Mike Gifford, CPWA

Law professor Larry Lessig on the 18th century laws governing our 21st century tech In the most recent episode of Your Undivided Attention, Harvard Law professor Larry Lessig and Meetali Jain, director of the Tech Justice Law Project explore the role of courts and judges in steering…

The First Amendment in the 21st Century — from the Your Undivided Attention podcast.

Thank you. It is.

How is it that critical pieces of government digital infrastructure are still ONLY AVAILABLE on X?

How many organizations? How many people? Still cling to their Twitter / X accounts because they fear giving up the followers they struggled to gain?

How many are there simply because it takes energy to do anything else?

How do we change that?

Accessibility as a core value For 18F, accessibility wasn’t just a requirement for shipping but a core value in how we approached each project as well as working as a team.

@alt18f.bsky.social Great to see 18f.org/topics/acces...

Could you repost the checklists too?

web.archive.org/web/20250304...

Drupal: A Digital Public Good for a Better Digital Future Drupal isn’t just powerful open-source tech — it’s officially recognized as a Digital Public Good, meaning it’s built to serve people and planet. In this piece, Mike Gifford shows how Drupal’s values ...

We’re proud to share a great article by CivicActioner @ox.ca, published in The Drop Times:

👉 www.thedroptimes.com/50678/drupal...

#Drupal #OpenSource #Accessibility #CivicTech #FOSS #GovTech #CivicActions"

What if humans went extinct next Friday? The Gray Area with Sean Illing · Episode

I liked this episode of The Gray Area from @vox.com - open.spotify.com/episode/0Ifv...

Sarah Paine Episode 1: The War For India (Lecture & Interview) First of three new lectures from Professor Paine, followed by my questions. This time: Mao v Khrushchev v Nehru v LBJ

I enjoyed listening two these podcasts on Asian history back to back today
Sarah Paine Episode 1: The War For India:
www.dwarkesh.com/p/sarah-pain...
How will #Taiwan shape #Asia’s future? With Chris Horton:
open.spotify.com/episode/4Yq0...

I was really impressed by just how much Taiwan.

#Podcast

@bigbluebutton.bsky.social It would make a lot of sense to move more of your traffic from Twitter / X to Bluesky and Mastodon.

Gaining the right understanding around topics like Accessibility, especially within the digital landscape, is essential. Don't miss this opportunity to learn what truly matters.

Register soon! 👇

FWD50: Use technology to make society better for all FWD50 is the annual gathering of the world’s leading public sector innovators. Where the people building tomorrow’s government go to learn, connect, and recharge.

@fwd50conf.bsky.social Think you could take Twitter /X off your site? Feel free to keep using it, but it is promoting anti-democratic movements globally and shouldn't be promoted on any responsible site.

At least move Bluesky & Mastodon up to give them a higher priority than X www.fwd50.com

CivicActions-Accessibility CivicActions Accessibility site is an open project for our team members and those who work for digital inclusion.

Accessibility Tip of the Week: Blend your testing methods. Use tests that can be automated with your continuous integration (CI), tests that can be leveraged by editors and tests to gather site wide errors. tinyurl.com/a11yCA
#a11y #accessibility

Our view on digital sovereignty A thought leadership article by Mike Bracken MBE on Public Digital's view on digital sovereignty

Great to see this @publicdigital.bsky.social work on #DigitalSoverignty public.digital/pd-insights/...

There is a lot here which governments should be digging into.

Is Decarbonization Dead? Podcast Episode · The Ezra Klein Show · 07/25/2025 · 1h 17m

Is Decarbonization Dead? — The Ezra Klein Show

Really interesting discussion about the impacts of the "Big Beautiful Bill" & it's impact on renewable energy.

podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/i...

Drupal Association graphic regarding Digital Public Goods Alliance's sustainability public support letter.

