Assessing social media accessibility: the case of the Rock in Rio Lisboa music festival

Abstract

PurposeThis paper aims to present a framework to analyse whether information published on social media is accessible for people with disabilities (PwD), namely, visual and hearing disabilities, with an application to a music festival.Design/methodology/approachThe methodology used in this exploratory study consists of establishing a recommended framework to assess social media accessibility for PwD, especially for people with visual and hearing disabilities (PwVHD), and analyse, through an observation grid, if the information published on the official pages of the “Rock in Rio Lisboa” music festival on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and YouTube is accessible for this target audience.FindingsThe results indicate that, although the Rock in Rio Lisboa music festival is promoted as a festival for all, posts on social media are not accessible for people with visual and/or hearing disabilities and do not meet most of the defined parameters established in the proposed assessment framework.Originality/valueSocial media accessibility has not been analysed in previous research in the tourism context. This paper aims to fill in the void by establishing criteria and parameters that can serve as a basis for a framework for accessibility assessment in social media for PwVHD.