Mar 19 2008
Social networking sites score low on accessibility – State of the eNation 2008
Abilitynet’s latest “State of the e-nation” report says social networking websites – like Yahoo, Youtube, Facebook, MySpace and Bebo – are either difficult or impossible for disabled people to use. In many cases users were not even able to register with websites.
Facebook is described as “a professional looking exterior belies a range of accessibility issues”, and gets a 1 star out of 5 review. MySpace is also slated as having “significant accessibility and usability issues across the website”, and likewise scores a miserable 1 out of 5.
However, Yahoo does better with 2 stars and is praised for using serif fonts and resizable text to make reading easier.
Sadly, the Brave New World trumpeted by social networking sites is not as democratic and inclusive as it appears, so roll on accessible Web 2.5.
You can download “State of the e-nation” reports all the way back to 2003 from here.
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