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Nov. 19, 2024
Breaking Barriers: Making Your Podcast Accessible with the Blind Blogger
Have you ever thought about how your podcast sounds to a visually impaired listener? Or how small changes could make a big impact on inclusivity? If not, you’re in for an eye-opening conversation. In this episode, host Mathew Passy sits down with Maxwell Ivey, affectionately known as the Blind Blogger, to share powerful, practical ways to make podcasts more accessible to everyone.
Maxwell, an accessibility advocate and founder of Accessibility Advantage, has devoted his life to helping others experience the digital world without barriers. Despite being visually impaired due to retinitis pigmentosa, Maxwell’s expertise in digital accessibility is unparalleled. Known for his insightful guidance, he’s here to teach us why accessibility isn’t just a checkbox but a way to connect with listeners more meaningfully.
What’s in it for you? Providing audio descriptions, accessible website navigation, and alternative text can forge a stronger bond with your listeners, increasing loyalty and expanding your reach. Maxwell covers it all—from why transcripts boost accessibility and SEO to the power of captions for broader engagement.
In This Episode, We Cover:
- The Impact of Audio Descriptions
- Maxwell explains how describing visual elements during your recordings can deepen the experience for visually impaired audiences, allowing them to feel fully included in your content.
- Making Podcast Players Accessible
- Discover how tools like WAVES and AudioEye can help ensure your podcast players are accessible, with properly labeled buttons and controls that work seamlessly with screen readers.
- Designing for Simplicity
- Simplifying your website’s navigation and adding alternative text for images makes it easier for people using adaptive technologies—and helps your SEO game, too.
- The Power of Transcripts and Closed Captions
- Transcripts aren’t just for accessibility; they also cater to younger audiences, with 37% of people under 35 preferring content with captions. Maxwell shares why every podcaster should consider adding this option.
- Maximizing Your Accessibility Efforts
- From consulting with clients to continuous improvements, Maxwell discusses how to approach accessibility as an ongoing practice that strengthens audience relationships and shows commitment to inclusivity.
Links and Resources Mentioned:
- Maxwell’s podcast picks:
- Michael Babcock Podcast
- "Podcasting Made Simple" by Alex Sanfilippo
- Follow Maxwell Ivy on Social media:
LinkedIn - The Blind blogger Maxwell Ivy
Instagram - theblindblogger
Facebook - Maxwell Ivey Jr
Twitter - @maxwellivey
Youtube - @MaxwellIvey
- Technology in podcasting that assists visually impaired podcasters - Interlink 360 Video Camera
- Podcast event organizers that fosters inclusivity - Podfest
- A platform for connecting podcast hosts with potential guests - PodMatch
This episode is essential for podcasters committed to inclusivity. Join us to learn how small changes can make a huge difference in making podcasting accessible to all. Let’s make the podcasting world a welcoming place for everyone—tune in now!
**As an Amazon Associate, we may earn commissions from qualifying purchases of podcasting gear from Amazon.com. We also participate in affiliate programs with many of the software services mentioned on our website. If you purchase something through the links we provide, we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. The team at Podcasting Tech only recommends products and services that we would use ourselves and that we believe will provide value to our viewers and readers.**
For additional resources and insights visit podcastingtech.com or follow us on social media:
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Transcript
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Welcome to Podcasting Tech, a podcast that equips busy
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entrepreneurs engaged in podcasting with proven and cost effective
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solutions for achieving a professional sound and appearance.
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I'm Matthew Passi, your host and a 15 year veteran in the podcasting
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space. We'll help you cut through the noise and offer guidance on software and
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hardware that can elevate the quality of your show. Tune in weekly
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for insightful interviews with tech creators, behind the scenes studio tours, and
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strategies for podcasting success. Head to podcasting tech dot
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com to subscribe to this show on YouTube or your favorite podcast platform
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and join us on this exciting journey to unlock the full potential of your
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podcast. Gonna talk about something that we
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not a lot of podcasters really address, and it's something that more of us
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should be thinking about, the idea of accessibility with
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our digital content. And joining us to talk about that is
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Maxwell Ivy, known as the Blind blogger.
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He also runs the accessibility advantage. You can find out the accessibilityadvantage.com.
