Created to celebrate the birth of Louis Braille and to raise awareness of sight-related conditions, January 4th is officially designated as World Braille Day. Blind himself from the age of four, Louis Braille is credited with designing a touch-based alphabet, opening the joy of reading to blind and partially sighted people, thereby transforming their education and work options. But how does World Braille Day relates to web content copywriting services?
A picture of a Braille Terminal – a device used to translate on-screen content into a braille equivalent for reading by visually impaired computer users
And the answer is this – the Internet may well be a highly graphical environment, but despite this it remains a valuable tool for use by the partially sighted community. And it is this fact which further underscores the importance of having top-quality web content to underpin your website, regardless of how appealing it is.
Browsers with adjustable font sizing or even screen readers focus on the text on your website, including the description tags attached to your images. For the blind web surfer, it’s all about the web copy as screen readers, or even braille output terminals, do not (and cannot) describe your graphics using anything other than your own wording.
Morals aside, is web content for the blind and partially sighted community a niche which can be safely ignored without harming your business? Probably not. Statistics published by the RNIB in February 2012 indicate that 99% of those surveyed had internet access at home, and 76% browse the web every day. Although the report focuses on the experience of younger people (those aged approximately 19) it is clear that having an “accessible” website with good quality copy is essential.
When designing websites for the largest possible audience it is clear that good quality web content is still the essential foundation on which everything else should be built.
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