AI and the Future of Library Accessibility: Making Digital Promotions Inclusive

In one of the posters released by the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) about the future development of libraries, there was a statement that left us deeply contemplative: “Libraries power inclusive innovation. Enable libraries to serve as the backbone of inclusive and effective open science systems, so they can deliver an innovative...” Libraries have the power to create innovation that facilitates inclusivity, particularly in how libraries, as centers for storing and distributing knowledge, can become the core of inclusive and effective open science systems. Libraries ensure that knowledge and innovation are accessible to everyone, regardless of background. However, the knowledge and facilities available in libraries are not yet being utilized to their full potential by users if the promotion being done does not include an element of inclusivity. Currently, digital promotion is more well-known because of its broader reach and greater appeal, especially to users who are already using smartphones. For users who have not or cannot use smartphones or digital devices, this becomes a different issue. This then becomes a challenge for librarians and content creators to pay more attention to how library promotion is made to be inclusive, so that in the future, people with disabilities can maximize their use of the library. Digital Promotion Promotion is understood as the way something is introduced to the general public. It involves what is being introduced, how it is introduced, and what is used to introduce it. Digital promotion, or now more popularly known as digital marketing, is essentially the same. It promotes something or someone through digital media. In general, there are three main points in digital marketing: using digital channels to promote products or services, employing techniques and strategies to engage the public, and combining offline and online techniques to strengthen the strategy (Patel, 2024). The primary point, of course, is using digital channels as the main strategy in promotion. Nowadays, we also see how libraries use social media as a tool to promote their programs and facilities. The use of social media in Indonesia up to 2024 is detailed as follows: 1) Total Users: 191 million users (73.7% of the population) 2) Active Users: 167 million users (64.3% of the population) 3) Internet Penetration: 242 million users (93.4% of the population) Most Popular Social Media Platforms: 1) YouTube: 139 million users (53.8% of the population) 2) Instagram: 122 million users (47.3% of the population) 3) Facebook: 118 million users (45.9% of the population) 4) WhatsApp: 116 million users (45.2% of the population) 5) TikTok: 89 million users (34.7% of the population) In terms of age, social media users are dominated by those aged 18-34 years (54.1%), with female users (51.3%) slightly outnumbering male users (48.7%). On average, Indonesians spend 3 hours and 14 minutes per day on social media, with 81% accessing it daily. The activities most frequently carried out on social media include sharing photos/videos (81%), communication (79%), news/information (73%), entertainment (68%), and online shopping (61%) (RRI). Inclusivity, People with Disabilities, and Accessibility Inclusivity, as described in the “Guide for Implementing Inclusive Education” by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology of Indonesia, is an approach to building an environment open to anyone with different backgrounds and conditions, including characteristics, physical conditions, personalities, status, ethnicity, culture, and more. Therefore, inclusive promotion should encompass all people with various backgrounds, statuses, ethnicities, and cultures, including vulnerable groups such as people with disabilities. The term “difabel” is defined as “different ability person”. People with disabilities are not those without abilities (disabled), but rather those who carry out life activities with different physical and mental conditions from most people. This condition may be congenital or developed later in life. The ability of people without disabilities to access all types of information in various forms has increasingly dulled their sensitivity and empathy toward people with disabilities. According to the United Nations (1981) was designated as the International Year of Disabled Persons. This milestone became a key reason for fulfilling the information needs of people with disabilities. Additionally, Indonesia's Law No. 4 of 1997 concerning people with disabilities, in Article 6, states that people with disabilities have the right to accessibility in their independence and the right to develop their talents, abilities, and social lives. Furthermore, Indonesia signed the Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Rights and Dignity of Persons with Disabilities in 2008. Prior to that, in 2000, Indonesia, through President Abdurrahman Wahid, initiated the National Accessibility Movement, aimed at making public services more accessible to people with disabilities. Reflecting on this, we began to rethink that many library promotions, as one of the centers for managing knowledge, are still not friendly to people with disabilities. We are not merely discussing whether special services for people with disabilities are available or not in a particular library or how applications used to access information in the library are designed. We are focusing on how digital promotions conducted by libraries, including the National Library, are still not friendly to people with disabilities. Accessibility is the key. According to the Department of Economic and Social Affairs Disability, accessibility encompasses tools, procedures, and challenges in accessing certain things. From a disability perspective, ease of access to meet specific needs is a hope that should become a reality. This is because the challenges of accessibility for people with disabilities are far greater than for those without disabilities. Therefore, it is necessary to create equal access to meet the information needs of all parties, without discrimination. The principles of accessibility according to the 2006 UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities include: 1) Physical environment: It should help people with disabilities strengthen their mental state, feel valued, appreciated, respected, and treated as any other human being. 