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And for as long as I've known Maxwell, which has been a few years since
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we first met at a Map Con here in South Jersey,
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maybe 5 years ago, He has always been out there trying to
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help podcasters make their content more accessible so
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that everybody can enjoy what it is that you were doing, and
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we are excited to chat with him about that today. Maxwell, thank you for joining
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us. Oh, thank you, Matthew. I'm happy to be here. It's always
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great when I get to spend time with one of my one of my favorite
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leaders of the podcast industry, so thank you. Oh, is that person here?
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I don't see them. Well,
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I I I wanna definitely talk about accessibility. I wanna talk about all the different
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things that podcasters can and should be doing, but, you
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know, the blind blogger is such a unique moniker for
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someone to have. Tell us a little bit how you started with
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that and where you're at these days with your with your digital media,
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adventure. Right. So you know that I started
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life as a car loaner. After my dad's death I
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transitioned to brokering used rides on the Internet,
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as social media came along I was building a community
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there and as a former shorthand, people on LinkedIn and Facebook just
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referred to me as the blind blogger because in 2009,
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'ten, along in there, there weren't a lot of people with
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disabilities period on the Internet and very few of them were putting
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themselves out there as openly as I was. You know, I like to
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tell people I wasn't the the most talented, most
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prolific, or most consistent, but I was the most shameless. So people knew
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me and they hung that name on me and it stuck and when I decided
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to start a second website to talk more about being a blonde entrepreneur, it was
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the natural choice and it stuck with me and, you
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know, the only thing I regret about the blind blogger is,
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in some cases, it's a little limiting, but I think I've finally found the
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right balance with the old and the new. I just tell people, Hey,
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I'm the blind blogger of Maxwell Ivy. Now let's talk about accessibility,
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because the truth, the truth is I've been
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talking about accessibility for years. It's just I'm
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surprised you and everybody else didn't tell me that that was what I was doing
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while I was doing it because up until 4 years ago, I really didn't
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realize just how much of an impact I was having, how big an advocate
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I was for making the Internet and content on the Internet
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more inclusive. And it was only as I started to get work
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thrown at me, basically, in the area of writing on the
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subject of accessibility that I realized, wait a minute. I've been doing this stuff for
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17 years now and I am the expert. And it's
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about time I lean into that role and start to
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be recognized for it more directly and get paid for it, of course.
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We always wanna get paid for our good work. Before we jump
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into the the work of accessibility specifically and and what you've been doing over
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at the Accessibility Advantage, because we do like to talk about technology and
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equipment and tools, I'm wondering what has been some of
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the best innovations, specifically in
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podcasting as far as equipment that allows you to
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have a show and and be successful with your content creation journey?
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Well, I hate to to spoil such a great question, but,
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I am not a high-tech person and even living vicariously
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through my friends with disabilities who are high-tech persons, there
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haven't been a lot of of big time innovations that
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have made having a podcast easier. I do
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have one thing that I'm using right now that I really love, although it's not
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as smart as it advertises itself to be. I have an interlink 360
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video camera, and it uses artificial intelligence
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to stay focused on my face and keep me centered in the camera
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view. Now, it took over an hour with a sighted person
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to configure it where it actually knows what it's supposed to do and when it's
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supposed to do it, but it does work really well now. So I can
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move forward and back and side and it'll still have me in focus. And
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this is important because I don't have complete
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control of my space. And as a blind person, one of the most
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important things to you is consistency. How do you create a
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consistent workspace or a consistent routine? And so
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I can't guarantee the furniture will be in the same place every time,
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but now I have a camera where I don't have to worry about that anymore.
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So that's that's an innovation. I would say
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that some of the new microphones that I haven't gotten to try yet are probably
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using artificial intelligence, and, I would
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also say just more people getting involved and becoming familiar
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with accessibility so that I don't have to
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spend as much time getting them up to speed as to what I need.
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And, you know, speaking of technology, I think you were there at the
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event where I won that, that very nice,
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microphone at Joe's event. I took it home and I used
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it twice, and then it broke, and a
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while after I posted those 2 episodes, people said, you know, Max, we loved your
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interviews, but the audio wasn't synced. The volume
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we'd have to raise the volume to, hear your guest and then
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we'd have to lower it so you didn't blast us out of the room.
