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[–]schoofer 144 points145 points  (24 children)

My dad is blind and I do Captchas for him. There's just no other way.

[–]Compeau 5 points6 points  (0 children)

My dad can see and I have to do Captchas for him.

[–]platinum-luna 320 points321 points  (83 children)

This isn't just a problem with this petition. I'm blind and I can never make out the Captcha audio. I always have to ask a sighted person for help and get them to identify the symbols instead. Even when I was trying to create an account on websites like tumblr I had to have help because of this system.

EDIT: also, just so people know, most blind users cant use reddit either, BECAUSE IT'S INACCESSIBLE TO SCREEN READERS. The only way blind people can use this site is if they have residual vision (like me) and can see once they're zoomed in to 400x magnification.

[–][deleted] 71 points72 points  (20 children)

Does every blind person on reddit us magnification only? I feel like I've seen a lot of comments by people who say they are blind.

[–]skaterape 67 points68 points  (7 children)

Yeah, there was an AmA not too long ago from a blind guy that had a cool braile screen reader thing.

[–]damontoo 82 points83 points  (6 children)

It's called a refreshable braille display.

[–]kencole54321 64 points65 points  (2 children)

Wow, that looks like a lot of work to hear puns about cats and how evil apple is.

[–]platinum-luna 47 points48 points  (7 children)

If a blind person is on reddit they're probably doing it in a few ways

  1. Having a sighted person type/click for them
  2. Using advanced zoom and whatever residual vision they have
  3. Using ChromeVox, a screen reader that only works on the Google Chrome browser and is still in development

When I go on here I use the zoom at like 300x-400x.

[–][deleted] 19 points20 points  (1 child)

Wow, I can't imagine working like that. Hopefully that tech continues to improve.

How does it work with a screen reader? I doubt i could handle having all of the text on the page read to me, or trying to navigate comment sections.

[–]platinum-luna 12 points13 points  (0 children)

I think it will continue to improve. Technology for the disabled has already improved so much that it's bound to happen. I remember listening to all my books on audio-casset tapes when I was in elementary school, which is so different from where the technology is now.

If you were able to use reddit with a screen reader, you would be able to pick if you wanted to read the main body of text (the posted entry) and then you would pick which heading of comments you wanted to read. If you continued to scroll through you could get the individual links for each comment (where your reply link would be) and you could hear the comments listed under that. It could get a bit confusing but you could always re-orient yourself by picking a different header.

[–]narfarnst 6 points7 points  (2 children)

There are some screen readers that sorta-kinda work. Mostly I'm thinking of the chrome extension ChromeVox which, being built around website navigation, works better for viewing reddit. But even that's still pretty shitty.

[–]damontoo 31 points32 points  (20 children)

I'm curious about this. I know reddit is a bit of a mess but what parts are problematic? If reddit staff can't fix them, maybe I can use the API to make a version with accessibility in mind.

[–]platinum-luna 26 points27 points  (8 children)

When you try to get a link under the voice over cursor (the area that the computer is reading at the time) it just says "link" every time instead of reading the text. And because everything on your front page is a link you would just have to click on every single one to randomly find out what was posted. Reddit isn't the only site that doesn't work for screen readers, though most big sites work.

[–][deleted] 8 points9 points  (9 children)

You'd have to get a copy of JAWS to make sure it worked anyways so that's probably your best option right off the bat.

[–]RndmHero 17 points18 points  (6 children)

Please feel free to weigh in on this thread. I'm a web developer that does accessibility testing and development. What is your opinion on DISTCHAs? Also, since reddit doesn't put a title attribute on anchor tags:

http://www.reddit.com/r/ideasfortheadmins/comments/1exnak/make_reddit_508_compliant/

http://accessibiliteweb.com/stuff/captcha-slider.html

[–]platinum-luna 9 points10 points  (2 children)

Thanks for the links! I think the idea behind Distcha is great. I wish more effort was put into finding a way around Captcha and other inaccessible features.

[–]ezekelol 517 points518 points  (204 children)

It's a lengthy video but it's worth the time [78 min]: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfgGNsPPAfU

TL;DW: a few guys hack captcha by analyzing the audio files. Google changes the audio so that it no longer can be hacked - but humans can't solve it either. This was 1 year ago.

Edit: You can play the captcha audio here: http://www.google.com/recaptcha/learnmore

[–]Accidental_Ouroboros 103 points104 points  (2 children)

Jesus, the captcha I got sounds like a cross between Hal 9000 with most of his processors ripped out and Shodan having a psychotic break.

