Scrolling through Bluesky and seeing a lot of beautiful photographs and artwork. Please add Alt text to your images, many of us will not repost without it. Adding #AltText is not only the inclusive thing to do, your posts will reach a much wider audience. Thank you. 🪶🌱🐡 🦑🌿🐸 #Photography #Art - ThreadSky

norcal-lynne.bsky.social • 9 days ago

Scrolling through Bluesky and seeing a lot of beautiful photographs and artwork. Please add Alt text to your images, many of us will not repost without it. Adding #AltText is not only the inclusive thing to do, your posts will reach a much wider audience.
Thank you. 🪶🌱🐡 🦑🌿🐸 #Photography #Art

Comments

tychobravo.bsky.social•8 days ago

Yes! Please #AltText!

Here's how:

https://www.zdnet.com/article/how-to-add-alt-text-to-images-on-bluesky-and-why-you-should/

and The Cooper Hewitt Museum has a wonderful guide to art #AltText

https://www.cooperhewitt.org/cooper-hewitt-guidelines-for-image-description/

helenbennett.bsky.social•9 days ago

Well said, and thank you. 🙏 It is a shame that more people do not use alt text.

norcal-lynne.bsky.social•9 days ago

Thanks, Helen. It’s something I do for those who follow me, every post will have Alt text even posts that aren’t mine. I’m seeing a lot of amazing work I can’t share even though I’d like to.

helenbennett.bsky.social•9 days ago

Yes.👍 My mother is blind and I used to work for a sight loss charity, so I know the difference Alt text makes to those using screen readers. I have & do repost others' work sometimes without Alt text though, particularly if they have described the photo in the body of the text.

shawnw39.bsky.social•8 days ago

And know that alt text is not intended to be a "caption for sighted folks". It is specifically for blind folks using a screen reader. So make your alt text meaningful. It should provide a visual description so that if read, someone who had never seen the image could still get a good visualization.

www.lostinamerica.com•9 days ago

I keep forgetting- but just discovered the @bsky.app setting to require Alt Text and have activated it. Thanks for the reminder!

norcal-lynne.bsky.social•9 days ago

Thanks for adding there’s a setting to remind people. 😊

jacquik63.bsky.social•8 days ago

what does "#AltText" mean?

almostidaho.bsky.social•9 days ago

What is alt text?

norcal-lynne.bsky.social•9 days ago

When you post a photo, screenshot, or art you can include a description of what it is so those who use screen readers can know the context of the post. You will notice Alt in the lower-right corner of images that have them. Click on them and you can see the description.

almostidaho.bsky.social•9 days ago

Got it! I've seen that 'alt' in the corners and wondered what that was. Thanks for the help 🙂

thebirdsnest.bsky.social•8 days ago

While you have this thread going what do you think of this #AltText for this photo?

I mean by our criteria, we can retreat this photo, but did it really describe the photo?

thebirdsnest.bsky.social•8 days ago

I just want to add that we really need an AI program to write altext for us and then we can edit as needed. It takes one second to make a post on blue sky, but it takes about five minutes to add alt text to a post. For those of us with vision issues it is a big job. 🙋‍♀️

shawnw39.bsky.social•8 days ago

There are quite a few AIs that you can drag and drop your photo into and prompt it to provide a visual description for alt text, then copy and paste that text, revising as necessary, to add to your image. Also, there are people, like myself, who literally do this as a side hustle.

thebirdsnest.bsky.social•8 days ago

Oh, I didn’t know that. how would I look for something like, do you know? maybe some keywords like “Alt text my photos”

shawnw39.bsky.social•8 days ago

Here's a few for you to tinker with. Use whichever you feel most comfortable with. ChatGPT was quite good, until I realized the CEO is a d-bag.

Popupsmart
LiveChatAI
Ahref
https://AltText.ai
Repixify

thebirdsnest.bsky.social•8 days ago

Thank you so much. 🩵

lizzies.art•8 days ago

Ai can't provide context correctly, that's why it's best that humans write it. When AI is left to write alt text it doesn't consider context, settings, or relevance.

It doesn't take 5 minutes to write, it takes less than a minute. If you can't describe what you're posting and why, then why post?

thebirdsnest.bsky.social•8 days ago

I try really hard not to like or repost photos that do not have altext in them.

Sometimes I just hit that button and I wish blue sky had a feature that would not let me *like* someone’s post that doesn’t use alttext

norcal-lynne.bsky.social•8 days ago

I like posts even those who habitually never use Alt txt, hoping someday they will start, and I have seen some accounts begin to include it. Just wish more would.

thebirdsnest.bsky.social•8 days ago

So I have done is if I accidentally like a photo that doesn’t have alt text I go ahead and add the alt text. I don’t know what the author of the photo thinks of this or if they think about it at all.

tinykarin.bsky.social•8 days ago

Thanks Cynthia - I will do better from now on!

thebirdsnest.bsky.social•8 days ago

Karin, I know it’s a big job with some of your photos. I would just look to other accounts for examples. I really don’t know what I’m doing. That photo was just so outstanding. I had to try to describe it.

tinykarin.bsky.social•8 days ago

All good Cynthia! I’m on board no problem.

thebirdsnest.bsky.social•8 days ago

Here is one I just added AltText to as a reply. I don’t have the eye strength to do too many. https://bsky.app/profile/tinykarin.bsky.social/post/3li3wla7mus2m

thebirdsnest.bsky.social•8 days ago

Here is an example of one I liked so I added the alttext as a reply https://bsky.app/profile/arnielund.bsky.social/post/3lhvvj6vtuc26

teasemporiumandco.bsky.social•8 days ago

Folks remember there is an option in the settings that you can turn on under settings- accessibility. Turn it on and it won’t let you post unless you add ALT to your photo it’s a great way to ensure you never forget!

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