What I'm calling the "either-or dilemma" has to be one of the biggest challenges facing the universal acceptance and application of accessibility best practices.
This is the notion that something can either be beautifully-designed or it can be accessible; it can be compelling or it can be accessible; on-brand or accessible; innovative or accessible — you get the point.
I've reflected on why this is for a long time and I don't have it all figured out, but consider this: as long as the people responsible for accessibility are necessarily different and separate from the people responsible for [beauty, compelling content, brand, innovation], it will always feel like a struggle, a choice between competing priorities.
But it doesn't have to stay this way.
Integrate accessibility into every design course. Teach developers how to code an accessible menu before they learn how to code an inaccessible one. Target the assistive technology user in marketing plans as heavily as you target anyone else. And watch as the either-or dilemma disappears from product development.
Accessibility Blog
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