1. I ignore your post.
Or
2... I use #AI to check out your post. How'bout that?

Can we get a t-shirt that says 'Always add #AltText'

A picture is *worth* a thousand words.
You've probably heard that all your life.
It is indeed worth a thousand words in some cases... Which is why #AltText is so important.

It's worth having a thousand words written about it. Isn't it wonderful?
The saying has never been quite so poignant as it is now. Think about it.

Retoot for #AltText

because I am not a boomer and this applies

OP: @jzmurdock

Hey y'all, I'm starting an "ALT After Dark" account, inspired by the wonderful @alttexthalloffame! The goal would be to encourage good alt-text on NSFW image posts, as well as showcasing shining examples of spicy alt-text.

Why? Because #AccessibilityIsHotAF, that's why.

What are our goals?
- Promote quality adult content that focuses on consent, community, and accessibility (great alt-text, proper CWs & hashtags) ❤️‍🔥
- Reduce the prevalence of porn-bot and repost accounts that post without subject consent, without alt-text or CWs, engage in hashtag spam, and lower the safety / enjoyment of folx on Fedi 🚫
- Engage positively with the community and generally be wholesome-ish 😉

How will we do it?
- With well-vetted human volunteers.
- By leading by example.
- With the help if the community.

What do we need?
- An ideal instance to host us.
- An effort to make the Fediverse a better place.
- Volunteers (of which we already have several).

Thoughts on all of this?

Update: It's Alive!!! @AltAfterDark

#NSFW #AltText #HallOfFame #AskFedi

A post that reads:
'Much better like this than on a podcast, Governor!'

Lack of alt-text.

1. I can actually *listen* to a podcast.
2. I cannot, without going out of my way, understand a picture.
Add #AltText, people. It's good for the world.

Picture: 0
Podcast: 1

Quick #accessibility tip: Rather than writing an alt text that says nothing but "image", you might as well just write one that says "fuck you".

#DontDoThat #DontBeThatGuy #AltText #PSA #a11y

“Out of 949 visual media attached in your 673 public posts with visual media, 935 have alt text. That's about 99%. You're doing a great job!”

I’ll take it! Through it is tempting to go back and fix those outliers…

Check your account here: stefanbohacek.online/@stefan/1…

#AltText

I was happy to attend #DrupalCamp Ottawa today. Lots of great people I was happy to see.

I also presented about #DrupalCMS & #AI highlighting how it can support better #AltText and & #PlainLanguage

It was also exciting to see so many new people join!

docs.google.com/presentation/d…

#Drupal #A11y

DrupalCamp Ottawa : Boosting Web Accessibility with Drupal CMS and AI

Boosting Web Accessibility with Drupal CMS and AI DrupalCamp Ottawa, May 2, 2025 https://drupalcampottawa.com/en/sessions/schedule Web accessibility is a journey—and with the right tools, Drupal can help you get there faster.

^{Google Docs}

📢 Introducing the #UnseenImageChallenge! 📢
What if everyone experienced social media the way screen reader users do? Let's find out together!

Visit our challenge website for more information and examples: micr0.dev/unseenChallenge

What Is It?

Post a solid black square image with detailed alt text describing what would have been there. Everyone will "see" the same way screen reader users see the post! This powerful exercise demonstrates why accessible content matters.

How To Participate:

1. Choose a meaningful image based on the daily theme
2. Replace it with a plain black square in your post
3. Write a vivid, detailed description as the alt text
4. Use the hashtag #UnseenImageChallenge
5. Nominate 3 friends to join the challenge

Need Help With Alt Text?

Not sure how to write good descriptions? We've created a comprehensive alt text guide at micr0.dev/alttext with examples, tips, and even an interactive quality checker!

You can also DM me the original image, and I'll help generate alt text you can use! (Make sure you are following me first! Mastodon blocks 'unsolicited' DMs!)

Example: Instead of "My cat" try "My orange tabby cat Whiskers lounging in a sunbeam on the windowsill, looking sleepy with half-closed eyes"

Daily Themes:

• Monday: Nature & Outdoors
• Tuesday: Pets & Animal Friends
• Wednesday: Art & Creativity
• Thursday: Food & Cuisine
• Friday: Places & Spaces
• Saturday: People & Portraits
• Sunday: Wild Card (anything you choose!)

Duration

The challenge runs for one full week! Join in on any or all of the daily themes.

Community Showcase

I'll be boosting exceptional examples throughout the week and featuring creative descriptions. Your participation helps inspire others!

Supporting the Mission

If you find value in this challenge and want to support Altbot's continued development and accessibility work, you can contribute to the project at ko-fi.com/micr0byte. All funds go directly toward server costs, development, and expanding our accessibility initiatives. However, awareness and participation are the most important contributions!

Why This Matters

Every day, blind and low-vision people experience the Fediverse entirely through alt text. This challenge helps everyone understand why detailed image descriptions are so important first hand. Awareness is important!

