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Re: - Auto-refreshing advertisements

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From: Hayman, Douglass
Date: Jan 16, 2024 9:06AM

Barry,

This is a great topic to bring up. I've seen some news sites that come up with multiple items that automatically play, some with sound and the steps needed to tab to those and pause or stop them far exceed the requirements. Even as a sighted user of some of those, it is a horrible user experience. On some, the size of the changing advertisements pushes the text I'm currently reading up/or down, interrupting the flow of reading content. They could code in right up there with skip to main content, "stop all advisement audio and video" as a button.

None of the advertisements or featured content should autoplay with sound or movement without stopping within the what 3 or 5 seconds.

Do these obnoxious, self-focused advertisers even create accessible multimedia ads? Does the Cadillac advertisement's closed caption say, "Led Zeppelin's Rock and Roll intro riff playing" Do they audio describe "A Cadillac races across a bridge with an older wealthy man driving while his trophy wife sits in the passenger seat smiling at him adoringly."

Doug Hayman
IT Accessibility Coordinator
Information Technology
Olympic College
<EMAIL REMOVED>
(360) 475-7632



-----Original Message-----
From: WebAIM-Forum < <EMAIL REMOVED> > On Behalf Of Hill, Barry (Accessibility Tester) via WebAIM-Forum
Sent: Tuesday, January 16, 2024 6:19 AM
To: <EMAIL REMOVED>
Cc: Hill, Barry (Accessibility Tester) < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
Subject: [EXTERNAL] - [WebAIM] Auto-refreshing advertisements

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Hi all

A website I am reviewing has third-party advertisements that auto-refresh every minute. As they are third-party, not all the adverts have proper labels or alt text. We're working with procurement to ensure that they will be accessible in the future. As the accessibility cannot be ensured, the developers are wanting to hide them from screen readers, but I don't think they should. Which way is best on that? Also, if they are not hidden from screen readers, I'm assuming that there should be a mechanism to pause the auto-refresh. Should there also be a mechanism to skip to next and previous ad?

Thanks in anticipation.

Barry

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