The Need for Information Access
Warning messages are often found among the "crawls" at the bottom of the television screen. Their content is sometimes "additive" or "supplementary," as is the case with the several running crawls containing headlines common during standard news coverage (e.g., on CNN). During emergencies, however, these crawls are a major means by which local stations alert consumers of specific conditions and, therefore, often contain vital life-saving information. At present, these have no auditory component which would make them available to blind people.