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So, sometimes technology can be very challenging if you have a disability,
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but I feel like, Zoom, Google Meet, and the other
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meeting platforms have done a good job of helping
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the the novice and the disabled balance their
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their sound quality so that people can really enjoy the
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audio and concentrate solely on the message. And and,
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certainly, there's a lot of post production tools as well that will fix a lot
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of problems, that might come up with, when you have difficulties in
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recording your your content. So let's let's talk about accessibility in
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the podcasting space. And, you know, I I think
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people are gonna hear this and they're gonna think, well, podcasts are an audio
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medium, you know, what is the big challenge for a blind blogger
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to listen to a podcast? Tell us what
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are the biggest hurdles that you come across when
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either you're trying to find specific content or
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you've landed on a specific show or network or
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program, but, you know, there are other things that
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would be done better to make your your experience
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enjoying it, a little bit smoother. Right.
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So I'm gonna come with this from 2 points. I'm gonna start with
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the positive, what podcast hosts can be doing
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that will help them take advantage of accessibility to build
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a better connection with their audience. One of the
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big trends in podcasting is people recording in
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video and then outputting the audio. The problem
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is, is depending on who you ask, anywhere from 70 to 85
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percent of your audience is only going to listen to your
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podcast. So they don't have the advantage of your video.
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So the one thing that would really help your audience
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is if you would do what is called an audio description. That's
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where you tell them a little bit about what you look like, your background,
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what you're wearing, what your set looks like. If you have a dog or a
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cat that thinks it's part of the show and will make an occasional appearance
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describing them, but more importantly, if there are head shakes,
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if there are facial expressions, if there are things that happen during the
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video recording that you think to yourself, if I had
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seen that happen, it would have affected me emotionally,
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or it would have entertained me, or made me laugh, or something. If I had
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seen that, it would have affected the way I,
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experienced this show, then you want
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to describe those things as they happen as best as you can. Sometimes you'll have
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to describe them afterwards. Sometimes you may wanna put it in the in the post
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production show notes, but these are the kind of things that your
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audience who, by the way, they're just as blind as I am, most of
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them, they can't appreciate what was going
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on on screen while you were recording this audio that you're outputting
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to your player. So I highly encourage people to do an audio description.
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If at the end of this recording you want me to do mine for you
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to give them an example, I could do that. That's one thing I would say
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because it allows you to build a stronger connection with your audience, which leads
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to more loyal listeners, which leads to downloads,
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reviews, and, hopefully, email subscribers are people who will buy
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whatever it is you're selling the next time you have something to sell. So that's
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Let's let's not wait. Let's let's get a sample of an audio description now so
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that while we're thinking about it, people can understand what it is that you're referring
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to. Well, I was hoping you would say that, but you being the host, I
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didn't wanna step over. So
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so I am a 59 year old white Caucasian
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male, and I say that because I'm a pale person. I have medium
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length brown curly hair, brown eyes. I'm
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wearing a white blue button down dress shirt, black tie. I'm sitting in a
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generic office chair, in my bedroom, which also
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doubles as my recording space. I have my back background
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blacked out or blurred out, whatever the big kids' term for it is,
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so there's nothing back there. No dogs, cats,
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children, etcetera. No, no monograms
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or, logos on my clothing, no visible tattoos.
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Those are the kind of things you would want to describe for people in the
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beginning of your introduction. And, of course, for me, since I have a disability,
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at the end, I would mention that I am almost totally blind
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having retinitis pigmentosa, otherwise known as RP.
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Okay. Thank you for sharing all that with us and and
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explaining what a good visual, what a good audio
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description is for a podcast, something that maybe more people can be, thinking
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about in the future. So what was your your second point on this front
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as far as trying to enjoy podcasts, you know, with accessibility
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challenges? Right. So the the most important thing
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is your player and where they're gonna find your player.
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So if you're using one of the top podcasting
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platforms, the odds are their players' buttons are going to be accessible.
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I have not been on any of the majors where that's been the
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case. It probably will be more likely to be the case with
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a with a free hosting provider or
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with somebody who is new to the industry as a hosting
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provider, but you do want to check and see if the
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buttons are properly labeled. It's easier if you have
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access to a screen reader or if you use a product like WAVES
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or the free checker at audioeye.com. Either of those can help you determine
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if your website or your player's website is accessible,
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at least for the most part, probably about 70%, 60%.
