Hi all,

About Netflix and accessing the next season of TV shows.

 

If you, by using the normal left and right arrows on the keyboard, sit on the letter S of where it states the line Season plus its number, press enter, then arrow down, you will get to the episodes of that season.  There are work arounds, but if the screen reader doesn’t say the obvious, they can’t be found.  I have windows 10, jaws 17, and I tried this with IE11.

 

I can see the screen to a degree, and how the screen is laid out to how jaws often reads it, does not always match.

 

Lisa-Maree

 

 

From: Joshua Hori [mailto:jhori@...]
Sent: Tuesday, December 1, 2015 6:03 AM
To: jfw@groups.io
Subject: Re: Netflix not accessible to blind people using a laptop and screen reading software.

 

Using Windows 7, JAWS 16 and Firefox. Full disclosure: I’m a sited user with screenreader experience. (I prefer Firefox since I get the best experience with a screenreader)

 

It seems that Netflix isn’t providing “focus" on content once selected. For instance, I can navigate the site using a screenreader by headers and/or links, (I bring up the links list and look for “Audio Descriptions” and press enter, then I bring up the links list again and navigate the list of movies that are now available) but once I find a movie I would like to watch, I press enter, but can’t access the new menu that drops down to play the content, it just keeps navigating to the next movie. The work around is to immediately bring up the headers, navigate to the header that’s listed and press enter, which then allows me to access the content within the dropdown (press tab once to access the play link).

 

TV shows are difficult to navigate as they all state “Play link” (instead of “play episode 8”) and do not announce the episode without using the arrow keys (press down a couple of times to hear more about the episode). For TV seasons there is a dropdown button to change seasons using the mouse, but I can’t locate the button with a screenreader without using the virtual cursor, and I can’t access the dropdown menu with a keyboard at all. You can access other episodes using the “see previous titles Button” and “see more titles Button” (bring up the form fields list to easily find these), but this is only for the season displayed.

 

I hope this helps some.

 

Best,

 

Joshua

 

From: Daniel McBride [mailto:dlmlaw@...]
Sent: Monday, November 30, 2015 9:37 AM
To: jfw@groups.io
Subject: Re: Netflix not accessible to blind people using a laptop and screen reading software.

 

Hello Tim:

 

Can you please clarify the accessibility issue we need address with Netflix? On my Toshiba laptop, using Windows 8 and JAWS 14, I can get onto Netflix, manage to utilize the Search field, find the movie, documentary or television program I desire and get it to play. This is without Audio Description. And I am not able to select a specific season and episode of a television program, such as Star Trek Next Generation. I am simply stuck with playing whichever season and episode is next up in my account.

 

I am going to email Netflix as requested in your email here. I just want to be clear about what our hurdles are as blind persons using Netflix. I will also add that I am a Rhapsody Music subscriber and the problems with Rhapsody are worse than Netflix, if anyone is interested.

 

Thanks for your efforts.

 

Dan McBride

Fort Worth, Texas

 

From: Tim Ford [mailto:ttford@...]
Sent: Monday, November 30, 2015 11:05 AM
To: jfw@groups.io
Subject: Netflix not accessible to blind people using a laptop and screen reading software.

 

Hi All,

 

For those out there who want to use Netflix, here is an email I received last evening that contains instructions on how to contact the right people.  As mentioned in the note, Netflix is still not very interested in fixing things, and your continued emails to Netflix are encouraged to keep some pressure on them.

 

Tim Ford

 

 

From: Accessible Netflix Project team

Sent: Sunday, November 29, 2015 9:46 PM

To: Tim Ford

Subject: Re: Netflix not accessible to blind people using a laptop and screen reading software.

 

This is kate! I am so sorry that your email has not been replied to yet but we get a ton, and I mean, a ton of email. Robert Kingett is the CEO and we are still trying to make them see what you highlighted as well as others. To be quite frank, they would rather not even bother with us, but we keep emailing and calling and bugging them, professionally, I may add. In our experience, we never hear a sincere, sorry! Let's work on these layout designs for JAWS OR NVDA users and I doubt we will unless we keep pushing them like we have been doing. Would you like to email Robert Kingett, He can give you more contacts than I can. I am just the email manager. :) Below is a message we just got that may help.

Hi, 

Hope you're well and thanks for your e-mail. 

Going forward, can I suggest you contact Marlee Tart in the global PR team please (her e-mail address is: mtart@...). 

From your recent queries it's clear that your questions are at global scale as opposed to regional/local, and this e-mail address reaches the Australian and New Zealand PR agency team (and we don't actually have visibility into a lot of the areas you're interested in). 

I've dropped Marlee a line to let her know you'll be in touch. 

Best,

L. 

 

On 6/24/2015 5:32 PM, Tim Ford wrote:

To Whom It May Concern,

 

Below I have pasted in an email I sent Monday to what is supposedly the engineering group for Netflix; a Netflix telephone representative gave me the address.  Today someone told me about your group, and I applaude you for your efforts that certainly seem to be the motivating factor for Netflix to start providing AD.  Please let me know if you have any suggestions on any of the issues covered in my post below.

 

Sincerely,

Tim Ford

 

 

From: Tim Ford

Sent: Monday, June 22, 2015 5:57 PM

To: technicalresearch@...

Cc: janemarie.rose@...

Subject: Netflix not accessible to blind people using a laptop and screen reading software.

 

Dear Netflix,

 

I am blind, and use a Windows 7 laptop.  Up until a week or so ago, your web site was extremely hard to navigate, but at least I could start a video.  Now, after your web page design changes implemented a few days ago, I cannot even start a video.

 

I am using the latest update of JAWS version 16; JAWS is the world’s most widely used screen reading software for the blind.  I tried accessing your service with IE, Firefox, and Chrome, but could not get a video to start.  With IE, I cannot even activate my profile.

 

I am a fairly experienced Internet user, and if there is a way to navigate your site with a screen reader, I have not figured it out.  I am using the recommended common settings for JAWS, and I have no problems with some other video streaming services.

 

Back a few weeks ago, Netflix announced the addition of audio description.  That is a great move, and I applaud you for that.  However, in a very ironic twist, it is not possible for a blind person to select the audio described version, even though one is on the part of your site that contains only audio described programs.  Why add that extra step?  If one is on the audio description page, the user obviously wants the audio described version, so why not make that the default?

 

In general, there seems to be a huge gap between your marketing department and the technology group.  Netflix marketing is advertising this new and wonderful audio description service, but a blind person simply cannot navigate the site, especially after the rollout of your new web page design.

 

In closing, I am using a Windows laptop, and I do not have a smart phone.  The issues I am asking you to please fix are just for us old-fashioned blind folks using a Windows computer.

 

I know from experience that screen reader accessibility is a very narrow specialty and skill set, so if you do not have such an expert on staff, you could either hire one or contract with one of the accessibility consultant experts that will help you become and stay accessible.

 

I am happy to volunteer by helping you test any changes; I have done that in the past for a number of web service companies.  Please advise, and much thanks.

 

Sincerely,

Tim Ford

Phone:  916-538-6415