Every day, Facebook, Instagram, Messenger and WhatsApp users send and share more than two billion photos. But for people who are blind or visually impaired, it’s a party they’re largely excluded from.
This led the Facebook team to try to create a generation that allows this network to stand out and Facebook like any other.
Automatic text choice is a complex neural network that necessarily generates a description of a symbol. It uses Facebook’s popularity of complicated objects that is transmitted through the elements of the photo, which means that any screen reader can hear a basic description of the photo, represent an image symbol of each.
Before this technology, screen reader users could only hear the call of the user who shared the symbol and knew it as a photo when they met them in their feeds.
“We can now offer a richer description of the content of a photo, thanks to automatic alt text. For example, you might now hear, “The symbol can involve 3 people, smiling, outside,” Facebook says. It is true that this is not exactly ideal, however, it is a step forward and may lead to even better technologies in the years to come.
The generation will be available first on iOS screen readers set up in English, but Facebook plans to roll it out on more platforms and more languages.