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It'll sell you, you know, at least that much of it whether it's right or
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wrong. So your podcast player being able to pause,
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stop, fast forward, rewind, being able to share your
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content by clicking the buttons, or by subscribing to
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whatever their favorite platform is, those things need to be tested.
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And then the website where you locate it. You want to make
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the podcast player on your website. I would
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say it should be the only thing on the page, unless
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you're using a plugin that allows you to embed
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your player on your homepage and then have it display the
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latest episode within that player, which I understand a lot of people do that now
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as well. In that case, you just want to make sure that there are as
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few elements on the home page as possible alongside
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the player. So when people use adaptive
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technology, whether it is somebody who is slightly
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visually impaired that has a screen magnifier,
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or somebody who's more impaired like me that uses a screen reader, or you're talking
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about hearing impaired, or people using automated switch devices
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because they have a lack of limbs or motor control,
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regardless, it takes people like me longer
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to navigate your websites. So
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the simpler design that you have, the fewer elements that
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you use on any one page, the better, because
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the the fewer things I have to pass through in order to find the one
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thing that I came to your website to do, which as a podcaster,
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that one thing should be your podcast. So if
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I have to navigate through 3 different pages
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or if I have to navigate through 25 links before I find
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the link to this week's episode or the player for where I can listen
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to any of your episodes, that's just making things harder for
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me and for people like me. So that's why I was was talking about
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adaptive technology and
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in some cases the adaptive technology
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also can can lead to some some help
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for, people that are are wanting to bring more
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traction to their website. Because after you talk about
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navigating a website and focusing on a simple clean design
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with a minimal number of elements, one of the next things you're gonna
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talk about is image. Because as podcasters, we've all got
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artwork for our shows, we've got artwork for our episodes, we've
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got artwork for our profile on our home page, and all those images
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need to have the alternative text tag that describes the image for
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people using a screen reader, but those descriptions are also
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indexed by Alexa, Google, Siri, all the
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major search engines are indexing those
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and the only problem I have when I tell people about that
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is they want to stuff keywords into their image descriptions.
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So I tell people you have a 150 to a 180
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characters depending on the search engine that will actually be indexed. So let's
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try to split that in half and have half be the name of your company
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and what you do and the other half be what's
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actually in the image, and that way you get the best of both
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worlds. You can drive traffic, and I am sure
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that you probably spent a lot of time, effort, stress, and
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maybe even a fair bit of money into creating the images that are on your
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website. So why not make sure that everybody
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visiting your website can appreciate them? You know,
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you were talking about what our page should look like.
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Is it best practices or would it be
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advisable if somebody has the resources to almost make, like,
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a separate page that would be more accessible
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friendly versus their main podcast listening page? Just because,
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you know, there's there's something about the design and form and function that
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people look for when they want to create a website.
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But also, you know, what is best for the entire audience so
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that everybody can enjoy the content and not get bogged down in, you know,
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tons of details and and, you know, tons of these,
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accessibility features kinda overloading our circuits with all
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the different things that we have on the site. Right. Well,
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I personally don't believe that anyone
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should be creating a second version of your site. I know that
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the larger corporations like, like Audible
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and Amazon, I know that they do it, but I often
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find that the version they've created specifically for people using
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adaptive equipment turned out to be not all that
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great and some of that's because they don't have the right
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people providing information to the developers on their
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team and some of it is just lack of time or
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funds or lack of care. I also don't
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believe that people should have to install a plug in or a
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widget on their website to make it accessible. The truth is, most
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things, other than the alt text descriptions and the audio descriptions for
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videos and audio files, other than those, everything you
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do to improve accessibility is stuff that you should be doing to improve the
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user experience of everybody else that visits your website anyway.