🌍 The Digital Public Goods Alliance needs your support! DGP product owners & supporters are committed to building open source, inclusive, and sustainable digital solutions. If you're in a position to fund, implement, or advocate for—please take a moment to read and share this letter: buff.ly/IzWuC17

3d rendering of drupal logo

✅ 27 Drupal contributions—and July isn’t even over.
At CivicActions, we don’t just use Drupal—we help shape it. Our developers, designers, and accessibility experts contribute directly to the core ecosystem, sharing improvements that benefit everyone.

www.drupal.org/civicactions

State of HTML 2025 Take the State of HTML survey

Go take the State of HTML 2025 survey if you have a minute! survey.devographics.com/survey/state...

ROOST Announces "Coop" and "Osprey": Free, Open-Source Trust and Safety Infrastructure for the AI Era /PRNewswire/ -- ROOST, a non-profit organization dedicated to building scalable, resilient, and open-source safety tools for the AI era, is proud to announce...

Great to see #Bluesky look at incorporating @roost.tools & Osprey in their platform. #OpenSource #Privacy #Security

www.prnewswire.com/news-release...

Free and Open Source Software Is COTS: Affordable, Efficient, and Proven - GovLoop Government is prioritizing technology solutions that encourage speed, savings and innovation. Open source software — a type of commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) solution — aligns with that approach.

Open source is COTS—and gov should treat it that way.
Aaron Pava & @ox.ca Mike Gifford make the case on GovLoop for why #FOSS qualifies as commercial, off-the-shelf—and why it should be the default.

www.govloop.com/community/bl...
#FOSS #COTS #GovTech

Free and Open Source Software Is COTS: Affordable, Efficient, and Proven - GovLoop Government is prioritizing technology solutions that encourage speed, savings and innovation. Open source software — a type of commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) solution — aligns with that approach.

Happy to have this post on #opensource & #COTS finally be public www.govloop.com/community/bl...

#FOSS is so key to effective digital transformation.

Privacy Policy I respect the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). This policy document explains how I collect and handle any information you provide to me.

Do you think you could add eleventy-excellent.netlify.app/accessibility/ and add an accessibility statement marking what you do, and how folks can report errors when they come in?

www.w3.org/WAI/planning...

Eleventy Excellent Eleventy starter using modern CSS, fluid type, fluid spacing, flexible layout and progressive enhancement.

@lenesaile.com I just took a quick look at the demo of eleventy-excellent.netlify.app here. It looks like it is pretty accessible from a quick review. Thanks!

So many still to read...

The definitive climate fiction reading list These wildly imaginative books will shape the way you think about our planet’s future.

The definitive climate fiction reading list.

These 20 wildly imaginative books will shape the way you think about our planet’s future — and humanity’s place in it.

grist.org/fix/climate-...

#Fiction #Solarpunk #Climate #Environment #BookSky #Literature

Libby?

ICYMI: Mike Gifford @ox.ca, Open Standards & Practices Lead at CivicActions, joined Oliver Davies on his podcast to talk about web accessibility.

Listen to the podcast: www.oliverdavies.uk/podcast/32-w...

#WebAccessibility #CivicActions #A11y #InclusiveDesign #FOSS

Join the discussion on the Road to the Indian AI Impact Summit at events across India. openuk.uk/indianaisumm... 🇮🇳 🌐 Thanks to our sponsors @infosys.bsky.social, UK Government, @controlplane.io, motia, and NeevCloud 🤩 #IndiaAI #AIImpactSummit #AIForAll #opensource #opensourceai #openuk #openhq #dpd

Cheat Codes for Successful Procurement Exclusively for public servants and policymakers

Save the Date: CivicActioner Mike Gifford @ox.ca will be speaking at Cheat Codes for Successful Procurement, a virtual event hosted by Apolitical.

🔗 apolitical.co/events/aug-2...

#GovProcurement #PublicService #CivicTech #FOSS #CivicActions #OpenContracting #DigitalGovernment"

Does the ACR need the actionable specifics? I agree that those are needed, but aren't those usually within the issue queue? I see ACRs as more focused on the barriers.

How would you assess what types of descriptions are useful for an Accessibility Conformance Report (ACR)? It would need to be a valid description of the barriers involved, but anything else? When building towards an #OpenACR or more commonly a #VPAT what is a good comment? #Accessibility #A11y