2) Transportation: It should help people with disabilities move from one place to another easily and affordably. 3) Information: It should help people with disabilities fulfill their information needs to improve their quality of life. 4) Facilities and public services: They should help people with disabilities perform their work and contribute to their environment. The principles of accessibility according to the 2006 UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities..." (United Nations, 2006). However, people with disabilities generally face many accessibility barriers, one of which is access to the information they need. These challenges are not only due to physical facilities such as stairs, doors, or bookshelves but also extend to the availability of media promotion that can reach them. For example, the lack of content that uses sign language, the use of colors that are not friendly to people with color blindness, the lack of captions that still do not use alternative text for people with low vision, and various other forms of promotion that are still not inclusive are challenges for libraries. The difficulties often encountered in digital promotion stem from the lack of and limited knowledge about disabilities themselves and the lack of exposure to knowledge on how to create digital promotions that are friendly to people with disabilities. This lack of knowledge is exacerbated by the fact that applications like iPusnas and BintangPusnas are not yet friendly for use by people with disabilities. Artificial Intelligence New research pathways opened by artificial intelligence can be used as a means to uncover topics that have rarely or never been explored. It is hoped that this gap can be filled with research that will develop new topics and contribute to the advancement of knowledge. AI itself emerged as a branch of Computer Science that promises many benefits in meeting future human needs. The literature on artificial intelligence mentions that the idea of AI began in the early 17th century when Rene Descartes suggested that animal bodies are nothing but complex machines (Budiharto, 2018). The word “intelligence” comes from the Latin “intelligo”, which means “I understand”. This means that the basis of intelligence is the ability to understand and take action. The word “intelligence” is a complex term that can be defined with different expressions such as logic, understanding, selfawareness, learning, planning, and problem-solving. On the other hand, “Artificial” is something that is not real, like a deception because it is a result of simulation. The history of AI began when John McCarthy (1995) from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) proposed the term “Artificial Intelligence”. He organized a conference to attract the talent and expertise of others interested in AI called, “The Dartmouth Summer Research Project on Artificial Intelligence”. This conference brought together AI founders and researchers from Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), MIT, and IBM, and laid the groundwork for the future of AI development and research. McCarthy defined AI as: “The goal of AI is to develop machines that behave as though they were intelligent. It is the science and engineering of making intelligent machines, especially intelligent computer programs. It is related to the similar task of using computers to understand human intelligence, but AI does not have to confine itself to methods that are biologically observable.” It can be understood that the goal of AI is to develop machines that behave as if they are intelligent, particularly through intelligent programs designed for humans. Therefore, it can be concluded that AI is a technique and science for making a machine intelligent, especially for computer programs. The intelligence referred to here is intelligence like that possessed by humans so that a computer can take actions to solve even complex problems with human-like reasoning. To enable computers to act like or similar to humans, they must be equipped with knowledge through a training process and have reasoning abilities. Several scholars has done research regarding the role of AI in the library. The first research, “Promosi Perpustakaan Melalui Media Sosial di Perpustakaan IAIN Salatiga” (Library Promotion Through Social Media at the IAIN Salatiga Library), written by Ifonilla Yunianti (2019). This study discusses promotion as one of the library marketing activities, which is key to the continued use of the library by its users. Social media is seen as a means to promote and communicate among librarians and with patrons. The IAIN Salatiga Library uses social media, including a website and a YouTube account, as promotional media to communicate its services, activities, and collections. Through an ethnographic approach, this research attempts to describe the library's culture in the realm of promotion. Next, we have research entitled “Adapting Intelligent Information Services in Libraries: A Case of Smart AI Chatbots” written by Subhajit Panda and Rupak Chakravarty (2022), after the COVID-19 pandemic. This study shows how artificial intelligence can be used in libraries through the implementation of AI chatbots. This is used as an effort to promote the library to users through interactive communication between AI and users. The presence of chatbots themselves has the potential to improve service quality, build user perception through positive UI/UX, increase engagement through notifications, enhance personalization capacity, increase automation productivity, and provide more flexible access for users. The implementation of chatbots is also closely related to Intelligent Virtual Assistants (IVA). Libraries can adopt IVA to strengthen relationships between the library and its partners, with the aim of creating user satisfaction, especially for those who have shifted to social media platforms. Another interesting reading entitled “Introduction: Promoting Inclusive Innovation” written by Tim Vorley, Helen Lawton Smith, and Beldina Owalla. Their writing discusses the fact that many policies and initiatives are still discriminatory, such as when these policies and innovations are not gender-inclusive. For instance, studies show a lack of female representation in STEM fields, which leads to inequality. The challenge of creating inclusive policies and innovations requires a holistic understanding of diversity. Essentially, the representation of every societal group should be fulfilled through inclusive policies and innovations.

