#text to speech accessibility

[alwerakoo]

A post to all (fan)fiction writers, surrounding text to speech accessibility.

For the past few years, I've been using a text to speech app on my phone to read - mostly fanfiction. I do it simply for convince sake, not because of any accessibility issues. The point of this post is NOT to police how anyone chooses to format their work, but to point out a few things that may not occur to someone who never used TTS. These apply to the specific app I use, I don't know how widespread they are.

1. Using long strings of "//////" or "-----" makes TTS goes absolutely nuts. It reads out every. Single. One. I often have to go to the app to manually skip those parts. Also note that if you only use bigger gaps to indicate a section break, your TTS readers don't hear that indication

2. Formatting a character saying something very fast like this: "sayingsomethingveryfast-" makes TTS read it out very quicky, to the point where it's practically incoherent

3. Made up acronyms spelled with dots makes TTS read one letter at a time. While that is usually how they're meant to be read, but there are exceptions (ex. S.H.E.L.D.O.N. from ROTTMNT)

4. Written out accents make some dialogue basically incoherent, since TTS doesn't recognize them as real words anymore (this can also include things like baby talk ect)

5. Emojis and symbols can cause it to freak out (just something to keep in mind when you have unusual formating)

-

Using TTS comes with many "quirks" and most of them are not the fault of the formating itself, which is why I only listed things I would genuinely love to see be taken in greater consideration. This is coming from a ff lover and writer. Thank you for reading <3

[describe-things]

This post is made with speech to text because my hand hurts from typing so much today. Please forgive any typos or speech to text swapping similar sounding words.

If you would like to start writing your own image descriptions, feel free to ask any questions.

The main things to keep in mind is that they should begin with some variation of image description start or ID, and end with some variation of image description and, and ID or something like that. This distinguish the image description from the caption or anything else.

Image descriptions should not be written in italics, bold, all caps, or any colors. If text in the image is in all caps, write it in regular case, and simply note before or after it that it's in all caps.

Image descriptions should describe all images in the post, without skipping any. This includes images that are nothing but text.

Plain text image descriptions in the body of the post are more accessible than alt text alone, because many people who need image descriptions cannot use alt text, and Tumblr is known for its glitches, so the accessibility of the alt text all by itself varies widely over time.

It is more accessible to have the image descriptions indented than not, because this helps to visually separate the image description from the caption. Having brackets or parentheses at the end is also helpful for this. This allows people to easily distinguish between the caption and the image description if they need to.

If you are an artist, writing image descriptions for your art will give you full control over the image description, and will allow you to correctly identify details that others might miss. This gives you the opportunity to show which parts of your art hold meaning to you and are important to notice.

If you are describing real people who are unknown to you, unless it is specified within the post or you are already aware, please do not assign any gendered terms to them, or any " male presenting or female presenting" terms like that. This is completely unnecessary and leads to misgendering. It is best to simply describe visible facts about the people. Hair color, length, clothes and style, pose, expression, the light or darkness of their skin, things like that. Do not assume that someone is white simply because they have light skin.

Do not use image descriptions to lie to the audience in any way and do not use image descriptions to make jokes where the audience reading the image description is the butt of the joke.

As an example, if there is a very clearly fake screenshot, do not say that it is simply a screenshot, or if a photo is very blatantly photoshopped, do not say that it is simply a photo. Say an edited photo, a badly edited photo, a screenshot with editing, something like that to indicate the changes have been made and then what you are going to be describing is not the natural version.

As an example, you would say a crab photoshopped to be driving a car. Rather than a photo of a crab driving a car.

Unless you are transcribing a text within the image, do not use meme speak within image descriptions. Do not refer to dogs as doggos for example, unless it is to specify that the dog in the image is, within the image, labeled as a doggo. Do not describe someone walking downstairs as breasted bubbly downstairs, even if it is an actor humorously walking down the stairs to imitate that sentence. Describe the facts of the movements, and then you can make the comparison for clarity.

If someone adds an image description to your post whether this be an original post or a reblog that you have added an image to, it doesn't matter how many notes to post already has, please copy and paste that image description into the original post or your original reblog. If it is a new post that has only a few notes from friends, after you update the original, you can just ask your friends to delete the reblogs of the inaccessible version and reblog the new one. Most people who are good people and care about disabled people will happily do so.

Keep in mind that image descriptions are accessibility tools. Treat them as such.

Anyone can write image descriptions. You do not need any special qualifications or training. As long as you are willing to take constructive criticism if you make a mistake, an image description written by someone who's new to it and honestly doing their best with good intentions is better than no image description at all.

I'm sure I'm forgetting some things, so please feel free to add on more tips and advice.