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Okay. That's that is fair. What
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about when it comes to transcripts? How often do you find yourself
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using those? I don't personally use them
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that much unless there's something in the episode that I plan on using
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in a later talk or presentation of some
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kind, but they are targeted to me. Transcripts
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are great for people that have a hearing disability,
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but transcripts and closed captions are one of those things
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that have a large benefit to the able-bodied
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community. Here's a statistic that I recently found
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where people under the age of 35, that
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37% of that group will not
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watch a video on any platform unless that
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video has closed captions. Now, we both know that's
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because they're most likely gonna be watching some of those videos when they
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shouldn't be watching those videos, and they don't want people
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overhearing them. But that's the truth. There's a large part of
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the society that is depending on closed captions because it just
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fits their lifestyle and the same thing applies with audio
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descriptions. I have sighted people who will tell me, you know, Max, if I have
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a good audio description during a movie or a TV show, once they discover that
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they're there on their TVs, if I have a good audio description, I don't have
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to look at the TV. I can go do other stuff. I can follow the
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plot and, in some cases, can even follow the plot
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better because the narrators will tell about stuff on the
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screen that maybe you missed because your focus was not
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totally on the screen for that 1 or 2 seconds where
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you needed to see something in the corner of the screen or whatever. So,
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I would say that those types of things,
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they make life easier for a lot of your people who don't have
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a disability. Another good example is the text,
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size, font, color contrast on your website and on
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your on your website pages.
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If you take a, if you take
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a high contrast color, like say black on white or black on
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yellow, and you give the user the opportunity to invert the
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text so that you have a white text on black background,
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that becomes much more easy to read and to
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navigate in very bright or very dark light for
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people who don't have a vision issue. That is absolutely
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fair. And I do see a lot of folks who are, switching over to dark
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mode often when they're at their computer. And so I could see why that would
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just be something good for people to think about even if they're not necessarily thinking
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about full accessibility, you know, concerns
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and whatnot. So what is it like to work with you? If somebody's hearing this
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and they're thinking, you know, man, Maxwell's got a great point. There's a lot of
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these things that we should be doing, but we just don't know how to. How
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do they work with you? What does engagement look like? Well,
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it starts with reviewing their current
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platform, whether that's a website, an app, or their podcast, and seeing where
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they're at now, giving them a
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breakdown of where they stand on the issues, and
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giving them a prioritized list of what needs to
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be done right now, you know, what are what are things that are
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basic necessities of accessibility that have to happen,
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or what are things that we can work on later. I'm
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definitely a big fan of doing this at
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the the speed that the website
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owners team can handle as far as time and money.
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And sometimes what we have to do is we have to say, okay, these things
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we can't fix now, but what we can do is we can come
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up with workarounds that we can teach to
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users who have a disability, and we can make those available either on the
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website or put a post a note that if
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they if they send us an email or click a button, then we can make
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those available to them so they can navigate the accessibility issues
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in the short term while the owner works on that.
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Then once those are corrected, then we can go
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on to something else that needs to be done. We can also reevaluate things that
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have been improved to make sure that later additions to the
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website haven't compromised the accessibility that we just built.
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I firmly believe that accessibility is a progress and not
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a perfection, and so it's, it is,
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it is one of those things where you're gonna work through it and
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hopefully get to the point where you're in the high 90s
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percent of accessibility. And thanks to my education,
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you understand how adaptive check users will navigate
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the Internet, so you'll be able to maintain it and avoid
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causing problems to it going going forward. One other thing I
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do that most people in this field, I feel
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like they're they're dropping the ball for their clients is
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the disability community, we love to support businesses that are making
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effort to be inclusive, but most business owners, for some
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reason, are reluctant to
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proclaim, announce, share with the world the
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efforts that they're putting in to being inclusive. I don't want I don't
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I don't have any idea what their reasons are, but I just know that they
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just don't feel right talking about the work they've done or the work they've
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had done. So, during the process I'll do
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blog posts, social media posts,
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we'll do podcast episodes for some clients because it isn't just
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about improving the accessibility because, you
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know, part of the point is making it accessible because it'll make it
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easier for everybody else that will visit your website or your or your products or
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services. But a big part of this is improving the
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lives of people with disabilities, and it really doesn't
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improve their lives if they don't know about it. So
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evaluation, advice on correction, reevaluation,
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promotion, that's what it looks like to work with Max. And if you would like
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to do so, the accessibilityadvantage.com. We are chatting
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with Maxwell Ivy, the blind blogger. Max, before we
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let you go, I have a couple questions that we like to ask everybody on
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the show. And, of course, this first question is basically the main
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topic of our entire conversation.
