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The Fediverse ALT-Text issue (thelemmy.club)
submitted 6 months ago by to c/fediverse@lemmy.world
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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

Screenshot of Mastodon "Preferences" > "Filters" > "Add new filter". The "Add new filters" page is open, under "Filter controls" a new red checkbox labeled “NO ALT” is added.
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[–] 21 points 6 months ago (15 children)

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

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  • [–] 4 points 5 months ago (3 children)

    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 :)

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  • [–] 1 point 5 months ago (1 child)

    ‘iPhone Magnifier and Voice over’

    I don't hear her complaining.

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  • [–] 2 points 5 months ago

    Yep, which is why I acknowledge that thats not my ingroup and while I think we should be considerate of potential issues with ai as a accessibility solution, its important to listen to people who actually depend on things like alt text. I've heard from people who are frustrated that ai gets treated as a standin for other humans caring about accessibility and find it unable to fill their needs, and I'm sure there are also people who find it really helpful. I couldn't claim to know what perspective is more common among folks with visual disabilities 🤷🏻‍♂️

    But I do think its worth considering and not just saying "ai solves this problem, let's just give visually impaired people ai descriptions" without trying to discuss what that means for people and listen to folks on whether thats what's needed or wanted

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  • [–] -1 points 5 months ago (9 children)

    I thought we were anti AI...?

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  • [–] 3 points 5 months ago (6 children)

    It's a polarised topic but doesn't need to be, IMO - I still see it as a tool, albeit a powerful one with lots of risks and drawbacks, but the cats out of the bag at this point so we may as well roll with it and make the most of the applications for good. Like with many other massive, rapid technical advancements of the past.

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  • [–] -4 points 5 months ago (5 children)

    AI is quite unlike other "rapid technical advancements of the past" in that sense. It's so damaging to people, society and environment that there is currently no possibility that any use you make of it, "well-intentioned" or not, can improve things. Any "we might as well use it" s little more than joining the oppression.

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  • [–] 7 points 5 months ago

    Imagine thinking that LLMs are so toxic that you'd think we're splitting the atom, a technology so polarizing that it became a security issue. Any yet, nuclear power is an incredible scientific achievement, and something we still use all over the place. But, it's also a technology that we still aren't fully utilizing 80 years later, because of fearmongers like you taking away any sense of nuance in the conversation, and letting blind absolutism govern your opinions.

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  • [–] 5 points 5 months ago (3 children)

    I replied to you with an example of AI recognizing things that the phone camera sees, to tell the blind user about them. That reply was before this comment of yours. I myself am also a person using auto-generated subtitles on YouTube, because my hearing isn't too good, especially for the non-native English language.

    Yet you claim that none of these uses improve things. So you see less-able people as unworthy of improvements to their lives. Nice to know, because an opinion stemming from bigotry can be summarily dismissed.

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  • [–] -2 points 5 months ago (2 children)

    You are somehow interpreting me not seeing the good in AI as if it was the same as less-able people being unworthy of aid? Please, get off your high horse. I never said that. I simply say AI is not the way, or even a way. AI is the solution to an invented problem, being sold as such, when people say "only AI can cope with the scale", have you stopped to ask, where does the scale come from? And, for that matter, 85% of what people call "AI" is actually just remote operators in Kenya or India, so what is "scaling" is just oppressing more and more people to unworthy work conditions.

    Oh well. You do you. Their goal is to get their victims to fight each other. I'm stopping here.

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  • [–] 2 points 5 months ago*

    You are somehow interpreting me not seeing the good in AI as if it was the same as less-able people being unworthy of aid?

    I provided examples of the good delivered specifically by AI for disabled people, you still continue to dismiss it. This means that either you're particularly dumb, pretend to be so, or are a bigot. Choose for yourself which one it is.

    I simply say AI is not the way, or even a way. AI is the solution to an invented problem

    Blind people not being able to see unless someone, or an AI, describes the surroundings for them, is an invented problem? You seem to be doubling down on either the bigotry or the idiocy.

    But wait, since you say AI isn't the way, you surely have another solution in mind. You know you're free to advocate for that solution instead, without being an asshole toward disabled people.

    when people say “only AI can cope with the scale”, have you stopped to ask, where does the scale come from?

    That video is from 2020. Pray tell, were you also protesting against AI in 2020, or did you finger your ass instead until it's become fashionable to hate ChatGPT, so you could blindly transfer that hate onto Apple too? Have you ever spent a second to learn that the Neural Engine accelerator for AI functionality was included in iPhones since 2017, or did you just pull your ideas about 'AI scale' out of your asshole? Do you even understand what it means when AI processing is done locally on end-user devices, or did three buzzwords about AI hate block the entirety of your feeble reasoning ability?

    And, for that matter, 85% of what people call “AI” is actually just remote operators in Kenya or India

    Or really, please feel free to provide any semblance of proof that Apple's AI is done by people in Kenya, India or wherever, despite the Neural Engine chip. Be sure especially to highlight how the poor overworked people are able to do sub-second responses to millions of queries every day, with no change in the cadence of quality of the responses.

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  • [–] 1 point 5 months ago

    Speak for yourself, being able to describe an image or generate subtitles when there are none made by the original creator while it might not be perfect, is great for accessibility and people who have hearing or visual impairments are happy to have them.

    Also because a lot of anti-AI people on here have decided that impersonating me, making fun of my cancer an alcoholism, and even straight up doxxing me is an acceptable reaction to me hosting AI friendly communities is an acceptable reaction I don't have any more patience for these people, especially considering that 90% of their arguments are debunked by on-device AI, and the other 10% are neoliberal Pro-IP and Pro-Copyright arguments.

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