Comment by eps 3 days ago
Apparently, it's about screen reader support in web pages.
Also "ARIA" stands for Accessible Rich Internet Applications and it's "a set of HTML attributes that make web content more accessible to people with disabilities."
I think "act like it's ridiculous" is pretty hyperbolic here. I didn't know what ARIA stood for until now (though I knew what it was).
You'd be surprised how many people barely know it exists... I was a TA for my uni's Web Engineering and Ethics in CS courses and accessibility never even came up in either course.
> I was a TA for my uni's Web Engineering and Ethics in CS courses and accessibility never even came up in either course.
That is genuinely baffling to me. How does a university teach web engineering without even mentioning accessibility? It’s not just best practice—it’s often a legal requirement for public-sector sites in many countries. Even outside government work, major companies (FAANG included) publicly invest in accessibility to avoid both reputational and legal fallout. Ignoring it entirely sends the wrong message to students about professional responsibility and real-world standards.
Many schools are not very good at teaching real world skills. Always been this way.
It’s why ‘self taught’ in many disciplines is very doable too, if someone focuses on what people actually want/need.
They might not be good at articulating the differences between fizzbuzz and bubble sort, but they can get shit done that works.
Every PhD that I know that went from Academia to Industry immediately had their stress levels decrease 10x and their pay roughly double too - because they could finally do a thing, see if it worked or not, and if it did, get paid more.
Instead of insane constant bullshitting and reputation management/politics with a hint of real application maybe sprinkled in. Few ‘knives’ have to be as sharp as the academics, in my experience.
Didn’t come up in my ethics course either. Unless you actually know someone with an accessibility issue, it’s unlikely you have encountered it or recognized it if you did.
For example: You don’t realize how absolutely abysmal voice control is for computers until you have to use it.
There are so many assumptions about the world that causes things like neurodivergence to become a disability instead of a difference.
> * I think "act like it's ridiculous" is pretty hyperbolic here.*
Fair. I might’ve read more snark in the “Apparently,” than the commenter intended to convey.
For what it’s worth, the comment you read is the toned down version of what I had initially come up with. I really don’t think being dismissive of accessibility concerns is good style.
MDN has decent docs on this, including (and echoed by the author) this top-level guidance:
>> The first rule of ARIA use is "If you can use a native HTML element or attribute with the semantics and behavior you require already built in, instead of re-purposing an element and adding an ARIA role, state or property to make it accessible, then do so."
https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/Accessibility/A...
The top of a lot of the ARIA docs pages say "No ARIA is better than bad ARIA"
I really like (not) when people read about accessibility and the first thing they decide to do is adding keydown handlers on all the buttons that have clicks handlers. Like, please, treat it like the rest of UX and design for it, instead of going with a checklist over all the places linter flagged.
Hey thanks for clarifying. I could have googled it, but lazily reading your comment on a cloudy Saturday afternoon is easier. Thanks again, appreciate it. ;)
This is like explaining what JavaScript is under a post about React. There’s no shame in not knowing accessibility basics, but there’s also no need to act like it’s ridiculous to expect the reader to know some.