Erica (she/they)

Learn more about Stéphanie's talk "How to Convince People to Care and Invest in Accessibility" at https://www.deque.com/axe-con/sessions/how-to-convince-peop... Meet Stéphanie Walter at Axe-con 2026

Designers, are you tired of having accessibility pushed later, or ignored, and you want things to change?
February 25, 9am ET (3pm CET) I'll open the design track at #axecon with my talk "How to Convince People to Care and Invest in Accessibility"
www.youtube.com/watch?v=u96U...

we have to build thousands of small websites we love and enjoy in order to beat back the ~10 websites that have transformed this miracle of a communications layer into a compromised nightmare btw

release your projects !!!

“Germany’s postwar constitution allows domestic intelligence agencies to surveil political parties, actors and organizations deemed extremist — and to make it theoretically possible to ban such parties.“ is the first part of the quote. AfD doesn’t belong in democratic government.

Basic light pollution diagram showing four different streetlight set ups ranging from more light pollution on the left to less light pollution on the right. The most pollution option, labelled "very bad" is a street lamp with a round uncovered bulb on top, making a sphere of light in the air. The next option, labelled "bad" has a tiny cap on top, that limits the upward pollution a bit. The "better" option is mostly uncovered on top, limiting pollution above the streetlight. The final option, labelled "best" has a full shroud overtop, limiting the light to only below the streetlight, where it is needed for pedestrians and vehicles.

Lots of folks captioning aurora photos like "for a few minutes we didn't think about politics"

guess I'm built different, every time I'm out trying to see night sky stuff I frequently think about how much light pollution is entirely preventable with just a tiny bit of regulation

MAMDANI: "So hear this, Donald Trump: To get to any of us, you will have to get through all of us."

Immigrants get the job done!

Gentlemen: thank you for your service.

Your ability to eat should not depend on your productivity

Your ability to get healthcare should not depend on your productivity

Your ability to get housing should not depend on your productivity

Saying “be more productive!” To those who are struggling devalues human life.

It aids fascism.

Reminder: November 4th is extremely important, don’t forget to vote!

An image illustrating the European Union's Digital Services Act (DSA). The background is a dark purple with a binary code pattern of '0's and '1's. In the center, nine yellow icons representing DSA themes are arranged in a circular formation, similar to the stars on the EU flag. These icons include a bell, a locked padlock, a crossed-out 'AD' symbol indicating a restriction on advertising, a magnifying glass over a document for transparency, a shielded checkmark for safety, and a crossed-out symbol likely relating to content moderation or tracking. Below this visual representation, the text in large white letters states DIGITAL SERVICES ACT, followed by a smaller line of text that reads "TikTok and Meta preliminarily found in breach of their transparency obligations." A small European Commission logo is located in the bottom right corner.

Preliminary findings:

🚫TikTok & Meta failed to grant researchers adequate access to public data.

🚫Meta failed to provide simple ways to notify illegal content and to allow users to challenge moderation decisions.

This is a duty, not a choice.

link.europa.eu/JYQrBX

Couldn’t sum up slop better if I tried

Liquid Glass Is Cracked, and Usability Suffers in iOS 26 iOS 26’s visual language obscures content instead of letting it take the spotlight. New (but not always better) design patterns replace established conventions.

Liquid Glass Is Cracked, and Usability Suffers in iOS 26

A really good article about how Apple ruined the even principles of legibility and usability in their OS.

Who said design "is just common sense" already? 😂

www.nngroup.com/articles/liq...

I fear that even if AI does compel some devs to (finally) take accessibility seriously, a web that is full of AI-generated content becomes a web that’s less accessible for everyone

If we're having a debate, and at any point you say, "let's ask ChatGPT", then you lose by default.

From article https://sarahkendzior.substack.com/p/inventing-antifa

Before the Trump administration invented "Antifa", the government of Uzbekistan invented "Akromiya": sarahkendzior.substack.com/p/inventing-...

I think we really should stop using antifa and just fully say anti-fascist and get them saying they are against anti fascism. Using antifa is giving them some distance and I genuinely think some of their base don’t even know that’s what it stands for.

Still waiting for it to trickle down...

UX so bad that it's illegal Big tech is divesting from user-centered design, and getting into hot water with the law.

Big tech is laying off user researchers in droves, because it believes that coercing its customers is more profitable than silly things like "making good products people want to buy."

But now the FAFO pendulum is coming around, with Amazon's $2.5B dark pattern settlement and #a11y lawsuits galore.

YouTube video by Brad Lander for NYC Brad Lander: "I'll keep coming back to court, week after week"

Tonight, I'll go home and sleep in my bed. I have a lawyer, I'll get due process.

But Edgardo, whose arm was ripped from mine by ICE agents, has none of those things.

That's why I'll keep coming back to court, week after week, to make sure that people's rights are protected.

Tennessee’s law expressly classifies on the basis of sex and transgender status, so the Constitution and settled precedent require the Court to subject it to intermediate scrutiny. The majority contorts logic and precedent to say otherwise, inexplicably declaring it must uphold Tennessee’s categorical ban on lifesaving medical treatment so long as “‘any reasonably conceivable state of facts’” might justify it. Ante, at 21. Thus, the majority subjects a law that plainly discriminates on the basis of sex to mere rational-basis review. By retreating from meaningful judicial review exactly where it matters most, the Court abandons transgender children and their families to political whims. In sadness, I dissent.

Justice Sotomayor's dissent in Skrmetti (which she's now reading from the bench) is deeply pained, accusing her colleagues of abandoning "transgender children and their families to political whims" and badly damaging "bedrock" principles of equal protection. www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/24p...

Storygraph!

No Kings On June 14—Flag Day—Donald Trump wants tanks in the street and a made-for-TV display of dominance for his birthday. A sp

Donald Trump is NOT our king — and on June 14th, it's up to us to prove it.

Quote from book

From HIDING IN PLAIN SIGHT (2020):

"Trump covers up crime with scandal. That is his main propaganda tactic, the one few seem to be able to discern...The crimes are much worse than the scandals, but the media will always take the scandal bait."

www.hidinginplainsightbook.com

Ah, schadenfreude.

I'm not worried about being replaced by AI, because I tell people what they don't want to hear.

Spare us the fake outrage.

“Without widespread theft, my industry can’t survive” is an argument against your industry surviving, and is not an argument for allowing widespread theft

Ok.

Then let it die.

Because theft is theft.

And even worse if you’re profiting from the crime.

A long long time ago, in a far away galaxy... the US used to tax the rich