20 January 2025
It wasn’t too long ago when people would bemoan: “The Internet is terrible for society. Using it isolates yourself. There is no human interaction or engagement.”
Of course that was before Facebook and other social networks took the world by storm. Today, over a billion people a day around the world check in on Facebook at least once a day. You probably know people who spend hours there, messaging with friends and family, posting photos, videos, and whatever is on their minds or they feel is important and interesting.
As a person who is blind or visually impaired, you may have begun to feel a bit left out. All of your friends and family are sharing their various adventures and milestones online, and it seems like all you can do is ask your spouse, “So what are the grandkids up to today?”
In reality, nothing could be further from the truth. As a person who is visually impaired, you can fully access and contribute to Facebook, Twitter, and Linked in—which are far and away the top three most popular ways to stay in touch and expand your social network. All you’ll need are some basic computer or mobile phone accessibility skills.
Accessibility and Facebook
If you are like most people, hardly a day goes by when you don’t hear someone mention something they read or posted onFacebook. Increasingly, Facebook is the go-to way people keep friends and family updated about their lives, activities, and achievements. Did your granddaughter just graduate kindergarten? There is likely an announcement, along with photos and videos, posted on Facebook. Looking for an old high school friend you lost touch with? With hundreds of millions of registered users around the world, the chances are you can find him or her on Facebook.
There is an overwhelming amount of content on Facebook, and people are adding new posts, pictures and videos every minute. At first the sheer amount of material can seem daunting to a blind user, but the Facebook Accessibility Team has worked hard to make their web site and mobile apps accessible to all. Below, we will introduce you to some of the tips and tricks Facebook offers their sight-impaired users.
Using the Keyboard to Navigate Facebook
For computer users who do not use a mouse, including most screen reader users, the main Facebook website makes extensive use of headings, landmarks, and lists, which can be easily navigated with your screen reader quick navigation keys.
When you read a post that makes you smile, you will probably want to access the “Like” button and perhaps add a comment of your own. Facebook enables you to find these special controls and others with a single press of a key combination.
Access Keys. Access keys let you jump quickly from page to page on Facebook with a single key combination, and without having to Tab down to or search for the appropriate control. Below is a listing of the letter keys to be pressed for each special action. The modifier keys you need to press along with these keys will differ, depending on whether your browser of choice is Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, or Safari.
Internet Explorer and Chrome for PC users can press the Alt + 1 to return anytime to the Facebook home page. Note: IE users will have to complete the command with a press of the Enter key.
Firefox for PC users: add Shift to the Alt +1 and other access key commands listed below. For example, Shift + Alt + 2 will jump you directly to your Facebook Timeline.
Mac users of Safari or Chrome: modify each number key command below with the Control + Option keys. For example, press Control + Option+ 3 to see your entire list of Facebook friends.
For Home, press 1
Timeline 2
Friends 3
Inbox 4
Notifications 5
Settings 6
Activity Log 7
About 8
Terms 9
Help 0
News Feed shortcuts. Much the same way that most screen readers offer quick navigation keyboard shortcuts (such as pressing T to move to the next table, or B to move to the next button), Facebook offers a number of shortcut commands for navigating your News Feed.
Function and shortcut key
Shortcut Key
Scroll forward between News Feed stories J
Scroll backward between News Feed stories K
See more of the selected story Enter/Return
Post a new status P
Like or unlike the selected story L
Comment on the selected story C
Share the selected story S
Open an attachment from the selected story O
Search /
Search chat contacts Q
Open a list of these keyboard shortcuts while in News Feed ?
Resolving conflicts with browser shortcuts. Unfortunately, many of these Facebook shortcut keys conflict with browser shortcut keys, so for now at least, you will have to either use your screen reader’s pass-through command, or toggle off browser navigation with NDVA + Spacebar if you are using the free NVDA screen reader, or Shift + CTRL + A for Window-Eyes.
Mac VoiceOver users do not need to change anything.
Thanks to a cooperative effort **** between Facebook and Freedom Scientific, the makers of the JAWS screen reader, starting with version 16, JAWS users will discover a new option in their QuickSettings dialog box: Allow Web Application Reserved Keystrokes. This new setting instructs JAWS to ignore a quick navigation hotkey if it conflicts with an interactive website’s own shortcut hotkeys. Using JAWS on most webpages, typing the letter P instructs JAWS to read the next paragraph. With Reserved Keystrokes enabled, pressing the same letter P on Facebook opens an edit box where you can post a status update. Pressing C opens a comment edit box instead of moving to the next combo box.
Facebook Messenger Shortcuts. Facebook Messenger lets you send typed messages back and forth to logged-in friends and family.
Function and Shortcut
Search conversations CTRL + G
Show/hide keyboard shortcuts CTRL + Q
Archive/unarchive conversation CTRL + Delete
Mark as spam CTRL + J
Start a new message CTRL + M
Go to Inbox CTRL + I
Go to Other CTRL + U
Using Facebook on mobile devices. These days, more and more people are enjoying Facebook on their phones and tablets. The free Facebook Android and iOS apps are quite accessible. Reading, writing, and sharing posts are all easily accomplished on a mobile device. You may even find yourself snapping a photo or two, composing humorous captions, and uploading your images for your friends to view and Like.
Accessibility and Twitter
Twitter is the haiku of social networks. Unlike a Facebook post, which can be as long as it needs to be, Twitter messages, known as tweets, have a 140 character limit. Users must condense their thoughts into a compact posting. So why would you want to constrain your thoughts and use Twitter? On Twitter you can Follow any number of interesting people and organizations. On Facebook, you need to Friend other users in order to follow their posts. On Twitter you can follow anyone, and, unless you protect your account, anyone can follow you and benefit from the wit and wisdom of your pithy and informative Tweets.