Resources

• Challenge information and examples: micr0.dev/unseenChallenge
• The Art of Alt Text guide: micr0.dev/alttext

The challenge begins today! Who's ready to make the Fediverse more accessible while trying something new? Make sure to tag three friends who you think should join in!

#Accessibility #AltText #DigitalInclusion

Buy Micr0byte a Coffee. ko-fi.com/micr0byte

Become a supporter of Micr0byte today! ❤️ Ko-fi lets you support the creators you love.

^Ko-fi

Oh boo hoo! Someone doesn't like the new alt text warning on Mastodon!

> This warning is extremely annoying, I wish I could get rid of it and be allowed to post images without alt text if I want to without being asked every time like every other website. I know it is not ideal for accessibility, but I'm not going to add alt text because the warning tells me too, I'm too busy already procrastinating my life in other ways.

Go cry me a fucking river.

How can we make assholes like this even more mad?

github.com/mastodon/mastodon/i…

#AltText #Mastodon #Fediverse

Add warning before posting a media without alt-text · Issue #5644 · mastodon/mastodon

With #117, Mastodon now allows users to add an alternative text to media in order to improve accessibility for visually impaired people. However, many people, including me, too often forget to do s...

^GitHub

REMINDER: Your resistance goes faster, harder, and further without the use of ableist language. Fascists won't give a fuck, but a whole lot of folk who have been called 'crazy’, ‘insane’, 'stupid’, ‘idiot’, ‘moron’, and so forth hear you every time you do this, and make themselves a little smaller.

The same goes for body-shaming of any kind. It hurts your allies, not your enemies.

Update your vocabulary.

And check for alt text before you post, or boost.

#Accessibility #AltText

I figured I should make this into a poster. A4 size, but can easily be scaled to fit onto Letter size, for you non-standard Americans out there.

Reuse encouraged, public domain!

#AltText #Accessibility

Hey Fediverse!

I'm micr0, creator of @altbot, the open-source bot that helps generate alt-text for images on the Fediverse to make content more accessible.

What's New in 2.1?

After successfully moving image processing to local hardware with version 2.0, I've now brought video processing capability back - but with a major privacy upgrade! Altbot can now generate descriptions for videos completely locally and privately without sending content to Google or any other third-party services.

Important note: Currently, video processing is visual-only and doesn't include audio transcription. The audio processing Google was doing was some serious black magic fuckery that isn't possible to replicate locally with current technologies. But the visual descriptions are excellent and totally private!

With this update:

• All processing happens locally with zero data retention
• Complete privacy for all content
• No data used for training models
• Videos processed with the same privacy standards as images

I've also maintained Altbot's focus on energy efficiency - while video processing naturally requires more resources than images, I've implemented it to be as efficient as possible, keeping power consumption to a minimum while still delivering great results.

Thank You for Your Support!

I want to express my heartfelt thanks to everyone who helped me reach my donation goal on Ko-fi with the 2.0 launch! Your generosity made it possible to set up the local processing infrastructure that powers this privacy-focused service.

The response from the community has been incredible, and it means so much to know that privacy and accessibility are values we share.

What's Next for Altbot?

I'm already working on exciting future developments:

• An Altbot API that will allow developers to integrate alt-text generation into their applications
• Direct integration with Fediverse software platforms - I'm collaborating with instance developers to make accessibility a built-in feature!

Remember that Altbot has always been and remains fully open-source, with self-hosting being a core feature from day one for anyone who wants to run their own instance.

Supporting Ongoing Development & Infrastructure

Altbot currently runs on hardware in my home, which means I'm covering all the electricity costs for powering the GPU server that processes your media. While I've designed the system to be energy-efficient, running a dedicated AI server still impacts my monthly power bill.

Monthly donations would be especially helpful in sustainably supporting:

• Ongoing electricity costs
• Time spent on development and maintenance
• Future infrastructure improvements

Even small recurring contributions can make a huge difference in keeping this service running reliably and allowing me to dedicate more time to improvements!

Ways to Support:

• Ko-fi (one-time or monthly): ko-fi.com/micr0byte
• Ethereum: 0xC992E57236eb9F30E79d0469446a6CF08Be05939

I've added the ETH option for those who prefer crypto or don't want to use PayPal!

Version 2.1 also includes various internal improvements and bug fixes that make everything run more smoothly behind the scenes.

Thanks again for your support in making the web more accessible without compromising on privacy!

Feel free to boost or reach out with questions! For press inquiries: inquiries@micr0.dev

#Accessibility #Privacy #Fediverse #AltText #Altbot

Buy Micr0byte a Coffee. ko-fi.com/micr0byte

Become a supporter of Micr0byte today! ❤️ Ko-fi lets you support the creators you love.

^Ko-fi

It might be worth pointing out that not only people with visual and/or auditory impairments benefit from #AltText. It can be useful in many other ways, too.

To me, as an #autistic person whose perception and information processing work in quite different ways, it is not always clear what the point of an image is. Some good alt text can help a lot.

Some clarifying background info in alt text can also be very useful for the general public (which helps to normalise the use of alt text).

