Christine MalecFor the first time in my life on Masto, I read alt text that made me wish the person hadn’t bothered. After a wordy post, they wrote in the alt text field something like, “I don’t really want to write alt text and train the AI for free, but okay, person holding a computer.” I’m going to assume they didn’t think about what a slap in the face this was to me, and possibly to anyone else who relies on alt text. 3 Times I started an acerbic reply and deleted it, but I’m still seething, so I’m asking anyone who is so disingenuous to just not bother; you’ll create less hard feelings that way.
Don Hawkins - W7DAH@ChristineMalec Reading through the comments I haven’t seen mentioned the use of AI to actually write the alt text, so I am curious if anyone else has used the app “Mona” for Mastodon & set the option to allow AI (ChatGPT apparently ?) to automatically create alt text for any image included with posts? I have and as a sighted person it seems to do a decent job, but would like feedback from those who actually rely upon alt text. (1/2)
As an example I’m attaching an image and putting my own description here in the body of this comment of a yellow, electric-assisted bicycle that has a basket in the front with 4 or more bottles in that basket and to the rear it has cargo in the form of a single box on a rack behind the seat. This bike has fat tires and a low bar for mounting and unmounting the seat. Here goes … (2/2)
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@ChristineMalec The Mona app is only available for ios currently.
I notice that AI included in its ALT text something I failed to include but, that AI failed to include elements that my own, longer ALT text did capture.
@ChristineMalec Both AI & my description left out a tiny headlight on the front fender, or even the fact that this bike includes fenders!
@ChristineMalec I think my description of the bike as “electric-assisted” is technically more accurate than AI simply calling it an “e-bike”.