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Craig Abbott

@craigabbott.co.uk
1.5K followers 189 following 518 posts

Principal Accessibility Specialist at TetraLogical. Former Head of Accessibility at DWP. Writer. Speaker. Coder. Wildlife Photographer. Cat botherer. ADHD. Autistic. He/They. www.craigabbott.co.uk

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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 28/09/2026
I’m looking forward to seeing all the companies who are replacing juniors with AI, complaining in 5 years time that there is a lack of senior talent in the industry. As they say, “you reap what you sow”.
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Hidde @hidde.blog · 24/09/2026
In 15 minutes I'll be live with the friendly people at #InclusiveDesign24 to present “How we want to make WCAG better” www.youtube.com/watch?v=tDvd...
youtube.com
Hidde de Vries / How we want to make WCAG better #id24 2026
YouTube video by Inclusive Design 24 #id24
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TetraLogical @tetralogical.com · 22/09/2026
Next up in our Foundations series, @craigabbott.co.uk takes us through the accessibility tree and how screen readers read what is on screen to people with seeing disabilities. Foundations: the accessibility tree tetralogical.com/blog/2026/09... #AccessibilityFoundations #SustainableAccessibility
tetralogical.com
Foundations: the accessibility tree - TetraLogical
There's a common misconception that when browsing the web using a screen reader, it's reading the actual screen. This is not really surprising, as the name suggests that's exactly what it's doing. And...
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 18/09/2026
New blog post. Some thoughts on why accessibility work might often rock your confidence: www.craigabbott.co.uk/blog/2026/th... #accessibility #a11y
craigabbott.co.uk
The Dunning-Kruger effect in accessibility - Craig Abbott
Why your confidence in accessibility could be a sign of how little you know
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 14/09/2026
I’ve been writing about accessibility strategy again. This time it’s on the @tetralogical.com blog: tetralogical.com/blog/2026/09... #accessibility #a11y
tetralogical.com
Sustainable accessibility: compliance, culture, and capability - TetraLogical
Accessibility programmes often fail to make an impact. But, in our experience, they don't fail because of a lack of standards or budget. They fail because the organisation focuses all of their efforts...
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 11/09/2026
I’m really enjoying writing at the moment. I’ve had over 30 blog posts in draft for months and felt like I was barely treading water. But, I’m at the point now where I’m starting to get a few of them over the line with less and less effort. ADHD in full motion 😅
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 08/09/2026
New blog post: Using maths to balance your heading styles. Using a modular scale, size, spacing and weight to create accessible and visually balanced headings, for all six levels. www.craigabbott.co.uk/blog/2026/us... #accessibility #a11y #design #ux #css
craigabbott.co.uk
Using maths to balance your heading styles - Craig Abbott
A simple system for styling heading levels using a modular scale
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 02/09/2026
Just been messaged by a recruiter for DWP, seeing if I want to apply for a working level accessibility specialist role. A role I literally wrote the job spec for as part of the strategy I created when I was Head of Accessibility there. I feel annoyed. Am I allowed to be annoyed? 😆
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 01/09/2026
New blog post. Exploring an issue where TalkBack keeps switching between an American and English accent. www.craigabbott.co.uk/blog/2026/wh... #accessibility #a11y #TalkBack
craigabbott.co.uk
Why TalkBack keeps switching accents - Craig Abbott
Why Chrome and lang="en" can make screen readers like TalkBack read parts of a page in the same language, but using a different accent.
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 15/08/2026
Anyone else a people pleaser, with all the power tools? Who has to replace all the blades when they actually come to use them, because they’re all worn out from everybody else borrowing them all the damn time? 😅
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 13/08/2026
Don't think of it as the hottest summer we've ever experienced. Think of it as the coolest summer of the rest of our lives. 🥵
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TetraLogical @tetralogical.com · 13/08/2026
A conversation packed with insights between @craigabbott.co.uk and @neciudan.dev in his Señors @ Scale podcast about sustainable accessibility and the three C's framework: compliance, culture, capability. - YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Q2s... - Spotify: open.spotify.com/episode/33Xe...
youtube.com
Accessibility at Scale with Craig Abbott (TetraLogical) | WCAG, Screen Readers, Design Systems
YouTube video by Neciu Dan - The Señor Developer
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 12/08/2026
AI models have started putting invisible watermarks into the content they write. So, if you use AI to write stuff for you, re-structure your own writing, or even just use it to correct your grammar, then may want to know how this could affect you! www.craigabbott.co.uk/blog/2026/ar... #ai #EuAiAct
craigabbott.co.uk
Article 50 of the EU AI Act, and what it means for you - Craig Abbott
AI now leaves watermarks in generated text. What that means for you if you write with AI.
