My Chinese Friend Who Can’t See: Digital Accessibility in China

In China, the first compliance standard went into effect this year. One of the first accessibility compliant products was QQ Mail in 2009; until today, most apps and websites are still not aware of accessibility needs.

As you don’t often see the disabled when walking on a street in China, the visually impaired are sorta invisible online too. They have their own forums and group chats. I accidentally met one whose nickname is “Shadow.” He told me that he wanted to make more “bright eye” friends.

Visually impaired, Shadow worked as a masseur in Northern China. He said I was different than other Chinese he met online- I never asked him how he read and text without seeing the screen. I told him that I worked as a software tester and it was part of the training in the U.S. to know how accessibility works.

In his spare time, Shadow liked playing the game The Return of the King and edited music using Adobe Audition. For Chinese, there’s also a language barrier for apps with the best accessibility. That’s why Shadow did not have many choices for entertainment but he was still grateful and warm-hearted.

Shadow told me that it was easy to navigate through my website. I felt bad because I didn’t put that much thought into accessibility. Therefore, I made a post on Weibo and offered some accessibility tips to developers.

With more awareness, product teams will consider accessibility from the beginning of the development and achieve better integration. I hope that in the near future, both legislation and technologies will come to bridge the gap for better accessibility in China.