How the Web Almanac Reveals Global Digital Inclusion Patterns

Mike Gifford from Civic Actions joins us to discuss the Web Almanac, a remarkable project analyzing 17 million websites and 83 terabytes of data to track accessibility trends across the web. He shares insights about comparative accessibility performance across countries, revealing how European websites generally outperform American ones despite the US having a 30-year head start in accessibility legislation.

• Web Almanac provides annual snapshots comparing accessibility across millions of websites
• European government websites show better accessibility than US government sites due to the Web Accessibility Directive
• Content management systems that prioritize accessibility lead to more accessible websites overall
• Educational institutions (.edu domain) show stronger accessibility performance in the US
• Alt text remains problematic even on otherwise accessible websites
• Website accessibility typically degrades over time as content refreshes and staff changes
• Automation and AI will be necessary to maintain accessibility at scale
• Data can drive competitive improvements between institutions and countries
• Individual contributors can sometimes make more impact than government institutions

Join our community discussions on Blue Sky every Tuesday night to continue the conversation about web accessibility and digital inclusion. Find the Web Almanac at https://almanac.httparchive.org/en/2024/accessibility

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