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Andy Bell @bell.bz · 06/08/2026
It's been a while since I've done a people looking for work thread. If you're looking for work, put what you do and what you're looking for (full time, freelance etc) as a reply. Companies: get hiring people!
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 06/08/2026
New blog post. I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about why accessibility initiatives are hard. It’s often not because of standards. Or that people lack the skills or knowledge to do it. It’s often just where an org chooses to start. www.craigabbott.co.uk/blog/2026/ac... #accessibility #a11y
craigabbott.co.uk
Accessibility: Start with "why" - Craig Abbott
Why leading with compliance fails, and how starting with "why" builds a lasting accessibility culture
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 04/08/2026
Had issues for ages with my MacBook's fingerprint sensor not working when mounted on a stand and connected to my dock. Just realised this morning my stand must prevent it from grounding. I've just figured out if I touch the body with my other hand, it works fine! So, in future, I must become… Earth!
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 04/08/2026
Re-implemented a light theme on my website rebuild. I’m a dark theme kinda guy, so I always struggle with light colour palettes. However, we’re renovating our bedroom, and I’ve legit used colour swatches from a paint sample booklet. Proof that you just never know where inspiration might come from! 😆
CraigAbbott.co.uk in a light colour theme. It is shades of washed pinks and dusky purples.
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Neciu Dan @neciudan.dev · 03/08/2026
"You can have a compliant website. It doesn't necessarily mean it's usable." New Señors at Scale with @craigabbott.co.uk on sustainable accessibility, testing what automation misses, and why AI writes bad front-end code. youtu.be/3Q2se9jI-wA
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 01/08/2026
Issue 1 is a go. buttondown.com/craigabbott/...
buttondown.com
July 2026
I've been trying to rebuild my website for… I don't even know. It's been at least 18 months! I get about 80% done and decide I hate it. I no longer like the...
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 31/07/2026
I’ve decided to start doing a monthly newsletter. It’s not going to be huge, just sharing things I’ve found interesting each month, with the main focus being accessibility, of course! If you’re interested you can sign up at the following link: buttondown.com/craigabbott #accessibility #a11y
buttondown.com
Monthly Newsletter, by Craig Abbott
One email a month, about interesting accessibility related things I’ve found on the web. Craig speaking at Access:Given conference.
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Eric Bailey @ericwbailey.website · 29/07/2026
I made an app! What Can't I Press helps you discover what keyboard shortcuts are already claimed by running apps, with a focus on screen readers. This helps prevent you from overriding something someone might rely on to get what they want or need. #a11y github.com/ericwbailey/...
github.com
GitHub - ericwbailey/what-cant-i-press: ⌨️ Lists what keyboard shortcuts are claimed
⌨️ Lists what keyboard shortcuts are claimed. Contribute to ericwbailey/what-cant-i-press development by creating an account on GitHub.
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 21/07/2026
I’m close to launching my redesigned website, and I’ve realised I’m terrible at collecting feedback / testimonial. If we’ve worked together, or you’ve seen one of my talks and it was useful, and you’re open to me quoting you, I’d really appreciate a couple of sentences of your feedback! ❤️
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 15/07/2026
Finally got around to playing with Anthropic's Fable 5. Man does it chew through tokens! I asked it to audit my CSS on my in progress blog redesign. I hit my session limit on the Max plan and wiped out my contingency funds in 20 minutes lol, I'm now 30% into the next session and it's still not done!
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 13/07/2026
The women Connor McGregor assaulted didn’t get to tap out. I think he should have been forced to continue with that busted knee until Holloway was finished with him.
