What about it? This doesn’t need accessibility.
The amount of ego doesn’t surprise me when the conversation of accessible code arises. Code, in any stage, from alpha all the way to production needs to be, should be, and can be made accessible. But a subset of the developer community, a rather large subset seems to think otherwise.
Thinking that there is no such thing as a disabled developer is on par with thinking we are the only living organism in the entire universe. That level of ego makes part of the reason why the Web and digital world is inaccessible. Those people would rather go to the grave thinking they are right, rather than be wrong.
We don’t talk about it much these days.
“This product uses AI and it will ship production-ready code!” but when challenged, they (the developer subset with egoism at the forefront) come out of the woodwork to attack people and argue with people that are pointing out the fact that is in fact a falsity.
That’s just one example of why without education and research, the Web is doomed to be inaccessible even more than it already is.
If those who egos aren’t checked at the door had their way, they’d ship their own computers and call it a day because, “It works on my machine!”. Hey Blaine, we’re not shipping YOUR machine.
If there were less ego from those that would rather die on the cross they make for themselves then maybe, just perhaps there would be a little more accessibility in the digital world. Yet, here we are and here I am writing what I can imagine will ignite some kind of firestorm in some ecosystem of keyboard wunderkind who can’t see beyond their own screens.
“Oh, I agree there needs to be accessibility but…” You ended the hate with the key word in that sentence. “But”. A “but” is an underlying statement to prove to yourselves you are correct. The reassurance that you are right and the other side of the argument is wrong no matter what the facts are or what the data is.
So when an accessibility professional says, “Hey, I just wanted to bring to your attention there are issues here. Accessibility concerns you want to address before making a a statement such as…” Stop going into a defensive posture and on the attack immediately.
That’s not an attack, it is someone telling you there are issues that need to be fixed to make your product, your brand, your app, your site, accessible to people with disabilities.
You created something more likely to make you money. That’s how tech works isn’t it? Then why would you shut out a subset of the population for whatever reasons because you didn’t want to make it accessible? Do a search for “disposable income of disabled persons”. You’d be surprised.
And to devs that wonder why it matters so. Think of these times when and if you ever become disabled because it could happen at any time to any of us.
Oldest comments (35)
Thanks for writing this! The intensity of the pushback and really ugly response in general to the accessibility side of the recent AI tool is... really disgusting.
I think the issue is that people interpret the world via their own life experience.
It's a very hard task to put yourself in the shoes of someone else that have a very different life experience.
Are there ways to give devs tools to live the life of someone who suffers from lack of acessibility ?
Have a search for tools and that is your first disabling experience, if you find anything it will probably be a janky learning curve and/or behind a paywall.
There is a big community on insta and twitter etc of disabled advocates who share their experiences first hand.
Ask those people how to help them make it accessible. Life experiences aside, it doesn't take a life experience to write accessible code.
Interesting take. I'm unclear how it would be acceptable for developers to ignore the results of a damming a11y audit considering their company could potentially get sued by users for inaccessibilty. Also, the words "selfish", "unempathetic", and "ignorant" are more applicable (to me) than anything relating to ego even describing developers refusing to make their apps accessible.
It's acceptable because the organization does not have any buy-in from the top. Or it is just not a priority. Or what organizations that "move fast and break things" bring out the "we're on a time crunch" excuse just to say, "Hey, we will do it later." but never do or do it and it still isn't accessible.
What developers complain about 100% of the time I ask what part of the job is the worst and they say, "The amount of hours I work" and when I tell them if they wrote accessible code, or the organization started adopting standards of coding, they wouldn't have to work twice as hard, for the same amount of money they make with double the stress.
The ego statement applies to any developer that thinks that there is no such thing as a disabled user using something they are working on or there is no such thing as a disabled developer. Because the largest group of people in the development space, have a disability. Hidden or not.
I really appreciate the post, as it tries to give voice to a marginalized community.
I enjoyed reading this, the only "accessibility" discussions and effort that I have been involved in relate to the finished product, not the code itself. And googling results are of same. Can you point out some materials for best practices please?
Here are some links I have:
linkedin.com/advice/3/what-best-pr...
developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/L...
w3.org/WAI/tips/developing/
What is accessible code and how can code be accessible/unaccessible?
Is it about the code style or about functions you use/should avoid?