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Podcasting space where we
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could improve upon? Are there things that you would like to see done
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better, whether it's on creation, distribution, marketing, anything like
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that? I think it's the same answer I would give if we
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were talking about the broadcast media. We need more
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people with disabilities in front of cameras and microphones. We need
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more attention and more spotlights being placed on
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those people because there are lots of
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blind, deaf, hearing impaired, paraplegic, quadriplegic,
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lots of people with disabilities out there who have podcasts or are in the process
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of starting podcasts, but there still
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aren't a lot of, what's that expression, faces that look like
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mine are out there in the podcasting world.
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So I think that would be something that would be an improvement. More
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people with disabilities on stages at conferences would help,
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but there again, that's part with the event organizers and it's part
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with the disabled people because y'all can't say yes to us if
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we don't ask, you know? So I would say those would
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be the kind of things I would think about and, I just want
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to drop in a short little plug here for the for Chris Krivitsas and
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his team at FOD Fest Expo including Nick Bad with us because,
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they invited me to record a video they will be posting shortly to
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help their presenters understand how to create more accessible and
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inclusive slides and QR codes. And as part of that, I also
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told them about doing audio descriptions. So Podfest in
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January, there's a organization that's making the effort
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to have their event be inclusive, so I wanna get their name out there if
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that's okay. Absolutely. I love Chris. I've
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always been a fan of his and the work that he's done, and I've
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always enjoyed my times at Podfest Conferences and
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actually hoping that I got my chance to go down, this year in January to
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go, check out the the latest one that they are working on. So,
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always happy to give Chris and his team a shout out. They do some
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really, really great work. Alright. This one
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is, a little probably gonna be a little bit trickier as well, but is there
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any technology that you would like to get your hands on that
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would help you with podcasting? Whether it's whether it's
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something that exists that, you know, just might be out of your budget or
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something maybe that somebody needs to create for you?
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I think there are 2 things I wanna get my hands on for different reasons.
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The number one thing on my wish list is a digital braille
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display and what the way they work is you connect
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them with your your desktop or your mobile
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devices by bluetooth and they use a series
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of magnets and metal pins to simulate
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braille characters, and the reason I want one is because
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when I record my podcast, I have to memorize all this stuff. I
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have to create tricks for myself so that I can remember all
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this stuff, But if I had access to a digital braille
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display, I would be able to read whatever I needed to read
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to refresh my memory on while I'm interviewing or being
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interviewed without the screen reader, that computer voice,
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getting in the middle of the conversation. So that's like my number one thing,
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and then my my second thing would be I
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would really like to to find a,
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a camera that would allow me to do
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better as far as recording events when I'm away from my
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house. I've spoken at a couple of
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conferences where I don't have videos of great talks because they
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weren't recording and it's not really easy for me to set up to
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record. So having a mobile ad source for recording
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video and or audio would be the second thing on my list.
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You know, I'm gonna have a nice chat with you right after this conversation
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about just such an idea, so stay tuned for that. Hopefully, we can help you
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out on that front. Alright. I like that. I I hope you can. And,
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lastly, is there a podcast in your
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playlist right now that you are listening to that, you know, no matter what is
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happening, when the new episode comes out, episode comes out, you're stopping what you're listening
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to or dropping everything to go check it out? It can be more than 1
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podcast, too. Okay. The easy one is one called Your Own Pay.
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It's done by a good friend of mine named Michael Babcock from Oregon.
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He's been in the disability space for probably 35
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years or more and the reason I like it is because he's
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got all the scoop on all the latest technology
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and how that can be used or not be used by people
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with disabilities. He's the only guy in my community who is
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also an expert on Android as well as iOS when it comes
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to accessibility, and so he's continuing to be in my
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ear telling me, Max, you know Android's almost there, you need to start thinking about
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switching from your iPhone. So, your own pay is one of
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them and then, I would say
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the, for I can't think of the name of the podcast, but I
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always listen to Alex Sethilippo's podcast. Oh,
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yes. Alex is from PodMatch,
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Success Stories or ah, man, what is
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this podcast? You know what? Yeah. I know. It bothers me, and I I deserves
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to hear, he deserves the credit for his podcast. And pull
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his name up on LinkedIn. It's right there in his profile.