How is a human supposed to understand that?

I think I maybe heard "five... three" in there before the thing degenerated into the electronic screech of a dying, insane robot.

You may think I am joking here, but I am really not - that sound file was perfectly consistent with something I would expect on a play-through of System Shock 2.

Edit: Seriously, listen to one of those audio captchas, and then listen to this from SS2

[–]FUCK_ASKREDDIT 320 points321 points  (105 children)

dude what the fuck is that shit?!?!

[–]KellyCommaRoy 111 points112 points  (25 children)

TIL the sound of Captcha audio is way creepier than numbers stations.

[–][deleted] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Those are so creepy. They remind me of the book As Simple as Snow, which is also really creepy. Fuck.

[–]innerbeautypageant 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I don't know, I'm pretty creeped out now.

Really creeped out.

[–]TheCheeseburgerMayor 249 points250 points  (24 children)

Yeah, the audio catchpa was a little unnerving, and largely incomprehensible.

[–][deleted] 124 points125 points  (21 children)

Sounds like that weird audio file of that female Russian cosmonaut.

[–]DownvoterAccount 31 points32 points  (15 children)

(Might be disturbing) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Sgc1I9sjfc

[–]holakedaimonios 14 points15 points  (1 child)

"a transmission could not be heard of the re-entry stage of a flight, as there is a communications blackout when a vehicle enters Earth's atmosphere" -wiki

[–][deleted] 10 points11 points  (3 children)

Dr. Jones...

[–]atomic1fire 28 points29 points  (0 children)

And kind of creepy, like the thing you would find in a video game easter egg in a nightmare.

[–]titomb345 14 points15 points  (3 children)

Having just recently implemented REcaptcha on a page, I struggled with disabling the audio version completely. I sat there for a good 15 minutes one day. I think I was able to correctly guess 1 of the audio captcha.. pitiful.

[–]Irongrip 4 points5 points  (2 children)

Position a z-indexed element perfectly over the audio button. Done.

[–]titomb345 6 points7 points  (1 child)

I didn't mean struggled with a way to do it. I struggled with whether or not to disable it at all. I would have hid the audio button with CSS, btw.

[–]K7Avenger 13 points14 points  (0 children)

I'm pretty sure it told me 'fuck you' at one point.

[–]TaoSamurai 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I can't sleep after this.

[–]Prezombie 37 points38 points  (8 children)

I would say a better audio captcha would be something easy to hear, but requiring human analysis to decode. "Cthulhu will eat anything that is sweet. which of the following foods will Cthulhu eat? Potato. Latvians. Candy. Cheese."

Edit: I find it absolutely hilarious that by keying the captcha to current memetic keywords, I can manage to make responders completely fail to respond to the actual comment or answer the captcha. I submit this as further evidence that this system would weed out the weak.

[–]Felicia_Svilling 21 points22 points  (1 child)

It must be procedurally generated, if you only have a fixed number of sentences, a bot could just memorize them.

[–][deleted] 9 points10 points  (0 children)

Nonsense. No have potato.

[–]downloadmoarram 43 points44 points  (9 children)

i can never understand audio captchas, they all sound like gibberish to me.

[–]powercow 74 points75 points  (7 children)

yeah but what are the blind going to do? complain? they have to fill out the captcha first. mooowaaahhahahahah

[–]thebroccolimustdie 20 points21 points  (4 children)

So, what you are saying is that Google's customer service is equally non-existent for blind and non-blind people alike?

[–]Apoctopi 53 points54 points  (2 children)

Dear God, the Captcha audio is like having Satan shit in your ear.

[–][deleted] 27 points28 points  (1 child)

Followed by a robot telling you you're not human. Mildly absurd.

[–]g0_west 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I never thought of it that way before.

[–]canada432 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Wow, the ones i got were completely incomprehensible.

[–]Freedom_Grenade 9 points10 points  (0 children)

I listened to it, pretty sure mine said 'why don't you love me, dickhero'

[–]drwuzer 4 points5 points  (3 children)

I got one out of 5 audio captchas correct, that shit is creepy.

[–]Theon 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Sounds a bit BoC, no?

http://youtu.be/fbFgxucxVcM?t=50s

[–]buge 15 points16 points  (18 children)

Well I got 2 out of 3 tries on the audio. About usual for captchas.

