‘Guys, I’m color blind. I can’t figure out what you are talking about’ – This was the complaint of a frustrated client during a workshop I conducted years ago. The workshop was about ‘Design-Thinking’ and the slides were full of colors.
We ignored his feedback and did not change our slides for future workshops. We had many excuses for not making our slides more accessible. The main one was- ‘we did not want to spend time and effort to accommodate one person out of 20 in the room.’
Let’s be real. A common practice among global organizations and enterprises is to incorporate accessibility into their product development. However, how does this translate to the everyday production of technology?
Microsoft 365 products offer a range of accessibility features to help everyone create, communicate, and collaborate effectively. However, some features may not be accessible to all audiences, such as charts with color-coded segments. For example, if I have a chart with a red segment and I refer to it as the Red Segment, some people may not be able to identify it quickly or at all, even with a descriptive legend. A better way to make the chart more accessible is to use labels or patterns instead of colors or to avoid using color names in the text. This way, everyone can understand the chart without relying on color perception.
Accessibility is a topic that caught my attention after reading a piece by a former colleague who is a Thought Leader in this field and experimenting with some AI tools myself. I want to share some insights that I gained from this exploration.
I was curious about how AI can enable people with disabilities to overcome their challenges and access opportunities. Firstly, let’s understand accessibility and AI.
Accessibility is the design and practice of making products, systems, and environments usable by everyone, regardless of their abilities and disabilities. It is not only a human right, but also a social and economic imperative, as more than one billion people worldwide have some form of disability, according to the world health organization. Lack of accessibility can limit people to exercise their right to education, employment, and well-being.
AI – The science and engineering of creating intelligent machines that can perform tasks that normally require human intelligence, such as vision, speech, decision-making, and natural language processing, can actually help in providing accessibility.
In my example, AI can bring the ability to enhance presentations in various ways. For instance, it can detect what the presenter is saying and automatically emphasize the pie chart on the screen. Alternatively, it can translate the color words in the speech to the corresponding colors on the chart and provide audio captions for the listener.
My search to understand AI and Accessibility ranged from reading/scanning multiple articles, evaluating a few common products available in the market, and of course, asking the AI itself.
I also came across this wonderful article on how AI can help with accessibility. I have tried to summarize it below.
The article discusses how artificial intelligence (AI) can be used to improve accessibility for people with disabilities. It provides examples of how AI can be used to help people with visual, hearing, and mobility impairments.
The article also discusses some of the challenges that come with using AI for accessibility. For example, AI systems may not always be accurate or reliable, and there is a risk that they could perpetuate biases or discrimination if they are not designed and tested carefully.
Overall, the article highlights the potential benefits of using AI for accessibility while also acknowledging the need for careful design and testing to ensure that these systems are effective and equitable.
AI is involved in providing better accessibility features, but yes this is only the beginning.
So, as we endeavor to harness artificial intelligence to facilitate people with accessibility needs until such technology becomes ubiquitous for accessibility purposes, it is incumbent upon us to provide paramount accessible functionalities for our clientele and institutions.
Next time, when I build a presentation, I will try my best to be mindful of the audience, and yes, my colorful representation will change to a pattern representation.
Cheers. Let’s do things accessible.
mgrb 