[netscapenavigator-official]

Hey, so here’s a fun accessibility thing I just learned. If you use the “Speak Selection” option (or a screen reader) on iOS, you can teach it to pronounce things correctly. Go to

Settings -> Accessibility -> Spoken Content -> Pronunciations

and you can set custom pronunciations for any word the screen reader voice doesn’t pronounce right. I use the iOS “Speak” button in the Copy/Paste menu a lot to check for typos and generally make sure my grammar is compatible with text-to-speech programs, so occasionally I stumble across a word that the Siri Voice just butchers. Now I can correct it, and that’s pretty neat!

[cacodaemonia]

I've seen a lot of people panicking, getting really angry, and sharing blatant misinformation about this upcoming lore.fm app, so I wanted to share this update I found from the creator.

I'm not defending it because I haven't seen exactly how it works yet, but from what I can tell, it's similar to a desktop program such as Calibre, which is what I (and many other people) often use for text-to-speech to read fics.

Calibre downloads the fic (just like ANYONE can download fics from AO3, mind you) into the computer from a URL provided by the user, and reads it from that file with the wonky robotic voice. I don't know if the lore.fm app even downloads the pages users provide for it to read, or if it just accesses them on a case-by-case basis, but I suspect it's the latter because otherwise, they would need to pay for a LOT of cloud storage.

Maybe the app is totally shady, but it could also be an attempt to make an accessibility tool for mobile screen reading that doesn't suck. The project definitely seems clumsily-executed, and they should really be providing more information beyond their TOS, privacy policy, and tiktok videos, but that doesn't automatically make them nefarious. It's also unclear to me if they are simply 'marketing' this as a better way to listen to fics that haven't been podficced, or if it can be used on any website, but I think it's the latter? I don't have a tiktok account and I don't feel like sifting through a bunch of videos, so. 🤷

Anyway, before you send them angry emails or messages on social media or share rumors, please consider looking into this on your own rather than relying on wild speculation.

Oh, and here's a reddit post from someone who emailed @ao3org and got a reply from them regarding the legality.

EDIT: looks like the app is shutting down. I'm still not sure what their goal was, exactly. Such a weird situation.

[mittenlady]

it is incredibly easy to tell when people can not write simon blackquill because his speech — at least for his TwIsTeD sAmUrAi persona — is so distinct. it’s difficult for me to explain in words, but if you look at the game transcripts for any period of time you should be able to get a sense for it and it is so aggravating to see fanworks where he isn’t yapping like some victorian era chap with a disposition for the macabre. a heinous fiend pried from the pages of penny dreadful.

“from the outset, i had no intention of paying heed to any of your babble”? bars. he calls apollo a “whelp.” impeccable. “the defendant sought to sow this confusion”? brilliant. “nothing but claptrap and balderdash if you ask me”? iconic. read some 18th century literature or ask the spirit of jane austen for her aid before putting the name of simon blackquill in your mouth my good chap

[nexus-nebulae]

"why are you so worried abt random accidents, stuff like that rarely ever happens" well you see I'm too disabled to ever evacuate a situation on my own, so I'd rather be a safety advocate now than become a statistic later

[hoiburto]

Can fanfic writers [ & people who post digital stuff in general! ] please be mindful that the dividers that consist of repeated symbols, such as [~~~~~], or [+++++], (& others used too) are read out loud by the majority of text to speech programs. For example, if I were to add a break right tilde tilde tilde tilde tilde tilde tilde tilde now, that's annoying. People who use these text to speech programs for accessibility have to listen to every single symbol you add to your work, or manually skip past, which, for many people using text to speech- defeats the point of the tool. Not saying avoid those details entirely, but maybe they don't have to span the entire width of the page?

[friendraichu]

My only real gripe with Dropout is their subtitling. It is horrendous, I think especially on D20. Constant mistakes and seems like every other line won't make sense if you're deaf or hard-of-hearing.

I just have auditory processing issues so most of the time I can tell that the captions are wrong, but I can't imagine how misleading the captions are to folks with less of an ability to decipher the audio.

Like I'm sorry to sound harsh but hire someone new for that department, because the quality control is abysmal.

[autismcultureis]

Autism culture is letting self use text-to-speech on phone for accessibility and wondering why you didn't just do this earlier

.

[orv-random-quotes]

day 15

[The new story 'Kim Dojega's Legend' has been created on Peace Land.]

...I hoped they would at least get my name right.