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Steve Faulkner @stevefaulkner.eurosky.social · 08/07/2026
“My personal worry is that for a long time, we sought to diversify the voices — you know, who is telling the stories? And we tried to give agency to people from different parts of the world,“ she said. “Now we’re giving a voice to machines.” #ai #stereotype restofworld.org/2023/ai-imag...
restofworld.org
How AI reduces the world to stereotypes
Rest of World analyzed 3,000 AI images to see how image generators visualize different countries and cultures.
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 26/06/2026
Finally updated my Raspberry Pi Kiosk project. Look. When I say I'll do something, I'll do it. No need to keep nagging me every 4 years about it! 😆 (sorry) github.com/abbott567/ra...
github.com
GitHub - abbott567/raspberry-pi-kiosk: A simple set of commands to set up a raspberry pi for use as a stand alone kiosk screen
A simple set of commands to set up a raspberry pi for use as a stand alone kiosk screen - abbott567/raspberry-pi-kiosk
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Julia Métraux @juliametraux.bsky.social · 16/06/2026
In bad news, with disability education oversight being moved to the Department of Health and Human Services from the Department of Education, that means Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will have power over disability policy positions. New from me at @motherjones.com www.motherjones.com/politics/202...
motherjones.com
RFK Jr. will oversee disability education policy
The dismantling of the Department of Education continues apace.
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 16/06/2026
New post: "The AI Strategy Trap" Many orgs are rushing to embed AI for improved productivity, lower costs and more profit. But, they might be rushing into a costly dependency on a technology, with no say in the terms of the lease! www.craigabbott.co.uk/blog/2026/th... #ai #strategy #aiStrategy
craigabbott.co.uk
The AI strategy trap
Why AI pricing is a loss-leading trap which is looking to lock you in
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TetraLogical @tetralogical.com · 10/06/2026
@craigabbott.co.uk will be speaking at UX Scotland in Edinburgh. His talk, “A.I-11y: should we use large language models for accessibility?”, explores where AI can support accessibility and where it falls short. uxscotland.net/programme/ai... #AIAndAccessibility #UXScotland
uxscotland.net
A.I-11y: should we use large language models for accessibility?
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 09/06/2026
Arrived in Edinburgh where I’ll be talking about AI and Accessibility at #UXScotland. If you see me shuffling about and being socially awkward, please come and say “hi!” 😆
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 29/05/2026
On top of everything else that AI is ruining, the memory card I’ve had on my Amazon wish list has rocketed from £130 to £400 thanks to AI orgs buying up all the NAND flash. Probably cheaper for Claude to just imagine the photos I might have taken rather than to actually take them at this point! 😅
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 21/05/2026
New blog post. Our CSS is not opinionated enough. Why our "best practice" advice to always use classes, despite being great for specificity, has quietly stripped the web of a lot of semantic meaning. www.craigabbott.co.uk/blog/2026/ou... #accessibility #a11y #css
craigabbott.co.uk
Our CSS isn't opinionated enough
Why styling on semantics and roles could make accessibility harder to skip
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Andy Bell @bell.bz · 21/05/2026
Google I/O summary - shipping an LLM to your Chrome whether you want it or not - destroying search once and for all - pervert glasses 👍
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 17/05/2026
Boarding my flight at Cluj-Napoca airport after an absolutely incredible experience at @jsheroes.io - Thank you for inviting me to speak. I met so many great people and learned so much! And thanks to @neciudan.dev for taking this photo of one of my favourite slides!
Craig Abbott on stage at JSHeroes. Behind him is a slide which reads: 120+ HTML elements, 85+ WAI-ARIA roles, yet many people just define everything as a DIV.
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 16/05/2026
Inspired by @danielroe.dev and NPMX, I've started building a Chrome extension, with the sole purpose of applying a dark mode theme to sites using GOVUK Frontend. Been having my retinas blown out since it was first raised by @charlesrt.uk in 2018. I'm tired of waiting now. github.com/alphagov/gov...
Chrome showing a GOV.UK website with a dark mode theme. The background is shades of dark grey with white text. Chrome Dev Tools is open on the right hand side.
