Talk:Accessibility of the Wikimedia websites

This paper has been written by Carol Campbell a trustee of Wikimedia UK. She is very interested in 'getting the ball rolling' on issues around accessibility on Wikipedia and all other wikis. She is fairly certain that this is not the first time these issues have been raised but would like to commit to bringing together people interested in finding answers to some of the issues she is raising. Please add your names below and offer any background or insights you may have. Thanks Jon Davies (WMUK) (talk) 15:39, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

I am interested in helping on these issues

• Richard Symonds (WMUK) (talk)
• RexxS
• Pigsonthewing
• Ukwebfocus
• Please add your name

These are my thoughts

• I am very interested in how we can get around the problem of 'inline links'. For example, if I was to link to Google (click here), this isn't very useful. Wikis tend to do this all the time and it creates a real problem for the disabled. Richard Symonds (WMUK) (talk) 16:09, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
• I've been an active advocate for WikiProject Accessibility for several years, and I have considerable experience in web design and WCAG 1.0 & 2.0, as well as the accessibility problems specific to wikimedia software. --RexxS (talk) 16:31, 13 January 2014 (UTC)
• What RexxS said. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 17:21, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Alt tags for images etc

I support in principle all of the ideas set out in this paper, but, based on some significant time working on these things on and off wiki, have some concerns about the ways to make the improvements.

To take one example - ALT tags for images. I remember a campaign on wikipedia to make these a requirement for any article being nominated for GA or FA status. I spent many hours gradually learning to write descriptions of what could be seen in the image rather than just what the subject was. I nominated one (I think the first at FAC) and the descriptions were challenged on all sorts of grounds: not "neutral", not "verifiable", "original research" and similar. Others experienced similar concerns and the requirement for ALT tags was removed & seems to have languished ever since.

Having investigated captioning etc for educational videos, the labour intensive nature of the process was challenged by managers as not being "cost-effective" and falling outside "reasonable adjustments" as defined under the act - although this may have changed since.

Although I would agree that it is important for Wikimedia UK to work on improvements in this area, I would suggest that many of the features need should be built into the mediawiki software, which is presumably a very different issue.Rodw (talk) 16:37, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Well, that'll teach you to mix with the FAC crowd ;-) We can do better than that. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 17:21, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

CC-BY-SA

The contents of this wiki are CC-BY-SA, indeed all contributors are clearly warned "If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly and redistributed at will, then do not submit it here." If the text currently pasted on this page is copyright of the RNIB and they do not wish it to become CC-BY-SA, then I suggest it is removed and we use the links to the RNIB guidelines so that everyone can read it at the source, rather than cut & pasting the text onto this wiki. This wiki was created to remain CC-BY-SA which fits the mission of the charity very well, there seems no need to change it to allow cut & pasting from copyrighted sources.

My understanding of copyright on the webpage as it currently stands is that the informal note at the top of the page does not introduce a waiver for the site-wide free release of all its contents. The page is confusing for a re-user and may fail to protect the copyright of the RNIB. --Fæ (talk) 17:30, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

I think I probably agree, I can imagine automated downloads (for example) where the addition of a div provides no machine readable means to remove the page from a CC repository. I wonder if there are other things we don't/can't release under open license such that we might justify having a separate namespace for such content. Sjgknight (talk) 17:37, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Can't it just be linked to, or could the RNIB be asked to release the text under a free license? Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 08:43, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

Could an employee or trustee please take some bold action and remove text that may be a copyright violation sooner rather than later. I would do this, but as a mere member of the charity, no longer feel I am empowered to interfere with employee or trustee pages on this wiki unless invited to do so. --Fæ (talk) 11:30, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

Broader issue?

If the items mentioned here affect this wiki, then they're likely to affect all wikis. Wouldn't it be better to work with the WMF to get design changes made in the default Vector skin, which is also used here, rather than trying to solve these issues uniquely for this wiki? Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 08:47, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes, it would. LZ (talk) 09:22, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

RexxS has already mentioned the WikiProject Accessibility and I was very interested to find a wider scope of disability and accessibility that I expected. And the effects on usability for everybody would improve by addressing these issue. LZ (talk) 09:27, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

Hi Mike, I've not really been involved in these discussions but I'm fairly certain the intention is not just a narrow focus on our own Wiki, it's to look for areas we might have wider impact Sjgknight (talk) 11:17, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

The discussion does relate to all wikis. The current title is something of a misnomer. We should consider accessibility of our own website, but it is certainly a wider issue. Richard Nevell (WMUK) (talk) 11:48, 14 January 2014 (UTC)