cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/45437770

I’ve been thinking a lot about the Fediverse ALT issue.

Some people are annoyed by posts without Alttext, & others get reminded¹ to add it.

The core question is: How can we improve accessibility?

Proposal: ☑️ Add a user filter to hide media posts without AltTag ☑️ Reduced engagement on hidden posts would encourage adding Alt text ☑️ People who need accessibility wouldn’t have to encounter unlabeled media

If this gets traction, I’ll open a Mastodon GitHub issue (maybe on others too?).

¹ https://mastodon.social/@madeindex/113996311493021102

  • Andrew Beveridge@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    1·
    1 month ago

    These days, it would probably be more effective to make it easy for instance operators hook up a local multi modal llm to the server to auto generate alt text for all images posted on their instance. I’d happily donate to cover the infrastructure costs for any instance owner who was doing that

    • Cris_Citrus@piefed.zipEnglish
      1·
      1 month ago

      While I understand the potential value of that, it is worth also acknowledging that ai will never understand the human, social, contextual meaning of things its providing alt text for, and theres a fair argument to be made that folks with disabilities deserve those things

      Id welcome perspectives from folks with relevant disabilities who use or depend on alt text :)