Mike Tech Show – Podcast – #9 – 04-30-05

Calendar April 30, 2005 | Posted by Mike


Show #9 notes:

Category Categories: Blog Post

No Comments

  1. Darrell says:
    May 3, 2005 at 4:10 pm

    Thanks for covering the accessibility issues with Google. Unfortunately, only Google can resolve the lack of accessibility to their visual verification system. Visual verification is also known as CAPTCHA. Its purpose is to deny access to automated scripts running on computers while allowing access to real, live human beings. This kind of system is needed in order to prevent spam and other forms of Internet abuse. When no accessible alternative to CAPTCHA is made available, the web site developers are excluding the blind from participation. It is just that simple. Visual verification schemes without appropriate, accessible alternatives represent a denial of our very status as human beings possessing the same rights and responsibilities as all others! Accessible alternatives to visual verification do exist, including the playing of the characters to be entered as an audio file. We have asked Google to make their visual verification systems accessible for almost six months now, but there has been absolutely no movement in the right direction. In fact, movement in the wrong direction on Google’s part continued in mid April by the introduction of a visual verification requirement (again without accessible alternatives) in order to create new blogs using their Blogger service!
    Please, everyone, visit http://www.blindaccessjournal.com and http://blog.carrolltech.org, write to Google asking them to make accessible alternatives available for their visual verification tests and provide us with any additional ideas for convincing Google to do the right thing. Thanks.