Alt-texts for profile images probably becoming mandatory, image descriptions for images in Mastodon link previews probably becoming mandatory, probably even for non-Mastodon users; CW: long (almost 4,500 characters), Fediverse meta, Fediverse-beyond-Mastodon meta, alt-text meta, image description meta, ableism meta
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More and more Mastodon users are acting like alt-texts for profile images are becoming mandatory Fediverse-wide. Never mind that they're currently being rolled out by and by and only on Mastodon even.
Here on Hubzilla, they aren't even a thought, also because Hubzilla doesn't know the concept of images having their own dedicated alt-text database field. (Before you ask: Hubzilla handles images and therefore alt-texts in messages vastly differently from Mastodon to begin with.)
At the same time, more and more Mastodon users are acting like image descriptions for the images in the link previews that are generated automatically in Mastodon timelines are becoming mandatory Fediverse-wide. Never mind that Mastodon itself has barely got enough character capacity to describe these preview images at the high level of detail that so many Mastodon users love, what with its meagre default character limit of 500.
Also, never mind that you'll have to edit your post to describe the preview image because it only appears
after you've tooted your toot, so you can't see it before you toot your toot.
Also, never mind that everyone outside Hubzilla will get an image description for an image that's entirely absent because they don't have Mastodon-style link previews, because these link previews are a Mastodon-only thing.
Again, this is even worse here on Hubzilla. Unlike Mastodon, Hubzilla has a preview button that lets you look at your message before you actually send it. But Hubzilla doesn't generate link previews. And Hubzilla's preview button doesn't offer you the option to show you what your message will look like on Mastodon.
So I'd have to
- write and send my message as usual
- switch to a tab with mastodon.social
- look for my message by using the hashtag search
- check whether Mastodon has generated a link preview, and if so, which image it has chosen
- find a copy of the image with the highest resolution possible;
alternatively, if it's an in-world image from OpenSim, log into OpenSim, travel to that place and take a close look at the place to write a highly detailed image description (takes from five hours to two days) - switch back to my Hubzilla tab
- edit my message
- add the image description
- re-count the characters in the message
- edit the message
- add a long post content warning with the current character count if there is none, and it isn't a comment; edit the character count of the existing long post content warning if there already is one
- save the edit
- discover that Mastodon hasn't recognised my edit as such, and now there are two copies of the same message on Mastodon, the old one without the image description and the new, longer one with the image description
All just to describe an image that isn't even there for my fellow Hubzilla users. Nor is it there for my contacts on Friendica, (streams), Forte, Misskey, Iceshrimp-JS, Iceshrimp.NET, Sharkey, Pleroma, Akkoma, snac2, GoToSocial, Hollo, Socialhome, Mitra, PieFed, Wafrn etc.
By the way, if a message comes from something else than Mastodon, and there's no actual link in it, Mastodon often creates a link preview for the profile or channel page of whoever has sent the message and picks their profile photo as the image for the link preview. Essentially, I'd have to reliably know when Mastodon does that, write two image descriptions for my profile photo (it's a rendering from OpenSim, and I always describe these twice; besides, people should have a shorter description next to my usual detailed description) and copy-paste
both into each post for which Mastodon will generate a link preview for my channel page.
Fortunately, Mastodon doesn't show Hubzilla profiles or channels like Hubzilla itself shows them, and neither do Mastodon apps. Otherwise, if Mastodon users figure out that the background image of my channel is part of my channel customisation and not a default Hubzilla Web UI element, they may demand I add an alt-text for the background image, lest I be mass-blocked as an ableist.
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