Please read this testimonial evidence from a blind person discussing the
negative impact caused by the "no blind people allowed" sign on a popular
social networking site. It is important for us all to realize that this
discrimination is quickly moving beyond the registration process and into
day-to-day use of some web based resources. We must insist that CAPTCHA be
made accessible by way of audio or other reasonable accomodations in all
cases where it is used.

My name is David Harvey from New Zealand. I just signed up with
www.facebook.comm and asked my flatmate to help me out with the visual
verification
process during registration. All went well.

Four days later as I write this today, they've put VV on the features that
mean a lot to me – adding friends, posting messages, writing on
walls, etc. You can stop the VV if you verify your account. You do this by
enterying your cell phone number and a text message will be sent with
a code you must enter into the box.

This has made me angry since using social networking sites like Facebook as
a communication tool is that you don't have to give out your email address,
and I wish to be able to use those sites the same as everybody else. I
don't want to have to deactivate my account with them, since
I've made a lot of friends this year, most of whom live abroad and are
leaving at the end of June, and they prefer Facebook over Bebo or Myspace.

As a result of this increasing inaccessibility, David has written an e-mail to Facebook’s support team:

Yes I did contact them. I’ll let you and Jeff know my response once I receive it. Here’s the email I sent regarding this very serious and discriminating issue:

Subject: CAPTCHA PROBLEM

Hello,

My name is David Harvey from New Zealand. I signed up for Facebook on 23rd of may NZ time. Since I’m blind my flatmate help me out with the visual verification at registration. Within the last six hours captcha has been implemented site-wide, which is preventing me from interacting with my friends, as well as adding new ones. I also discovered there’s an option to verify my account, but I don’t yet have a mobile phone to verify with and won’t have one for at least three months. I know blind and visually impaired people who work in the technology field. Some sites like PayPal, LiveJournal and Google have implemented audio captcha, which reads the text out using synthesized speech. This is a very serious issue not just for Facebook but for all sites who wish to use captcha.

Please let me know if you are interested in working with me to resolve this issue. I love your services and I’d hate to cancel because of a visual graphic which my screen-reader is unable to read get in the way
of using such a fine service.

Another quote on the Facebook login page says “Everyone can join”. Well that’s not the case. Did you know that companies can be find for misleading users?

Thanks

David Harvey