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Yeah. Oh, podcasting made simple. There you go. So Alex
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Sanfilippo at Podcasts Made Simple. He's he's been a
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mentor and a friend, and his podcast always
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includes such great guests and they they share stuff that you're like, okay,
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this this should be a good interview. And then you listen to it, you're like,
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wait a minute. That was so much more than I ever thought I was gonna
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get from this particular guest. I mean, he, he just rings them
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dry or they, they come in and empty their, their, their brains for
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them. I don't know how it works. I just know that, you know, that you
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just you just get so much every time you listen to one of his guests.
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Yeah. Alex is someone who, is doing a lot of very
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interesting things in the space and already chatting with him,
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trying to make sure we can get him on the show. So very glad you
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brought him up as well as our buddy, Chris Karmitza. So I'm I'm trying to
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get him on my show too because I've I've been the accessibility adviser
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to PodLottery at PodMatch now for a few years. And,
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you know, the, in his case, it's been longer than it probably would have
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been because they're continuing to grow and build upon what they
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started at, but, the thing about PodMatch is,
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I'm really impressed with the, not just the work they've done to make it
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accessible, but the the point of their heart as
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far as they really want this to be the best thing for
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podcasters, including podcasters who just have a disability and people with disabilities
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who want to be guests. So, you know, I've been I've been
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helping him out for a while now and,
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I want him to come on my podcast to talk about accessibility on his
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platform. And he's like, Max, check back with me in December.
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What? Okay. His, his tag guy is a gentleman
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named Jesse, and I don't know Jesse's last name. I'm sorry.
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But but I I I spend a lot of time back and forth with Jesse.
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I've been trying to get him on my podcast as well to talk about Pod
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Match and accessibility. And so far, I'm still in
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the, you know, just keep checking back with us, Max. When our schedule's
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open, we'll come. You know? So He is he is
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a rather busy guy, and the next
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chance I get to chat with him, I'll I'll nudge him to, you know, go
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on your podcast as well and, you know, make an
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appearance there. Once again, we've been chatting with Maxwell Ivy, the
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blind blogger, also an accessibility advantage. You can go to the
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accessibility advantage .com to check out the great
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work that he does. And just, you know, think about
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Max. He's out here trying to enjoy content, and he's not trying to
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make you pay an arm and a leg, you know, for your content to
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be more user friendly. He just wants it so that everybody
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can can enjoy it and, you know, share with the rest of the world. So,
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Max, thank you so much for taking the time and joining us and for doing
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what it is that you do. Well, thank you, Matthew. I appreciate you
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making a spot for me on the show and for understanding the value
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value or the prevent the potential value of accessibility to your
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audience. So thank you for that. Thanks for joining us today
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on podcasting tech. There are links to all the hardware and
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software that help power our guest content and podcasting
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tech available in the show notes and on our website at podcastingtech.com.
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You can also subscribe to the show on your favorite platform, connect with us on
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social media, and even leave a rating and review while you're there. Thanks,
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and we'll see you next time on Podcasting Tech.
Maxwell Ivey
Digital Accessibility Advisor
Maxwell Ivey, widely known as The Blind Blogger, is a trailblazer in the realm of digital accessibility and content creation. Losing his sight to retinitis pigmentosa didn’t stop him from forging a remarkable path—from brokering used carnival rides online to becoming a leading advocate for inclusivity in the digital world.
Since launching his first website in 2007, Maxwell has been educating people about the importance of accessibility, even teaching himself HTML to overcome the lack of accessible tools at the time. Today, as an accessibility advisor, speaker, consultant, and podcaster, he empowers others to embrace inclusivity—not just because it’s the right thing to do, but because it enhances user experiences, improves search engine optimization, and opens doors to untapped markets.
Through his website, Accessibility Advantage, and his candid storytelling, Maxwell demonstrates how accessible design benefits everyone. His unwavering commitment to advocating for inclusive digital experiences has made him a respected voice and an inspiration to countless individuals. Maxwell’s journey is a testament to resilience, innovation, and the belief that accessibility is an opportunity for growth and connection.