I know what you will do until next summer…
Creepy! And hello to one of the occasional newsletters from me, Eric Eggert.
What many of us will do until next summer is getting projects ready for the European Accessibility Act deadline of June 28, 2025. That date seemed like a long way out when we first heard about it, and now we’re exactly 10 months out.
Here’s the friendly reminder that there is no transitional period for services like websites and shops beyond that date. We are currently in the transitional period.
I know this is now a stressful time, and it will get only more stressful as clients will notice that they need to be compliant and try to rush it. I hope we as an industry don’t get overwhelmed by the demand. Accessibility online is slow and steady and methodical.
That said, if other regulations like this have been any indication, initially, there will be more carrots than sticks.
Three new(-ish) blog posts
I have published three blog posts since the last newsletter:
In detail: 1.4.11 Non-Text Contrast (User Interface Components) (S'ouvre dans une nouvelle fenêtre) – There are plenty of misunderstandings about one of WCAG’s most complicated success criteria and my goal was to clear some of them up, especially what counts as UI component. I put great effort into the examples and am very proud of this one!
The infuriating inefficiency of accessibility audits (S'ouvre dans une nouvelle fenêtre)– In this article, I lament the fact that most audits come too late or too early in a product’s life cycle. But they almost always happen to products that have not been built with accessibility in mind. This makes auditing frustrating and time-consuming. Let’s change that!
WCAG’s A and AA distinction is mostly academic (S'ouvre dans une nouvelle fenêtre) – A discussion about what different WCAG levels actually mean to individual Success Criteria led me to write this article. In practice, AA is usually considered the baseline conformance level that is acceptable. Do we need the A and AA distinction? Spoiler: I think we don’t.
If past behavior is any indication, writing this newsletter often sparks new thoughts and blog post. And if you would rather not wait 8 weeks until I get around to writing a newsletter about them, I generally cross post them on LinkedIn (S'ouvre dans une nouvelle fenêtre) and Mastodon (S'ouvre dans une nouvelle fenêtre), and the blog has an RSS Feed (S'ouvre dans une nouvelle fenêtre).
I mainly try to only post longer newsletters like this. Would it be useful to send emails for individual blog posts, even if I have no additional thoughts? Please let me know if you would like to be informed for every blog post in a short newsletter.
Links, links, and more links
If you follow me on Mastodon, you might have noticed that I share links in a separate account to my main account. You can follow @links@yatil.social (S'ouvre dans une nouvelle fenêtre) to get informed about new shares. Recently, I added that my highlights in the articles also get shared as replies to the shared link. Neat!
I hope to integrate my links as seamlessly into my website as Hidde does (S'ouvre dans une nouvelle fenêtre), but I’m just not there yet. That said, the whole archive is on the Raindop.io website (S'ouvre dans une nouvelle fenêtre), which I use to manage my bookmarks.
Parting Words
Thanks again to everyone who has subscribed to this newsletter and a very special thanks to all nine members, you know who you are, and you rock!
I hope you all can enjoy the last days of summer or, if you’re in the Southern Hemisphere, overcome the final days of winter without too much dread. I apologize for the Northern Hemisphere-centered introduction, EAA is something that’s just very much on my mind, so anchoring the seasons here made sense to me.
👋 Eric
Socials
My primary social media/Fediverse/Mastodon handle is @yatil@yatil.social (S'ouvre dans une nouvelle fenêtre), and you can also find me on LinkedIn (S'ouvre dans une nouvelle fenêtre).