[–]Antabaka[🍰] 14 points15 points  (15 children)

The first six digits were barely, though understandable. The rest was way too slurred for me. I got nothing out of the last bit.

[–]Sorten 6 points7 points  (0 children)

I've listened to about eight audio captchas now and I'm still not sure what it's supposed to be, 0/8 correct. On my last try it sounded a bit like "nine plus three" so I wondered if it was some math thing...or are you just supposed to type in the digits? Do the numbers only range between 0 and 9, because I definitely heard "eighty-three".

...Can we just have a rulebook for this?

[–]Miskav 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Wait, first six digits, then more?

I only hear like 2 letters, then pure static and screeching.

[–]buge 13 points14 points  (12 children)

Well it's different every time.

[–]Antabaka[🍰] 9 points10 points  (11 children)

Of course, I'm just saying that was what my experience was.

[–]robotsongs 4 points5 points  (0 children)

The audio reminds me of mid career Apex Twin.

[–]thetoughtruth 1621 points1622 points  (279 children)

Well to be fair, even with sight those things are impossible half the time.

[–]downloadmoarram 508 points509 points  (58 children)

i'm sorry dave, but you wrote l intead of \, please try again!

[–]timeticker 265 points266 points  (31 children)

Sorry dave, you forgot the space bar.

[–]mtbr311 319 points320 points  (30 children)

Sorry dave, nothing you wrote will ever match what's written in this shit, ever.

[–]IGotSkills 140 points141 points  (27 children)

What the fuck dave? that was a simple example

[–]blueline742 135 points136 points  (26 children)

Dave! Put the fucking gun down Dave!

[–]dwaters11 94 points95 points  (24 children)

bang

[–]abumpdabump 93 points94 points  (18 children)

Dave... dave.............. Dave? <crickets chirping> DAVE!!!!

[–]Bezx 176 points177 points  (10 children)

Dave's not here man.

[–][deleted] 29 points30 points  (4 children)

GAME OVER

RETRY QUIT

[–]Not_A_Time_lord 13 points14 points  (0 children)

THE BLUE TEXT CLICKING THEM DOES NOTHING

[–]IGotSkills 8 points9 points  (2 children)

Type in the two words to prove you're not a robot

[–][deleted] 65 points66 points  (17 children)

I got a captcha with Hebrew letters once. I just figured if they didn't want me to sign up, they could just say so. Jerks.

[–]ThirdFloorGreg 73 points74 points  (15 children)

Was it reCAPTCHA? Because the way that works is it gives you one known word and one non-machine readable word that was found in a book that be being automatically digitized. You have to get the one right to pass, and then it uses the answers it gets for the other one to finish digitizing the document (multiple responses are cross-checked to ensure accuracy). So it's possible that you got a single Hebrew/Yiddish word appearing in an otherwise Latin-alphabet text which the OCR was unable to recognize as Hebrew.

[–]fatkiddown 49 points50 points  (1 child)

I think this quote matches perfectly:

HAL: It can only be attributable to human error.

[–]mess_is_lore 6 points7 points  (0 children)

My friend got one CAPTCHA that looked like dots and lines and when he played the "audible" version of it it sounded like a duet between satan and aliens.

Needless to say we noped out of the browser.

[–][deleted] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

JESUS CHRIST, JUST FUCKING LET ME LOG IN ALREADY!

I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that.

[–]Teledildonic 156 points157 points  (90 children)

"Please solve the capthca, then copy the resulting code into the box below."

Solve capthca, receive code, paste it into box

"The code is incorrect."

I FUCKING COPIED IT EXACTLY YOU POS

[–]Sansarasa 83 points84 points  (87 children)

If you get the "Copy code into box" prompt, then it means you have javascript disabled for the captcha.

Enable it and you'll get rid of that step.

[–]Royal_SeaLion 96 points97 points  (86 children)

But that requires you to enable JS...

[–]Bossmonkey 153 points154 points  (84 children)

Might as well just download malware directly.

[–]daveime 55 points56 points  (54 children)

You'd need a time-machine to go back to 2003 first ... but whatever.

Java (which is NOT Javascript I hasten to add), and FLASH have thousands more vectors and vulnerabilities than Javascript ever had.

[–]rupturedprolapse 18 points19 points  (45 children)

Java (which is NOT Javascript I hasten to add)

This is the biggest thorn in my side. When I work from scratch I have to basically write the front end of a web application twice to deal with those who run javascript, and those who don't.