Is spaghetti code more accessible since a user has all code in one place instead of having to jump to different places?
I have the feeling this article just says "there is an error" but doesn't say what the error is.
Yeah, the article says the problem is with accessible code and I wonder if that's meant literally or if the author means more like accessible UI/UX facilitated or provided by code. I have no idea what accessible code would be, and this article is definitely an incomplete rant ("rabble rabble rabble!")
The above comment should clear up the "rabble rabble rabble".
Accessible code. e.g., Semantic HTML. Button elements instead of divs. Labels and accessible names being added to form inputs and labels. see linkedin.com/advice/3/what-best-pr...
Not only readable by a disabled developer, meaning the readability. Something utility-first frameworks that when mismanaged, leave a swath of code when the maintenance portion of the project is being done when the inevitable return to the project happens because of a lawsuit, or when something is broken and reported in a pull request.
I've heard screen readers read utility-first framework code and it's a nightmare. The issue which was the impetus behind this checks notes "rabble rabble rabble!". When a company touts "Production-ready code" in an alpha stage, I can guarantee it is not. Sure enough on a closer look, it wasn't.
When something is inaccessible, it's broken. That's inaccessible code. There are disabled developers out there as well as a disabled community as well. Not just blind, deaf, or in a wheelchair too.
This is a bit personal, but when I lost full use of my right arm, the barrier of attempting voice control for writing code was absolutely huge and just another layer of grief... I doubt I would be a developer today if physio hadn't worked for me. Now that I am hardly bothered by mobility or pain, it's so comfortable to just be able to use your IDE! There is such a big tooling gap.
But aside from my personal experience with disability, the right to information is a human right, ya gotta be accessible.
Exactly. I wonder how many times this comment you made has been read through the wave of people needing to nitpick the definition of "accessible code" and opine on something that they don't know of because they have asked what accessible code is.
Accessibility is a right, not a privilege. I see who and who does not practice this daily. Individuals and organizations alike.
Well isn't it some kind of accessibility as well to write an article in a way everyone can understand it and see what you mean?
Not all of us are native speakers and not all of us can look in your brain. German accessible Websites from our government provide an "easy language" mode where all articles are written in an easier to understand way because of this.
Accessibility can also mean to explain something well enough so others can understand what it is about. When many people don't understand what you are trying to explain one could think it's not accessible enough.
I was really confused what accessible code should be - that's not nitpicking, just confusion.
However thanks for explaining it (even if the only real dev accessible example was "not using utility first css" and writing readable code but that should be common sense)
On that topic, I've been using Hemingway editor for readability checks recently 👍
hemingwayapp.com
Uh that's cool, thanks for sharing 👍
Is this about code being accessible to disabled devs? What would be a way to improve here? Better speech to text, optimized for writing code, could help. But it seems you are unsatisfied with anyone saying "well I'm a jQuery maintainer, what could I possibly do about that?"
Code itself can't really be optimized for accessibility, at least not more than it needs to be optimized for general maintainability (concise code, good documentation etc).
Better tools, better coding, less spaghetti code, better readability. There is a start. See also linkedin.com/advice/3/what-best-pr...
Rant 👎
Wait until you need assistive technology and what you want to access doesn't work for you. Remember that.
I think you need to look up 'whataboutism'. It was not properly demonstrated here.
"It’s essentially a reversal of accusation, arguing that an opponent is guilty of an offense just as egregious or worse than what the original party was accused of doing, however unconnected the offenses may be."
So, in this case, the vO controversy, where an accessibility professional refuted the claim from the CEO that the "Production-ready code" was available with the alpha release and pointed out some issues that should be addressed (the job of an accessibility engineer - and it complete fairness the CEO answered perfectly with 'Thanks for the feedback.') when, naturally, the villagers with their tiki torches and ableism showed up to demean, ridicule, insult, and gatekeep said disabled developer.
So... Kelly Brown, my reversal of accusation is this. Your community is a reflection on your organization. When they act like cro-mags who like to throw stones at glass houses? Don't be surprised as soon as they get to the point where they need accessibility accommodations, people throw stones at them. That is what is more egregious, than the lousy code they write and then follow it up with name-calling and behavior most suited for Truth Social.
So it actually was demonstrated properly. You missed that paragraph.