Since last Saturday, X (formerly Twitter) has been flooded with the viral “Click Here” trend, catching everyone’s attention. While many have been joining the bandwagon of this buzzing trend, numerous others remain puzzled about the new feature.
Notably, major political parties such as the Bharatiya Janata Party, Aam Aadmi Party, and Congress have also actively engaged in the trend through their official X pages.
What is the “Click Here” trend all about?
This new trend has thousands of users sharing images featuring a stark white backdrop with the bold, black declaration “Click here” emblazoned across it.
The text is accompanied by a diagonally downward arrow, pointing to “ALT” text or alternative text on the bottom left corner of the picture.
The “ALT” text is a feature by X that helps its users add descriptions to the photos that they share on the platform.
Let us take a look at a few examples:
— BJP (@BJP4India) March 30, 2024
— FC Barcelona (@FCBarcelona) March 28, 2024
— AAP (@AamAadmiParty) March 30, 2024
Some users also confessed that they were unable to understand this trend. Shiv Sena MP Priyanka Chaturvedi wrote, “What is the click here pic story? My timeline is full of it!”
What is the click here pic story.? My timeline is full of it!
— Priyanka Chaturvedi???????? (@priyankac19) March 30, 2024
What is the use of the feature and why Twitter created it?
The Click Here feature is meant to help visually impaired users understand the image better, with the help of text-to-speech recognition and Braille language.
The “ALT” text was introduced by the platform back in 2016 when the social media company was still known as Twitter.
Announcing the feature Twitter in its blog, in 2016, stated, “Photos have been at the center of some of the biggest moments on Twitter. As a core part of the Twitter experience, it’s important that images shared on our platform are accessible to everyone, including those who are visually impaired.”
It added, “Starting today, people using our iOS and Android apps can add descriptions — also known as alternative text (alt text) — to images in Tweets. With this update, we’re empowering everyone to ensure content shared on Twitter is accessible to the widest possible audience.”
“The Alt text is supposed to contain a textual description of what the image contains, to help the visually impaired people understand what the image is about. So, using that text for anything else is a misuse of that feature and goes against web content accessibility guidelines (WCAG),” a user, wrote while explaining the feature.
Apologise! I’ve just deleted this tweet as I wasn’t aware that the feature was meant for people who are visually impaired.
The Alt text is supposed to contain a textual description of what the image contains, to help the visually impaired people understand what the image is… pic.twitter.com/I7DjYiqbnh— Mohammed Zubair (@zoo_bear) March 30, 2024
How to use this feature?
The blog post also explained that this feature can be enabled by using “the compose image descriptions option” in the app.
The statement continued, “Enable this feature by using the compose image descriptions option in the Twitter app’s accessibility settings. The next time you add an image to a Tweet, each thumbnail in the composer will have an add description button. Tap it to add a description to the image. People who are visually impaired will have access to the description via their assistive technology (e.g., screen readers and braille displays). Descriptions can be up to 420 characters.”
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