If you think the phrase “Click Here!” is annoying, try being blind. The still ubiquitous two word command trips up screen readers, tools used by the visually impaired to read web pages.

People using this tool often skip around from link to link, bypassing the text in order to get a quick idea of what the site is all about. Knowing this, it makes sense that a link labeled “Register for Email List” is more useful than a link labeled “Click Here” or, even worse, “More.”

That’s just one of the blog optimization tips discussed in a recent article by the American Foundation for the Blind that tells you How to Make Your Blog Accessible to Blind Readers. This 7 tips discussed are relatively quick and painless to implement, and cover such topics as writing image descriptions and where to locate your blogroll.

The tips article is culled from a larger AFB study which asks Is Blogging Accessible to People with Vision Loss? The study evaluates several prominent blogs, including a few of our faves – Hacking Netflix and Steve Rubel’s Micro Persuasion.

Believe it or not, one of the hardest parts for the blind is getting started. Those verifcation boxes that spell out spam relief for most of us and have prompted some fun Craigslist v-word postings are big trouble to bloggers who are visually impaired. Some sites provide work-arounds, but it’s often a highly technical, convoluted process.

On a related note, Waxy.org links to a Simpsons episode captioned out loud for the blind using Descriptive Video Services technology. It’s being compared to an old-time radio show:

“Every sign, locale and visual gag is described by a harried announcer employed by Fox Television and WGBH.”

With the third-person intervention, there’s also a fair degree of editorialization going on throughout the episode:

“Homer pretends to smoke a joint at one point and the DVS description of his action only says ‘Homer pretends to smoke.’

Learn more about DVS technology.

This entry was posted on Monday, May 23rd, 2005 at 12:14 pm and is filed under Blogging. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.