If Your Digital Content Isn’t Accessible, You Could Be Leaving Behind Up to a Billion Users
May 17, 2023
Screen capture shows how the Libraries’ homepage appears to someone with macular degeneration and other visual impairments.
Screen capture showing how the Libraries’ homepage appears to someone with macular degeneration and other visual impairments

Do you create digital content? Whether you’re sharing an opinion, offering a service, or selling a product — if your digital content isn’t accessible to all, you’re simply creating barriers to your own work.

A billion people worldwide have some type of disability. Yet, a 2023 study of a million homepages found that 96.3% failed to meet at least one of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines.

As we celebrate Global Accessibility Awareness Day (GAAD) on May 18, 2023, UT Libraries wants to provide resources to help you learn more about improving the accessibility of your website, software, mobile app, or other digital product.

As stated by the GAAD Foundation: “Every user deserves a first-rate digital experience on the web. Someone with a disability must be able to experience web-based services, content and other digital products with the same successful outcome as those without disabilities. This awareness and commitment to inclusion is the goal of Global Accessibility Awareness Day (GAAD), a global event that shines a light on digital access and inclusion for people with disabilities.”

Check out this list of accessibility/disability-related books, movies, games, and Ted Talks:

Movies

  • Love on the Spectrum (Netflix)
  • Atypical (Netflix — autism spectrum)
  • Girl Interrupted (multiple commercial outlets and DVD at Hodges — adolescent mental illness)
  • A Beautiful Mind (multiple commercial outlets — mental illness)
  • Gattaca (multiple commercial outlets and DVD at Hodges — sci-fi eugenics)
  • Deaf U (Netflix — story of Gallaudet)
  • I am Sam (Prime Video — intellectual disabilities)
  • The Theory of Everything (Prime Video — Stephen Hawking/physical disabilities)
  • Crip Camp (free from Netflix on YouTube)

Knox County Public Library books (Many other book and movie titles also available.  Check the catalog.)

Other books

Learn Something New

Play a Game

Take a Picture

YouTube videos, Ted Talks, and podcasts

Knox County resources

Knoxville resources

UTK resources

 Other