Event accessibility

As the event and marketing industries continue to rely on digital communications to connect with audiences, it’s important to ensure that virtual events are able to remove barriers that people might face in the physical world. The following article contains some information to consider when putting together your next virtual or hybrid event.

Closed captions

When using the Live Studio, or RTMP as your room video mode, you can enable Closed captions and make the content of the sessions accessible!

How do I enable closed captions in my event?

To enable this feature, go to Settings > Tools. Scroll down until you see the Live section. Then, press Edit, and make sure the Speech to Text Transcription checkbox is checked. Press End to save the changes.

If instead of seeing a checkbox, you see Click, you will need to enable this feature in the company tools. To do so, press Click and a new tab will be opened automatically on the company tools page.

Then, scroll down until you see the Live section, press Edit, and make sure the Speech to Text Transcription checkbox is checked. Press End to save the changes.

How can I enable the closed captions function in my activity?

To enable the closed caption function in an activity follow the steps in the gif below using the Live studio room video mode as an example.

1. Navigate to Agenda > Activities.
2. Choose an activity and click the Edit button located in the top right corner.
3. Scroll down to the Closed Captions feature and check the box to enable it.

1. Select the desired speech language from the drop-down menu labeled Select the desired speech language.
2. In the Select a translation field, choose the desired language(s) for translating the speech.

1. Press End to save your changes.

Closed captions and subtitles inside the activity

Once you have activated the Closed Captions feature on the platform, attendees can enable the captions when logged into the activity. To do this, click on the CC icon in the lower right corner of the activity screen, and choose the desired language for speech translation (if more than one language has been added).

In addition to activating captions/subtitles, you can customize the text's appearance in the captions settings. To disable captions, simply click on captions off.

Automatic transcriptions and translations

Another alternative to closed captions is live AI-generated transcriptions based on speech recognition. Our Speech to Text Transcription feature combines speech recognition and live translation, so your virtual events can have real-time subtitles in multiple languages during your sessions.  

Sign-language interpreter

Sign language interpreters can use our language interpretation channel to make your event more inclusive, delivering an engaging experience for everyone. Ensure the interpreters check out this article before going live.

Tabbing Navigation

Navigating between focusable elements (or modals) using the tab key is an easy task within our platform. Pressing the Tab button will focus on the next element, pressing the Space bar will activate buttons and checkboxes, pressing Shift + Tab will focus on the previous element, pressing enter will activate the selected element, pressing Esc will exit the modal being explored, and moving the arrows up/down/left/right will scroll the pages. The order of focusing is based on physical order, being also cyclical, which means that the tabbing will cycle to the first/last element when moving away from the last/first element.

Accessibility menu

If this feature is enabled in your event, attendees can adjust contrast, change color schemes, disable animations, mute sounds and change the font size on all pages of the Virtual Lobby.

How do I enable the Accessibility menu feature in my event?

To enable the Accessibility menu feature, carry out the following steps:

1. Go to Settings > Tools. 
2. Scroll down until you see the Extra section. 
3. Press Edit, and check the Accessibility menu checkbox.
4. Press End to save your changes.

Once you enable the Accessibility menu, an Accessibility icon will appear in the bottom right corner of all Virtual Lobby pages. Click on the icon to view the Accessibility options.

Accessibility options

You will find the following options in the accessibility menu to meet all your attendees' needs.

Color scheme

There are three color schemes for attendees to choose from:

• Dark: This option displays white text against a black screen. The dark option helps to reduce light emitted by device screens while maintaining the minimum color contrast ratios required for readability.
• Regular: Enabled by default, the regular option shows the original colors the event organizer chose for the Virtual Lobby using the Virtual Lobby editor tool.
• Light: The Light option displays black text against a white screen. It provides maximal value contrast and, therefore, optimal readability for body text.

Contrast

Attendees can choose from three different contrast options using the contrast box.

1. If you click on the contrast box once, the Virtual Lobby colors will turn to grayscale.

1. If you click again, you will enable a warm fader for the Virtual Lobby colors.

1. If you click one more time, you will enable a cold fader for the Virtual Lobby colors.

Stop animation

If there are animations on the Virtual Lobby page, you can stop them all at once. Click on the Stop animation button, and they will stop, as shown below:

Mute sounds

You can mute sounds on all pages of the Virtual Lobby. To do so, follow these steps:

1. Click on the Mute sounds box. The pop up window below will appear:

1. Click on Continue and all sounds will be muted. These include:

• Video sounds
• Notification sounds (receiving messages, meeting invites and speed networking)

Font Size

The virtual lobby accessibility menu provides three font size options. The Virtual Lobby font size will increase as you press the Font size box. A fourth click will return the font to the original size.

Reset settings

If attendees press Reset settings, the Virtual Lobby will change to the template mode (Normal, Dark or Light) set by the event organizer on the backend.

Best Practices for speakers

• Ensure Clarity of Visuals and Sounds: Ensuring audio-visual quality is a key part of accessibility. Speakers should be well-lit and have their microphones tested beforehand. Also, keep background noise to a minimum and avoid speakers talking over each other.
• Read polls, chats, and questions out loud: Guarantee speakers read questions and replies for other attendees aloud. Also, ensure plenty of time is given to their answers.
• Describe your slides: Ask speakers to take a moment to describe their slides to the audience, making sure they summarize key graphs, images, and videos.
• Check the color contrast of slides: Ensure your speaker's slides have enough color contrast between text and background. Using a contrast checker tool may be helpful here. Ask Google to search for available options, many of them are free.
• Provide your slides ahead of time: Providing your slides before the presentation can be of great help to participants. Check this article for more information on how to share files with your participants before, during, and after your sessions.