What people should know BEFORE writing articles or creating products about accessibility
So many people are writing or developing products around this hot tech topic right now. Many of them are getting it very wrong.
Authors note: Because of Medium’s refusal to address its accessibility issues for both authors and readers, I’ve moved my last three years of blogs to Substack. Please sign up there for notices of all new articles. Thank you for your continued readership and support.
I read a lot of articles about accessibility. Some of them (and not just the ones I write) are very, very good. Others are cringe-worthy. These are the signs that I use to determine which to read to the end and which to close the browser tab on partway through.
The author/product developer does not have access to lived experience
It’s never enough to “comply” with whatever WCAG standard you have chosen to follow. People who work in accessibility who want to be good at it must understand how people with disabilities process interactions flows and data to make it usable.
Example: If slide text announces in a training deck, but then the software forces the user to read through the…