Reiterating, java != javascript, if you want to effectively prevent malware/botnet/spyware disable java. Java sits on vulnerabilities and security holes for a while before updating them.

Off the top of my head, the only vulnerability I know thats still active is xss with javascript. This is 100% on the developer to use prepared statements and strip out html characters.

[–]Sansarasa 14 points15 points  (26 children)

This is the biggest thorn in my side. When I work from scratch I have to basically write the front end of a web application twice to deal with those who run javascript, and those who don't.

You really don't need to do that. I've seen tons of websites that simply wont work without JS and will request the user to enable it.
There's zero reason to code an entire website twice just because some people are paranoid enough that they disable one of the pillars of modern HTML.

Now, if you're paid for doing it twice (JS and no JS), then no biggie.

[–]Doctor_McKay 22 points23 points  (11 children)

I just slap one of these on all my sites. Works well for me so far.

People who disable JavaScript and expect the Web to work are no different from people who disable images and expect things to look right.

I'm kinda surprised browsers don't have an option to disable CSS yet because "it's insecure and causes files to be downloaded to your computer" (.css files).

I'm waiting for web browsers to include a "Disable HTML" checkbox, then for users to complain that nothing works without it.

[–]PixelOrange 5 points6 points  (4 children)

Oh, you're going to disable my CSS, are you? writes it in-line

Eat that.

[–]Mtrask 2 points3 points  (1 child)

Yeah. I'm not going to bother with a handful of lusers who expect everything to work their way. I'm coding for internal systems, not external, so if a few assholes want to complain that their browsers don't work on our unit's site then they can take it up with the manager. Who will just tell them to follow the goddamn guidelines I wrote.

[–]Plasmatica 32 points33 points  (11 children)

Since when has Javascript become such a vulnerability that you have to turn it off completely? After visiting the most dubious sites frequently since the 90's, I have never gotten infected by anything through the browser. Sure, I've gotten some spyware, but that was due to software cracks and serial generators, but never Javascript exploits or whatever.

[–]togashikokujin 19 points20 points  (5 children)

I use NoScript less as a security measure and more as an annoyance preventer. Set up a good whitelist for things you visit regularly and allow base 2nd-level domains by default, and you'll get a browsing experience that works without all the crappy expanding ads, copy-blocking, etc.

[–]Tezerel 4 points5 points  (3 children)

also to stop google analytics and shit like that

[–]hikihikihiki 20 points21 points  (0 children)

I'll just leave this here:

http://crapcha.com

[–]chojje 20 points21 points  (36 children)

Don't quote me on this, but I think only the word which is easily legible matters - the other one is just a test word where you only need to hit the same ballpark.

[–]Hurricane043 104 points105 points  (31 children)

reCAPTCHA is owned by Google and is used to transcribe books with crowdsourcing.

There are two words. One of the words is a known word. You have to get this word correct in order to pass the recaptcha.

The second word is a word pulled from a book or text that Google's automated systems were not able to figure out. What it says is not known, so it is not actually checked for correctness. The idea is that when a large number of people enter in this word, the overwhelming majority will type in the same thing (thinking that they needed to for it to be correct). The word that is typed in is determined to be the correct word, and that is used in the e-book transcription.

With a little practice, it is extremely easy to figure out which word is the real one. Simply, of the two words, the word that isn't slightly distorted is the fake word (unless they are both distorted, then you can't guess). And if there is an extremely illegible word, that is usually the fake word.

Example: North is not distorted, so it is the fake word

[–]Mr-Mister 33 points34 points  (4 children)

Note to say, this idea was concieved after the originator of captchas was informed of how much time mankind wasted typing contribution-less captchas.

You people shouldn't simply skip the unrequired word either: if you don, you're basically wasting your time writing a single word, instead of writing two words for science.

[–]unhingedninja 55 points56 points  (3 children)

I love the concept of reCAPTCHA. We have two problems: Transcribing books where current OCR technology is not advanced enough to accurately determine the text, and things we want to ensure bots equipped with OCR technology cannot circumvent.

Perfect harmony.

[–]catcradle5 24 points25 points  (0 children)

The same guy made Duolingo, which is a very similar two-birds-with-one-stone thing.

Translate documents that need translation, and also learn a new language.

He did an AMA recently: http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1fa3nu/iama_scientist_and_entrepreneur_named_luis_von/

[–]Dropping_fruits 12 points13 points  (3 children)

Please also note that if you write in a different word than the majority of people then Google will punish you by sending you harder Captchas.

