THE ACCESSIBILITY OF SOCIAL NETWORKS: THE VIADEO CASE
Relatore: Prof. Marco Porta
Correlatore:Prof. Mario Dossoni
Correlatore esterno:Dott. Roberto Marmo
Laurea Specialistica inEditoria e Comunicazione Multimediale (ECM)
Tesi di laurea di:Chiara Evangelista
Aim of work is…
To Check and Verify the accessibility of Social Networks(Viadeo in particular) by comparison with accessibilityguidelines (WCAG 2.0) in a “social environment” in whichare all involved , without exceptions
To Spread a culture of accessibility and increase its practical application and the verification of its requirements by the developers of content
To Make clear that the development of accessible resources is a gain in quantitative and qualitative terms
Social Network: definition
“A social network is a social structure made up ofindividuals (or organizations) called "nodes“,which are tied (connected) by one or more specific typesof interdependency, such as friendship, kinship,common interest, financial exchange, dislike,sexual relationships, or relationships of beliefs,knowledge or prestige”
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org
Social Network: birth and development
sixdegrees.comBorn in 1997, remained a niche reality for some time
friendster.comBorn in 2003; unlike sixdegrees.com became immediately famous on the Web
Started the boom of Social Networks on the Web that still does not seem to stop
From Social Networks to Social Media
Social Network:“ […] a social structure made up of individuals (or organizations) called "nodes“
which are tied (connected) by one or more specific types of interdependency […]” (Source: en.wikipedia.org)
Social Media:“a group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0, and that allow the creation and exchange of user-generated content” (Source: en.wikipedia.org)
Disability: definition
“Disabilities is an umbrella term, covering impairments,activity limitations, and participation restrictions. An impairment is a problem in body function or structure; an activity limitation is a difficulty encountered by an individual in executing a task or action; while a participation restriction is a problem experienced by an individual in involvement in life situations”
Source: World Health Organization – http:/www.who.int
Disability: normative sources
Italian Law n. 104/92, Legge-Quadro per l’assistenza, l’integrazione sociale e i diritti delle persone handicappate
Italian Law n. 4/2004, “Disposizioni per favorire l'accesso dei soggetti disabili agli strumenti informatici” c.d. Stanca Law
The Madrid Declaration “Non discrimination plus positive action results in social inclusion (2002)
ONU Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (2007) implemented by Italy in 2009
Accessibility: definition
“Capability of informatic systems, in the forms and limits allowed by technological knowledges, to supply services and to provide usable information, without discriminations even by those who need assistance technologies or special configurations, owing to disabilities” *
“Web accessibility means that people with disabilities can use the Web. More specifically, Web accessibility means that people with disabilities can perceive, understand, navigate, and interact with the Web, and that they can contribute to the Web” **
* Source: Italian Law n.4/2004** Source: http://www.w3.org
About the W3C
“The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is an international community where Member organizations, a full-time staff, and the public work together to develop Web standards. Led by Web inventor Tim Berners-Lee and CEO Jeffrey Jaffe,W3C's mission is to lead the Web to its full potential”
The information are taken from the Web site: www.w3.org
WCAG 2.0
“Web Content Accessibility Guidelines” are the new guidelines for accessibility of Web content (official version of 2008)
They represent the revised edition of the existingWCAG 1.0, written in 1999 for the same purpose
WCAG 2.0: structure
• Principles - At the top are 4 principles that provide the foundation for Web accessibility: perceivable, operable, understandable, and robust
• Guidelines - Under the principles are guidelines. The 12 guidelines provide the basic goals that authors should work toward in order to make content more accessible to users with different disabilities
• Success Criteria - For each guideline, testable success criteria are provided to allow WCAG 2.0 to be used where requirements and conformance testing are necessary such as in design specification, purchasing, regulation, and contractual agreements. In order to meet the needs of different groups and different situations, three levels of conformance are defined: A (lowest), AA, and AAA (highest)
WCAG 2.0: an example
Principle 2. Operable – User interface components and navigation must be operable.
- Guideline 2.1 Keyboard Accessible: Make all functionality available from a keyboard.
• 2.1.1 Keyboard: All functionality of the content is operable through a keyboard interface without requiring specific timings for individual keystrokes, except where the underlying function requires input that depends on the path of the user's movement and not just the endpoints. (Level A)
PRINCIPLE
GUIDELINE
SUCCESS CRITERION
FacebookBorn in 2004 from an intuition of a student of Harward,Mark Zuckerberg, is now the most popular and used Social Network with over
500.000.000 users
- 123.000.000 in Europe
- more than 13.000.000 in Italy
facebook.com: accessibility
m.facebook.com (“Mobile” version)
Founded in 2003, is the Business Social Network with the largest number of usersCurrently has over
75.000.000users
- 15.000.000 in Europe and - 1.000.000 in Italy
linkedin.com: accessibility
m.linkedin.com (“Mobile” version)
The Viadeo case
Founded in 2000, is one of the most popular and used Business Social Network, second only to LinkedInHas currently
30.000.000members
- 10.000.000 in Europe- 700.000 in Italy
Viadeo: study of accessibility
1. Use of colors that create little contrast with the background and therefore are not suitable for low-vision or color blind people
2. Too much content with not enough space between text lines
3. resize the text and change the color scheme
4. display “high contrast” or “content only” versions of the pages
5. vary the structure or order of the content
6. obtain clear indications about mistakes (no checking and suggestions for correction)
Also…
It is not possible to:
Study of Viadeo accessibility: conclusions
• The WCAG 2.0 Guidelines principles satisfied by Viadeo are more than those not satisfied
• However, Viadeo remains partly inaccessible…
• Viadeo developers are currently working to provide a full accessible version
Conclusions
• WCAG 2.0 are available to everyone, so accessibility should be checked for any Web resource
• Accessibility is currently not taken into proper consideration… as demonstrated by the inaccessibility of the two most popular Social Networks: Facebook and LinkedIn
• Prejudice against the “different” is still widespread
• Inaccessible sites preclude their use by a significant number of people
My future project is…
To Continue in my personal studies and research on the subject by creating a space dedicated to them on the Web
To Continue the discussion emphasizing the importance of accessibility and application of his knowledge
To Propose myself as a “consultant for accessibility” for all companies that will want to understand the effectiveness and make accessible design
To Develop innovative projects with major Social Networks
Author
Chiara Evangelista
mail: [email protected]
Viadeo: http://www.viadeo.com/it/profile/chiara.evangelista
LinkedIn: http://it.linkedin.com/in/chiaraevangelista
Tesi on line: http://www.tesionline.it/adminautori/admin.asp