[novella-november]

Okay, I've been playing around with the Voice to Text tool built into Windows computers as an accessibility option for those who struggle to physically write or type their works, and it's working pretty decently!

but the second half of this post time actually using voice to text tool. to type it. There's a few small spelling things, but I think there is a way to calibrate it to your speech. Though to be slightly more accurate. I'm just not sure where to find that, because I've only been fiddling with it for a few minutes. Right now, I had auto punctuate turned on and had turned off. Profanity Filter. I am using a pair of generic $10 Bluetooth headphones. They have a microphone belt into them. But if you have a dedicated microphone, that would probably work even better. you can download different language packages to recognize different whereas. in different languages you can type in more than just English. and I am hoping there is a way to add auto correct to certain names. In words so that I can say it how it's pronounced in a different language and have it be spelled correctly in English. such as for "Arsenal, Lupe". "Arsen Lu Pan". which as you can see voice access does not want to spell correctly. or will spell as just random words that sound like his name. LOL. As then, Lupin. Arsene Lupin. It wants me to pronounce his name as "are-sane Loopin" And even then, it does not get it correctly. Most of the time. anyways. So while it is not perfect, this is just like the base thing built into all windows computers. There's probably actual programs that let you train it on your voice that would be even better for dictating your novel, but this is an option anyone with a windows Computer should be able to access for free!

Back to typing by hand: if anyone has any tips, tricks, or guides for using Windows Voice Access for accurate dictation, please feel free to share here!

for those wondering, my favorite Public Domain character's name is spelled "Arsène Lupin" and is pronounced close to "arson" but with an "e" instead of an "o" -- Arsen -- and Lupin is pronounced Lou-pon, not loo-pin, hence why the English language voice access is having trouble parsing it lol.

If anyone knows of how to manually add corrected words and spelling to the Voice Access Dictionary, that would be great for anyone who plans on writing fantasy or scifi novels, or just anyone like me writing about ""our son blue pond"" as speech to text commonly spells it 😭

[thecouncil-aac]

Good news!

I have found a way to use our AAC app most effeciently/effectively!!

Typing the entire sentence on the keyboard and using it as a TTS instead of custom making each button and phrase... can't believe we hadn't figured this out earlier...

[snail-friend]

Me: I would like to read this pdf with my phones built in screen reading software :)

Software: OK! Can do pdfs!

Me: great! Please read this selection as you have done for many other things

Software:??? No text found there?????? :(

BRB gonna kill the guy who made pdfs impossible to highlight for DRM :)

[rivkae-winters]

Hey I’m not sure if you’ve made the post already, but if not, I’d be interested in knowing how to use that reading tool on ios and other apps/sites/any options out there that you also like and are not the suspicious shit the lore.fm seems to be. I just read the posts you made on them… and yeah… they seem to be at the very least unethical

Im so sorry it’s taken so long for me to answer this! I initially started writing my guide on the 12th but my health has been fairly poor so things didn’t go as planned XD

Thankfully, someone on Reddit beat me to it and was also able to cover the android reading mode as well as iOS’s native features! I would not currently have been able to cover the android features due to recent tech issues so this is spectacular- more information than I could have provided for sure!

Their Reddit post on the topic is here and the tumblr version is here

The guide is hosted on a separate website https://fanficttsguide.my.canva.site/ and here is the direct link for ease of access!

To clearly credit: this guide is thanks to @chaosisbeauty23

[rjalker]

I'm actually really mad about the op blocking me for adding an image description to that post because I spent a lot of fucking effort typing that out on my phone. It took like 10 whole minutes to not get any typos. And then my hands hurt.

So another PSA. ALT text alone is not accessible to everyone who needs an image description, which is too many people to count.

There are tons of people who need image descriptions but cannot use alt text. If there are images in your post, the most accessible way to describe them is to have a plain text image description in the body of the post itself. Not in the alt text, not hidden under a read more, and most certainly not linked in another post. (Yes. That is an actual thing I have seen people doing).

And do not purposefully refuse to describe part of your image and then get pissed off when somebody else takes the time to describe it for you. If you are only describing half the images in your post and purposefully not describing the rest then your post is inaccessible and you are just being an ableist piece of shit on purpose! (Yes! This is an actual thing I've seen people do!)

Image descriptions are accessibility tools meant to make the post that you are looking at right at that moment accessible. It doesn't work if it's only in the alt text where people can't use it, or if it's under a read more which will direct the person away from the post and to your blog, which could have the most inaccessible setup possible. Not to mention if you ever change your URL or delete the original post everything under the read more is gone forever.

Is your post meant to be accessible? Is your blog meant to be welcoming to disabled people of all kinds?

Then include plain text image descriptions along with ALT text.

And if you refuse to do this because you think plain text image descriptions ruin the aesthetic of your blog, then you're just ableist and don't actually care about making your blog accessible and need to admit that.

If you're going to block people who take the time to add plain text image descriptions to your posts, then say that on the fucking post itself so disabled people can block you already and not have to waste our time helping to make your goddamn post accessible.

[catadioptrics]

"Sometimes I wonder how Giratina does that backmasked speech thing."

".seunitnoc ti sa tluciffid erom steg ylevissergorp taht tset yticapac ciborea egatsitlum a si tseT recaP marGssentiF ehT"

"No, that's not it."