Free Online Event in March Set To Be Largest Digital Accessibility Event with Over 90 Speakers & Thousands in Attendance
HERNDON, VA – January 14, 2021 – Deque Systems, the trusted leader in digital accessibility, today announced an expanded speaker lineup of over 90 experts for its inaugural axe-con conference, taking place virtually on March 10-11, 2021.
Axe-con is an open and inclusive digital accessibility conference welcoming developers, designers, business leaders and professionals of all levels to a unique event focused on building, testing, and maintaining accessible digital experiences.
New Speakers: include Rachel Andrew, noted web developer and former editor at Smashing Magazine; Val Head, speaker, author and design advocate at Adobe; and Dave Rupert, lead developer at Paravel and co-host of the ShopTalk podcast. Also new to the lineup are independent UI engineer and speaker, Sara Soueidan, and Forrester Research principal analyst Gina Bhawalkar.
These additions round out an impressive roster that includes Vint Cerf, widely known as the “Father of the Internet,” disability rights advocate Haben Girma, and Deque CTO Dylan Barrell, author of the “Agile Accessibility Handbook, A Practical Guide to Accessible Software Development at Scale.”
The full list of axe-con speakers can be found at https://www.deque.com/axe-con/speakers/ .
Four Distinct Speaker Tracks: Presentation topics will cover the following categories:
- Accessibility and Development
- Accessibility and Design
- Organizational Success with Accessibility
- Wildcard Track
“We’re thrilled to see the excitement building for axe-con. Registrations have already far exceeded our goals for the inaugural conference,” comments Preety Kumar, CEO at Deque Systems, who will also be presenting at the conference. “Attendees will have a one-of-a-kind opportunity to learn about a variety of topics, including accessible development and testing; accessible design/UX; handling organizational challenges, as well as compliance and legal issues.”
Registration for axe-con is free, with sign up at https://www.deque.com/axe-con/register/ .
Axe-con attendance can be used towards continuing education (CE) towards IAAP certification.
While the first year of axe-con will be completely online, Deque Systems plans to host the event both in-person and online in the future when it is safe to do so.
5th Annual axe-hackathon: The day after axe-con, Deque will host its axe-hackathon entirely online for the first time. Participants will have an opportunity to make the web accessible to people with disabilities by coding and collaborating with others on axe-related projects.
What is Digital Accessibility? Digital Accessibility is the practice of making digital documents, web and mobile apps accessible to everyone, including people with disabilities. Many people with visual, auditory, motor, speech or cognitive disabilities rely on various forms of assistive technology or usability features to experience the full benefit the web has to offer. Without the continuous use of features like captions, alt-text for screen readers, zoom functions, simple presentation layouts and more, digital content may be inconvenient or impossible to use.
Follow the chatter about axe-con on Twitter: #axecon
About Deque Systems
Deque (pronounced dee-cue) is a web accessibility software and services company, and our mission is Digital Equality. We believe everyone, regardless of their ability, should have equal access to the information, services, applications, and everything else on the web.
We work with enterprise-level businesses and organizations to ensure that their sites and mobile apps are accessible. Installed in over 250,000 browsers and with over 4,000 audit projects completed, Deque is the industry standard.
News Media Contacts
At Deque:
Ryan Bateman, 703-225-0380, marketing@deque.com
