ORF expands barrier-free offering: News in simple language!

ORF expands barrier-free offering: News in simple language!

The ORF is expanding its offering in simple language. From now on, the ORF Topos platform will offer a variety of articles in understandable language that are of great importance for people with learning difficulties, seniors and people with little knowledge of German. This initiative covers topics from culture, science, religion and society. The articles are created in collaboration with the inclusive teaching editorial team, which also creates the news in simple language on news.ORF.at ORF.at reported.

The new section on ORF Topos not only offers texts, but also uses multimedia elements such as graphics and audio recordings to clearly explain complex relationships. This enables more comprehensive participation in social discourse. FM4 also relaunched the knowledge podcast “Simply Explained”, which publishes new episodes in simple language every month, also in collaboration with the inclusive teaching editorial team. The accessibility of this content is part of the social commitment of the ORF, which is committed to accessibility in its media, as has been practiced in ORF TELETEXT since 2017, such as OTS reported.

New goals through the EU project ENACT

A further step towards improving media accessibility is ORF's participation in the EU project ENACT, which aims to develop guidelines for the creation of plain language news in audiovisual media. The target groups are particularly people with learning difficulties and older people. The project aims to promote Europe-wide collaboration in order to further diversify the offering and increase the quality of reporting.