When you set up a Twitter account, you are presented with a list of suggested people you might wish to follow. Do you have a favorite comedian? He or she is likely using Twitter, and if you Follow him or her you may be rewarded with an occasional one-liner or rye observation. Are you a news junkie? Follow @CNN and keep up with headlines as they break, often long before you will hear about the same stories on air.
Other Twitter Features
Besides posting tweets and reading the tweets of others, you can also:
Reply to a tweet, or retweet a post so people who follow you can enjoy it.
Tweet a link to a webpage or video you enjoyed, or open a link someone else has tweeted.
Direct a public message to another user by adding the “@” character before his or her Twitter handle. For example, if you follow the Facebook Accessibility Team at @fbaccess, they will see the tweet “@fbaccess Excellent job on that new accessibility feature.”
If you are following someone and they are following you, you can send direct, private messages back and forth that do not display to others.
Accessing Twitter
These days many people use their smartphones to access their Twitter feeds. Both theiOS and Android Twitter apps are quite accessible using VoiceOver or TalkBack respectively. Many Windows PC users enjoy the extra screen reader accessibility features provided by the third-party Chicken Nugget Twitter app, which interfaces directly with the Twitter feed. Night Owl is a popular third-party option for Mac VoiceOver users.
Recently, Twitter has been tightening their restrictions, and the future of these and other third-party solutions is a bit murky. Consequently, you may wish to begin your Twitter experience using one of the official Twitter mobile apps, or at the website.
Twitter Shortcut Keys
Like Facebook, the Twitter website uses a number of shortcut keys to help you access its various features. Below is a list of these shortcuts, but don’t worry about trying to memorize them. If you access Twitter with a screen reader, the site will offer you the opportunity to review them.
Shortcut and Action
n New tweet
f Favorite
r Reply
t Retweet
m Direct message
u Mute user
b Block user
Enter Open tweet details
l Close all open tweets
o Expand photo
/ Search
Ctrl Enter Send tweet
Many of these shortcut keys may conflict with your screen reader’s quick navigation commands. Consequently, you will need to use your screen reader’s pass-through command, or turn off enhanced browser navigation (Forms Mode in JAWS, Focus Mode in NVDA, and Browser Mode in Window-Eyes).
Accessibility and LinkedIn
The last social network we will cover in this guide is LinkedIn.
LinkedIn is a career-oriented social media site, where you can connect with colleagues, work contacts, and potential employers and/or employees. When it comes to career success, networking is critical. With LinkedIn you can gather all of these connections in one place.
Sign up for a free account and you can opt to have LinkedIn import your e-mail or phone contact list and alert you to all the people you know who are already members. You can also search for individuals by name, company, alma mater, and a host of other ways. For each person you know, you are given the opportunity to send a LinkedIn request. When that person responds, presto, he or she is now what is known as a first-level connection.
It would not be unusual for you to wind up with a hundred or more first-level connections. Then comes LinkedIn’s multiplier effect: second and third level connections. These are people who are linked to your connections, or linked to people who are linked to people who are linked to your connections. In other words, these are people who know people you know, or people who know people who know people you know. You can also join special interest groups, such as Virtual Volunteering or Accessible Travel for Persons with Disabilities where you can learn, contribute to the discussion, and cultivate even more connections.
With LinkedIn, you can quickly create an informal network of many hundreds of connections in your industry, in your field of expertise, or at organizations where you may be a good fit for a great new employment opportunity.
Making the Most of LinkedIn
When you sign up for LinkedIn you are asked to create a profile. Spend a good deal of time writing and refining this profile, as it functions as your first impression on the site. Consider composing your profile in your word processing software, where you can check the grammar and correct spelling mistakes easily before you copy and paste the text into the profile data fields.
Include every job, skill, certification, and activity you can think of. You may have a very specific skill set that would make you eminently qualified for a job or volunteer opportunity, but if recruiters don’t know you’re out there, they can’t find you.
Even if you are already retired or happy with your current job, setting up a LinkedIn profile is advisable. Your expanding network of colleagues, potential advisors, and others who share your interests and passions will quickly prove invaluable.
LinkedIn Accessibility
The LinkedIn website is mostly accessible. Content is well formatted with headings and lists so you can use your screen reader’s quick navigation keys to find your way. Alt tags are used wherever possible, though many contributor pages may not always be accessibly marked up.
The company has announced they are working on site-specific shortcut keys such as those used by Facebook and Twitter, but they are not yet available.
Mobile LinkedIn
LinkedIn offers mobile apps for bothiOS andAndroid devices. Using an app to create a LinkedIn account can be problematic from an accessibility standpoint, as there is currently an image-based CAPTCHA that must be completed in order to begin the account signup process. You will either need sighted help to sign up on your mobile device, or you can opt to sign up on the website.
Once logged in, both apps offer notifications, such as when someone wishes to link with you, that will appear in your device’s notifications area. You can also edit your profile, search for and add new connections, and even search and apply for jobs directly from your mobile device.
Getting Accessibility Help for LinkedIn
LinkedIn does not display any accessibility information on either the website or mobile apps. There is a dedicated e-mail address however. If you would like the company to reply to your accessibility questions via phone, be sure to include a number where you can be reached.
https://www.afb.org/blindness-and-low-vision/using-technology/using-social-media-visual-impairment-or-blindness
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