Adopting an Inclusive Design Approach
According to Google, every week, a million users will start using the internet; they call this phenomenon the Next One Billion Users. From this moment forward, every new product, feature, or app, the company will consider the Next One Billion new users that will be going to use this.
Keeping in mind the NBU's, a creator or developer should start their new product or project with an Inclusive Design approach; this involves three aspects: Visuals, Logistics, and Calculated.
The Visual aspect of achieving an Inclusive Design approach is a visual representation. Consider this, What happens when we make accessibility include humans when we talk about gender, race, disabilities, religion, or status quo? What happens when users from all over the world see themselves in the apps that they use?
The answer is a technology for all users.
An example of this is that many big companies in their career’s website create forms to include every kind of audience, even though they offer the option to the user where they don't need to communicate if they don't want to. What does this use case say to us? That the opportunities that the company offers are for everyone.
Another example for this is to develop a multicultural set of visual communications, and this can be in the shape of photographs or illustrations showing diverse people or with a disability interacting at their jobs or with each other.
The Logistic aspect of reaching an Inclusive Design approach consists of taking into consideration the Geographic location. If you want to bring technology for all users, you need to think about where you live. Do you have a good wi-fi connection in your hometown? What type of smartphone do the people have in your community? Do you live outside the city where internet access is limited?
All of those things can be solved by thinking with an Include Design approach. If you're developing an app that shows maps, think about adding an option to download the routes, so José that lives at the city's outskirts can access them offline.
And now that we're talking about José living in the outskirts, what if he wants to watch some shows or movies on his smartphone or tablet? Keep in mind to develop a light version of your app, one that doesn't take a lot of space of your phone, and test how your videos look on a 4-inch screen
And the third aspect of having an Inclusive Design is the Calculated aspect, and this means taking into consideration, for example, people with visual weakness, you as developer or creator, should think about adding a setting for a contrast feature to your app that is responsive to the light, where the user can set it up to high contrast, and talking about screens, color can have different meanings depending on the location, maybe the purpose that you give to some colors in your community are not the same in another country.
Think about communities where low-cost smartphones are usually the preferred option and are small in size. You should test your prototypes for your products because they should be clear and be readable. The scope for the touch targets should be the minimum required since you're probably dealing with new users that are not familiar with the UI of the app is also a best practice in accessibility for the case of having a broken phone screen.
By thinking of the Next Billion Users, Google is bringing new standard rules to the space of app development and UI/UX design; getting to the table information like costs, connectivity, and digital literacy from the users opens a state the art practices for making technology easy to interact with and accessible for everyone.
References: Google. (n.d.). UX for the Next Billion Users. Https://Design.Google. Retrieved March 18, 2021, from https://design.google/library/ux-next-billion-users/