A qualitative method is being used to assess this study. Data collection was conducted through observation and literature review. Before determining this research, we first read and referred to several journal articles relevant to our research topic, which is inclusive digital promotion. The focus of this research is on how artificial intelligence can assist librarians and content creators in making digital promotions more accessible to people with disabilities. Seeing that artificial intelligence is currently not only trending but also a challenge, it is essential for librarians, in particular, to be able to utilize AI to ease their work and help users from various backgrounds maximize the use of library facilities and collections.

There are three assessed aspects: accessibility in content presentation, representation of a diverse audience, and technological adoption for accessibility. A. Accessibility in Content Presentation Currently, the promotional content shared by the National Library on its Instagram account, @perpusnas.go.id, is still dominated by text, images, and videos that does not fully accommodate accessibility needs for people with disabilities. For instance, not all content includes closed captions, and the text used does not always facilitate comprehension for people with disabilities. Sign language content is also absent from the National Library's Instagram social media posts. Additionally, on the National Library's X account (@perpusnas1), content has yet to incorporate ALT text or descriptions accessible to screen readers. The content on X remains primarily limited to images and videos, presenting a challenge for content accessibility. B. Representation of Diverse Audiences The digital promotions on the National Library's social media are still focused on standard content regarding facilities, services, and access procedures but have yet to consider the representation of people with disabilities. Although content about disability services is available, it remains limited in quantity and is not well-targeted specifically for individuals with disabilities. No collaborative content with social media platforms focused on disability issues exists. In terms of facilities, services, and collections, the National Library does provide for people with disabilities, but there is a lack of corresponding digital promotions, which are not yet optimal. This indicates that users with disabilities have not yet become a primary focus in the National Library’s digital promotion strategy. C. Technological Adoption for Accessibility Artificial intelligence technology has yet to be utilized by the National Library's social media content managers on Instagram or X. Implementing AI on social media could include, for example, automated sign language translation or automatic voice descriptions for image-based content. Using AI avatars to deliver information in sign language would also demonstrate the adoption of technology for enhanced accessibility. In the article entitled “Have We Built an Inclusive Library?”, published by the National Library of Indonesia, clearly depicted on how iPusnas, a digital library application with 114,527 titles, is not yet accessible to visually impaired individuals. In contrast, the Instagram account of the National Library, with 3,573 posts, 331,000 followers, and 208 accounts followed, rarely, if ever, features content that uses sign language or captions with alternative text. Looking again at the National Library's X (formerly Twitter) account, I have yet to find image posts with alternative text, which is usually marked with ALT at the bottom left of each image. However, this account has 9,641 posts and 52,236 followers. This simple feature, in our opinion, needs to be advocated because, in essence, any library is for everyone, regardless of their background. FIGURE 1. EXAMPLE OF THE NATIONAL LIBRARY'S INSTAGRAM FEED Sumber:@perpusnas.go.id EXAMPLE OF THE NATIONAL LIBRARY'S INSTAGRAM REELS Sumber:@perpusnas.go.id EXAMPLE OF THE NATIONAL LIBRARY'S X ACCOUNT Sumber: @perpusnas1 EXAMPLE OF THE NATIONAL LIBRARY'S X ACCOUNT Sumber: @perpusnas1 We took examples of the Instagram and X accounts of the National Library. As we can see from the posts, there is no accessibility available for visually impaired people, such as the ALT feature that should be present in every image post. We can compare the X account's display, which should be friendly to people with disabilities.The assessment of other social media accounts also uses the same three aspects: accessibility in content presentation, representation of a diverse audience, and technological adoption for accessibility. Two social media accounts were selected as examples of disability-friendly digital promotion techniques. The first is the Instagram account @silang.ig, and the second is the X account @DisabilityGovUK. D. Accessibility in Content Presentation The social media accounts @silang.ig and @DisabilityGovUK are considered more accessible in their digital promotions, as they provide ALT text for images on Instagram and X, audio descriptions for video content on Instagram, as well as automatic subtitles and sign language in Instagram content. E. Representation of Diverse Audience Social media that prioritizes making its content accessible to the public tends to be more proactive in embracing the disability community. Such content explicitly demonstrates its representation of diverse audiences. Using characters and models with disabilities, adding accessibility features, and fostering collaborations highlight how promotions can reach various audience types. F. Technological Adoption for Accessibility The social media accounts @silang.is and @DisabilityGovUK demonstrate the use of artificial intelligence to add closed captions to video content, provide audio