Blind-accessible porn
At glasshaus, we used to joke that a book on developing usable, accessible porn would sell millions of copies, but wreck the brand, so we didn’t do it.
So I’m delighted to note that there is a porn site out there marketed at the (primarily) blind, male, heterosexual market. THIS IS NOT SAFE FOR WORK! Enjoy soundsdirty.com.
And, although it uses a lot of inline CSS, it validates as xhtml 1.0 strict, and there’s a well-considered accessibility statement which I quote a little of for those whose employers frown on their visiting adult entertainment sites from work:
All content images used in this site include descriptive ALT attributes – limited to approximately 150 characters. Purely decorative graphics include null ALT attributes.
Complex images include LONGDESC attributes or inline descriptions to explain the significance of each image to non-visual users. All pictures of the models on this site have comprehensive descriptions for example in the meet the girls section the thumbnails contain a brief description, with the option to click the link to hear the full description. Due to the nature of the SD.com site certain images are deem to be of great significance and may contain slightly longer descriptions.
And here’s a serious point: the porn industry is traditionally not famed for putting moral concerns before cash generation, so if these guys think there’s a market for blind-friendly internet porn, why do so many mainstream businesses lock out the disabled customer? </hectoring and finger-wagging>
Thanks to my completely anonymous informant for alerting me to this.
12 Responses to “ Blind-accessible porn ”
Mainstream business? Like a Stella Artois sponsored fim festival for instance?
Sorry, Bruce. That was lazy.
You’d think that if there is a case to make porn accessible to blind people, there would be a pretty good case to make buying tickets for films just as easy.
Hopefully, just as porn led the way for credit card payments and paid-for- content, their financial muscle will lead to some advancement in other areas too.
I never thought I’d ever see an accessible porn site. I didn’t think it was even possible. I wonder how long it will take for the millions of other sites to begin following suit.
I should personally take it upon myself to take a look at porn websites, as a whole, and report back (with links) on the general state on accessibility in the world of web-based porn.
Oooh! Doctor baby!
How can one forget porn for the blind on Fleshbot?
Fucken oath I would volunteer to test it! I am a blind person myself… It wouldn’t be that hard to find volunteers. Open up your mind a bit more people.
There are also a few of us producing erotic audio stories. Although not specifically intended for the blind, If the blind or visually impaired could find us, they would enjoy listening to my stories.
According to PAS 78, wouldn’t a truly accessible site require extensive user testing? Where, oh where, would they find volunteers for that?