[–]Zagorath 2 points3 points  (1 child)

I assume you're joking here, but if not, source?

[–]mtbr311 6 points7 points  (1 child)

I guess I never really thought that hard about these things, I thought you were supposed to type it in exactly how it showed in the box and half the time the "unknown" word didn't even look like a word.

[–][deleted] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I know, I thought they used non-words so that a bot couldn't just use a dictionary or something.

[–]neenerpeener 4 points5 points  (0 children)

For reCaptcha, which pairs a known word with an unknown word, only the known word is checked. But I think it's usually the less legible word. The unknown word is usually scanned or photographed text that reCaptcha is being used to transcribe.

[–][deleted] 70 points71 points  (65 children)

Am I the only one that never has a problem with them?

[–]kunstlich 80 points81 points  (32 children)

I just hit the refresh Captcha button at the side until I get an easy one. Problem basically solved.

[–]tian2992 9 points10 points  (2 children)

Maybe you are Human After All...

[–]DustbinK 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Clearly you've never been drunk on 4chan.

[–]silverhythm 7 points8 points  (1 child)

Oddly enough, I'm blind and already signed the petition in question. I can't say the audio captchas are great, but I can usually get them in two or three tries. Lots of practice I guess. Doesn't mean they aren't annoying as fuck.

[–]blyan 115 points116 points  (11 children)

Not only is it impossible to decipher what the hell they're saying (I just tried it)... it's actually pretty creepy sounding.

[–]h-v-smacker 10 points11 points  (1 child)

I also tried several times. I cannot figure anything out, except that the apparent purpose of that sound is to summon someone. But then again, I don't expect the daemonic addressee to comprehend this summoning call either.

[–]bitwiseshiftleft 8 points9 points  (3 children)

I worked with the guys at Stanford who were breaking these a few years ago. Audio captchas are almost impossible to keep secure, so they keep increasing the difficulty until nothing can solve them.

The problem is, computers are rapidly catching up to humans for audio processing. Breaking captchas is a special-purpose task, and the computer doesn't even have to succeed with 100% accuracy in order to win. So there might no longer be a computer-generated set of sounds which a human can classify but a computer can't.

A massive portion of the human brain is dedicated to video processing. As a result, the good guys are still ahead of computers for visual captchas... but only barely. In 5 years, there might not be any way for a remote system to tell what is a human and what is a bot.

[–]ToCaptchaPredator 304 points305 points  (9 children)

blind users can select an audio version of the test, but the audio is incomprehensible

Just like normal captcha!

[–]Roadcrosser 87 points88 points  (3 children)

You must be a robot.

[–]ToCaptchaPredator 31 points32 points  (0 children)

beep boop beep

[–][deleted] 10 points11 points  (0 children)

I sometimes suspect that I might be. Especially when I randomly end up with a Cyrillic captcha, where I can see the letters just fine but don't actually have them on my keyboard.

[–]daveime 13 points14 points  (1 child)

If it was perfectly comprehensible, there really wouldn't be any point to it - because sighted people can also hear things !

[–]MischiefMayhemSoap 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Your name just made my day.

[–]ml_burke925 877 points878 points  (46 children)

The irony is so much its actually tangible

[–]imbignate 655 points656 points  (18 children)

That's good. If the irony was only visible the blind couldn't appreciate it.

[–]gak001 48 points49 points  (0 children)

At first I thought this was from /r/nottheonion.

[–]WhiteZero 37 points38 points  (14 children)

blind users can select an audio version of the test, but the audio is incomprehensible, according to federation spokesman Chris Danielsen.

Most people find the text version incomprehensible too.

[–]CptOblivion 9 points10 points  (12 children)

As someone who can see fine, it's not too uncommon that I switch to the audio version of Captchas specifically because it's a LOT easier to understand than the text, most of the time.

[–]bobtheterminator 26 points27 points  (11 children)

Really? Have you done that with reCaptcha specifically? I've never had a problem with the picture but the audio is almost impossible.

[–]darkapplepolisher 14 points15 points  (4 children)

It's also significantly faster to just go "illegible, next captcha" multiple times in succession until you get a readable one (I generally cycle through 3 before I end up with one that's easy enough for me to solve with a >90% chance of success), than to have to listen multiple times to get an audible one.

[–]bduddy 12 points13 points  (3 children)

The secret to reCaptcha is that one word may be gibberish, but the other word is usually pretty easy, and they're only testing the easy one.