descriptions, and include ALT text for images. In these cases, AI is integrated into their social media platforms, enhancing the reach and usability of digital promotions for people with disabilities. Similar to Canva's Magic Writer, features like closed captions and ALT text improve accessibility, making the content more inclusive and accessible to a broader range of audiences DISPLAY OF X ACCOUNT OF DISABILITY UNIT RETWEETING EQUALITY HUB Sumber: @DisabilityGovUK EXPLANATION OF ALT TEXT WHEN CLICKED. Sumber: @DisabilityGovUK DISPLAY OF INSTAGRAM REELS FROM SILANG Sumber: @silang.ig The use of clear and visible sign language allows deaf people (The Deaf Friends) to understand the content of the displayed reels. Reflecting on the already available accessibility features from social media accounts that are friendly to people with disabilities, here are some ideas that can be used for more inclusive digital promotion. Of course, with the presence of artificial intelligence, or AI, digital promotion can more easily reach the community. Based on the research findings, we provide the following recommendations: First, The use of AI for personalized promotion has evolved, with libraries now leveraging AI not only for creating chatbots but also for analyzing user preferences and specific needs to produce tailored promotional content. For instance, AI can customize language, format, and promotional media based on the type of disability, offering larger text or audio formats as needed. This capability extends to automatically generating multi-format content, such as converting text into audio and vice versa, and providing closed captions or voice narration. With these features, AI enables library promotions to become more personalized and inclusive. By analyzing user data, AI can predict individual preferences and behaviors, allowing promotional content to align with their interests. For example, AI might recommend books or library events based on borrowing history and search patterns, enhancing promotional effectiveness and user satisfaction. For individuals with disabilities, AI supports adaptive promotions by transforming content formats for greater accessibility. As a result, AI not only broadens the library's outreach but also fosters a more inclusive user experience that meets diverse needs. Second, If earlier we emphasized the use of sign language in promotional content, AI can now integrate digital sign language translation that automatically translates promotional text or audio into sign language. This enables Deaf Friends and people with hearing impairments to more easily understand the promoted information. Additionally, AI avatars can be customized to convey messages in sign language in real-time. Integrating sign language into digital library promotion content is a crucial step toward inclusive information access. With AI, creating and translating content into sign language becomes seamless and efficient. For instance, AI-powered avatars can "speak" in sign language within promotional videos, ensuring the information reaches the deaf community. This approach expands library promotions beyond text or audio formats, allowing them to reach all user groups. Incorporating sign language into digital content reflects the library's commitment to achieving comprehensive accessibility for all patrons. Third, ALT text plays a critical role in making digital visual content accessible to individuals with disabilities, particularly those who are visually impaired. In the context of library promotions, AI can automatically generate appropriate text descriptions for images, graphics, or illustrations used in promotional materials. AI technology is capable of understanding visual contexts and providing more detailed, meaningful descriptions compared to manual methods. This ensures that users relying on screen readers can comprehend the visual information presented in promotions, thus enhancing the inclusivity of the library’s digital content. Fourth, AI streamlines the production of library promotional content, enabling the creation of relevant and engaging material for diverse audiences more quickly and efficiently. AI algorithms can assist in generating various types of media—written content, videos, and images—tailored to specific user needs. Moreover, AI can support the automatic creation of promotional materials in multiple languages and formats, ensuring accessibility for international users or those requiring content in specialized formats. This accelerates content production while ensuring that the promotions are inclusive, diverse, and accessible to a broad audience. The difficulty and confusion of content creators in producing information that is friendly to people with disabilities can also be minimized with the help of automatic content creation, which can be presented in various forms such as carousels, articles, infographics that are more optimized for different accessibility needs. The content produced can even be translated into various local languages, allowing more people to access the information presented.

In conclusion, creating digital promotions that are friendly to people with disabilities indeed presents many challenges. However, with the help of artificial intelligence, these difficulties can be minimized, making promotions more accessible and user-friendly. The use of ALT on image posts on the X platform makes it easier for visually impaired individuals to listen to image descriptions. The addition of alternative text on Instagram also facilitates more accessible closed captions, and the use of clear and visible sign language makes it easier for The Deaf Friends to understand the content presented. The presence of artificial intelligence will maximize the creation of more engaging, accessible, and user-oriented digital promotions.