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 13/05/2026
Been learning Spanish for about 6 months. Just had my first interaction with a native speaker, completely in Spanish, in Palma de Mallorca airport. Terrifying, but also felt weirdly accomplished!
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 07/05/2026
A common but often undetected accessibility failure, particularly for global organisations, is untranslated alt text. www.craigabbott.co.uk/blog/2026/do... #accessibility #a11y
craigabbott.co.uk
Don't forget to translate your alt text
Why translated websites often fail WCAG by leaving alt text in English
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 01/05/2026
Some of you might remember, a while back I wrote a blog post pulling apart a job advert for a UX Accessibility Specialist at JD Sports. It turns out I wasn't shouting into a void. They reached out! We worked together on it, and we got to a good outcome! www.craigabbott.co.uk/blog/2025/mi...
craigabbott.co.uk
Mission impossible – a follow up!
A follow-up on my JD Sports accessibility job role post, and what happened next.
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 24/04/2026
Tech giants talk about how AI will replace apps, interfaces and even the web. How you’ll just “talk to an AI” to book appointments or get information. But, do people want that? I detest talking to Siri or Alexa because it doesn’t understand my Geordie accent. Even when using AI, I type my prompts.
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 23/04/2026
One month ago, I cancelled all of my AI subscriptions apart from Claude, and I can honestly say I haven’t missed any of them. The only issue I’ve ran into a couple of times is hitting my token limit for a session.
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Shaun @sconner.net · 31/03/2026
I always like to remind folks of something @craigabbott.co.uk said that stuck with me. Accessibility is the Viable of MVP, if it's not accessible, it's not viable.
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Lloydi @lloydi.com · 13/01/2026
Something I did a while back but just noticed I never linked to it from a11y-tools home page: a GitHub repo for PolyPane workspaces geared to accessibility testing: 👉 github.com/lloydi/PolyP... You might not be aware of these and find them useful 😊 #testing #tools #accessibility #a11y #polypane
Polypane logo
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 11/01/2026
Rearranging the layout of apps and widgets on iOS, continues to be one of the most horrific user experiences ever.
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 08/01/2026
I’m talking about AI and accessibility at A11y North this month, in Leeds. If it’s something you’re interested in, it would be great to see you there! www.linkedin.com/events/a11yn... www.a11ynorth.com #a11y #accessibility #ai
a11ynorth.com
A11y North
The homepage of the A11y North charity and meet-up group
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 08/01/2026
In my talks, I’ve been saying for a while now that as AI continues to dominate “innovation”, accessibility is going to pay the price! In this awesome article by Tracy Stine, you can see first-hand how many people are affected! vocal.media/01/the-acces... #accessibility #ai #a11y
vocal.media
The Accessibility Crisis of 2026: What No One Wants to Admit
Innovation is speeding up, but disabled people are the ones paying the price.
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 05/01/2026
Overheard somebody in the gym this morning, saying they’re “full of miniature heroes and regret”. 😆 Happy new year!
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Adrian Roselli, pH0 @aardrian.bsky.social · 21/12/2025
TalkBack does not offer an option to use computer vision & LLMs (“AI” for the scope of this thread) to describe images lacking alt text. If you do it in Chrome, it overwrites all the good alt text with, well, crap. Try it on this page: srt.csb-cde.ca.gov/jaws/jaws-l [1/4]
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 22/12/2025
Autistic burnout, at this time of year. Changes in routine. Increased social activity and masking. Expectations on how you’ll spend your time, your money and your energy. Sensory overload, different lights, textures, smells and sounds. It’s ok not to be ok, even when it’s “the season to be jolly”.
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 10/12/2025
I really relate to this Holborn graffiti.
A spray painted shaggy looking raccoon holding a fork.
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Craig Abbott @craigabbott.co.uk · 08/12/2025
Movie you’ve watched more than six times with a gif. Hard mode: no Stars (Wars nor Trek), LOTR, or Marvel.
media.tenor.com
a man is holding a lighter with the words come out to the coast get together have a few laughs above him
Alt: Bruce Willis as John McClane in Die Hard. He’s inside of air conditioning ducting holding a lighter with the caption: come out to the coast. Get together. Have a few laughs.
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