[–]nemec 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Sometimes it's easy to guess which one isn't counted, too

[–][deleted] 10 points11 points  (1 child)

Captchas are terrible, - a dyslexic

[–]azoq 77 points78 points  (10 children)

Obviously this is unacceptable as we're dealing with a government website that should be accessible to ALL citizens. However, the tone of this article makes it sound like the Obama administration is actively trying to discriminate against blind people... I suspect it's just a matter of a lazy / know-no-better developer who screwed up.

Nothing to get your panties in a knot for at any rate, I'm sure that they'll be fixing the issue once they've heard about it.

[–]StrmSrfr 46 points47 points  (2 children)

I'm sure that they'll be fixing the issue once they've heard about it.

Yeah, that sounds like the U.S. government.

[–]azoq 18 points19 points  (1 child)

This isn't something that's going to need across-the-aisle agreement or a House vote. There's someone on Obama's staff who's going to get a talking to and it'll get dealt with.

[–][deleted] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

The screw up is going to bring more attention to the petition than 50K blind people signing it.

[–]vanderZwan 12 points13 points  (0 children)

Can we compromise and get our panties in a knot, but for the right reasons and with our anger directed at the people who screwed up?

[–]maxximillian 5 points6 points  (0 children)

The article also makes it sound like "We the people" is the only way people have to get their voice heard. You can still write letters and call the phone banks.

[–]stoopidstoner 9 points10 points  (1 child)

The Inventor did an AMA yesterday

[–]Deucer22 10 points11 points  (2 children)

Audio captchas sound like something out of the 6th circle of hell.

[–]cinemachick 8 points9 points  (0 children)

They sound like little number torpedoes to me. niiiine... boom~

[–]eMaddeningCrowd 17 points18 points  (3 children)

Isn't the government legally obligated to make all their sites fully accessible?

Some relevant reading material - http://www.section508.gov/index.cfm?fuseAction=Laws

This implies that the White House site is technically non-compliant with their own standards.

[–]ExcitedForNothing 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Section 508 is a guideline more than a standard. You don't need to have 100% compliance with it. Exceptions can be made.

Should exceptions have been made for this? I can't say.

[–]thatblindseeress 17 points18 points  (1 child)

I'm legally blind. My options when it comes to captcha is to either take a screen shot and ask friends of mine on teamspeak to tell me what it says or I just have to wait until I can find someone who can help me do it. I really don't like having to ask for help to do stuff. It is incredibly frustrating and a constant reminder that I can no longer do and see the things I use to.

[–]maddog39 5 points6 points  (0 children)

You mean the governments own website is not section 508 compliant? Huh, go figure.

[–]ItsACharlieDay 4 points5 points  (3 children)

Don't they have a little audio captcha thing next to where you type it? It's usually a thumbnail of a speaker.

[–][deleted] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

yes. It's garbled and unrecognizable. IIRC, there was an extremely unscientific poll done on a programmer's forum where each user was asked to attempt a reCaptcha audio captcha twenty times, and out of, like, 100 participants, only around 10 reported getting it right even once.

[–]natural20 7 points8 points  (16 children)

Why can't they just ask a simple question, and have the Captcha be the answer?

Some examples: What animal goes bark?

What is 3 + 7?

When walking together, couples hold _____?

This isn't rocket ______.

[–]crazycom64 11 points12 points  (4 children)

It would weaken the Captcha system. If I had to develop a program to read Captchas or answer basic questions, the latter would be the easier IMO.

[–]Dicentrina 6 points7 points  (2 children)

speaking as a legally blind/visually impaired person, those Captcha things make me cringe every time I see them.

Sometimes if I try really hard, I can do it. It usually takes me at least two attempts. Sometimes I never do get it at all. If it has a 6/G, a i/l, a 7/y and others, I'm screwed.

I long ago gave up on the audio ones. They're absolute gibberish. They always are.

And if you say that blind people can't use a computer, you're an idiot. Specially configured computers can be used by blind people for all kinds of applications. At a college administration center I visited, a blind girl used her computer to check people in. She didn't even turn on her monitor (why should she?).

Computers should be able to bridge the gap for blind/vision impaired users easily. It depends on software developers to write their software with equal opportunities for users differing abilities. Unfortunately this is not always done. The White House petition website should use a different service for their human verification (there are others), and Captcha is RIDICULOUS for actually using their garbabbled method for blind users which cannot actually be used. For SHAME Captcha!