My girlfriend bought me a new dress last night and I went a little off the rails trying to describe it in the alt-text 😉

#AltText #AccessibilityIsHotAF #AccessibilityMatters

My 2nd @fosdem talk was Alternative Text for Images: How Bad Are Our Alt-Text Anyway?

fosdem.org/2025/schedule/event…

It is available online:

docs.google.com/presentation/d…

#FOSDEM #FOSS #AI #LLM #AltText #Accessibility

FOSDEM 2025 : Alternative Text for Images: How Bad Are Our Alt-Text Anyway?

Alt Text for Images: How Bad Are they Anyway? FOSDEM, Feb 1, 2025 25 minutes, Track: Inclusive Web, Room: K.3.201 https://fosdem.

^{Google Docs}

Oh nice, Mastodon is getting an alt text reminder.

github.com/mastodon/mastodon/p…

#mastodon #accessibility #AltText

A photo of part of a tower computer featuring a headphone jack, a knurled dial switch, and a 5-1/4" floppy disk drive. A large sticker on the computer proclaims: "REMEMBER Turn your computer off before midnight on 12/31/99 - BestBuy"

#Alt4You
#AltText

@BasicAppleGuy next time please ask and there are folks who are glad to write your alt text for you

What do people think of this response to ‘generate detailed Alt Text’ by Gemini:

Here is some detailed alt text for the image you provided:
Alt Text:
A large, menacing grey cat, reminiscent of a monster, stands on its hind legs with its front paws raised. It has glowing yellow eyes and a wide, toothy grin. The cat is surrounded by a fiery aura as it emits a powerful beam of energy from its mouth. The beam is directed towards the Empire State Building in New York City, which is engulfed in flames. The city skyline is visible in the background, with tall buildings and smoke rising from the destruction. The overall tone of the image is chaotic and destructive, evoking a sense of fear and awe.
Additional Notes:
• You may want to adjust the description of the cat's appearance based on its specific characteristics.
• If the image is part of a larger context (like a movie poster or book cover), you could add a brief reference to that context.
• The alt text should be concise and informative, providing a clear description of the image without being overly detailed.
Let me know if you have any other questions.

#Accessibility #AI #AIsoftheBlind #AltText #Blind #ComputerVision

A couple years ago I opened a thread to add #AltText on #Mastodon banners and profile pictures. Now detailed todos are being posted. Is there anyone who could help in this case?

github.com/mastodon/mastodon/i…
#a11y #Acessibility

Add ALT-Tag to banner and profile pictures and make the value editable for acessiblility reasons · Issue #10313 · mastodon/mastodon

Pitch The banner and profile picts on the profile site has no ALT or ARIA tags. Blind people can't get information about the content of this images. Motivation Additional text information for image...

^GitHub

Even though I know #HTML inside out and use it virtually every day, I'm still reading #HTMLForPeople by @bw because it's a prime example of how a good guide should be written.

1. The book is simple and easy to follow, with relevant points explained well enough even for non-coders to understand.
2. Images are clearly described for #blind readers through the use of #AltText.
3. The website is easy to navigate with a #ScreenReader.
4. There are no annoying pop-ups or ads on the website.
5. The book is entirely free of charge.

htmlforpeople.com/

HTML for People

HTML isn't only for people working in the tech field. It's for everyone. Learn how to make a website from scratch in this beginner friendly web book.

^{htmlforpeople.com}

Repost mit #AltText

#SZ #Verkehrswende #Ensham #SUV

Sometimes we're in a hurry, or we didn't think (or even know) about #AltText , for images and videos, to assist visually impaired and describing text for other languages.
PASS THIS AROUND #Boost

Guide on writing Alt Text: identifying who, the expression, the description, color, and interesting features.

I'd like to boost this, but:

1. There's no alt text
2. There doesn't seem to be any link to the original source

In the interests of accessibility, avoiding disinformation and getting your post the most reach possible, would you consider fixing these two issues?

Thanks!

#accessibility #AltText #Disinformation #Tuta #Journalism

Still looking for a reason to bother adding alt text to your images here? Here's one: out and about in low bandwidth land images may not ever load. The first image here is what it looks like. The second one shows what you get when the author included a description.
Folks who are blind don't need low bandwidth to experience the difference, in case you didn't know the most important reason.

#alttext #images #photography

Reminder: #AltText is not a place for copyright information, or additional details about the image.

Put that into a separate post, for the love of god.

It's as if you were blocking a bike path with a street sign.

The purpose of alt text is increased accessibility, so when in doubt, ask yourself if the text you're adding helps blind or visually impaired folks better understand what's in the actual image.

#accessibility

"How can you use AI, it steals things people share online, it burns down the planet!"

"Alright, do you mind telling me what's in this picture you posted online?"

"Ah. Carry on."

#AltText #accessibility #AI

Hey, if you don't like the fact that many #blind people have to rely on AI to describe images for them, you can help by, you know, describing images for them.

mastodon.social/@botwiki/11147…

#AltText #accessibility #ai