The curious case of Jakob Nielsen behaving like a tech bro around accessibility

A few weeks ago, Jakob Nielsen confused everyone (and lit his reputation on fire) when he implied that accessibility had failed and AI could save it.

That statement sounds like what a hotshot Silicon Valley Entrepreneur (i.e., Tech Bro) would say. As a result, there’s been speculation about whether someone is ghostwriting for Nielsen (or even if he’s mentally well).

Rather than reacting immediately to the article, I dug into the subject to understand what was happening here. What I found isn’t a defense to his (weak) argument.

Instead, I found tech optimism around a long-standing dream of Silicon Valley: personalized, accessible interfaces made possible through a new tool.

Personalized user interfaces are one of Silicon Valley’s dreams

In The Inevitable: Understanding the 12 Technological Forces That Will Shape Our Future” by Kevin Kelly, one vision of the future Silicon Valley wants is the concept of personalized user interfaces.

They aim to create completely personalized interfaces that customize every web page the user visits.

We’re there, partially. For example, when we load up our home page, we may see stock prices and sports scores, while we’ve chosen to hide celebrity gossip and news.

We may receive targeted and personalized ads, specialized coupons, and offers via e-mail. In addition, the social media feeds of two people are likely to be completely different.

When we consider this the future that tech bros want (including Nielsen, apparently), our current accessibility efforts seem hopelessly outdated by comparison. Standardized and limited versions of pages, designed to adhere to guidelines and checklists, make it sound like these accessible interfaces are inferior to regular ones.