Episode 395 | Martine Dowden - Accessing Goodness

Guest:

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Martine Dowden talks with Dave Rael about being a geek, psychology, art, accessibility, business, and lifestyle

Focusing on web interfaces that are beautiful, functional, and usable, Martine delivers products that adhere to WCAG and Section 508 for accessibility and compliance. She approaches User Experience from both Art and Science, drawing from her degrees in Psychology and Visual Communications. Martine has worked as an artist, educator, and consultant since 2005. She stays active in the industry, teaching new developers at Eleven Fifty Academy, attending and speaking at conferences and meetups, and publishing the occasional blog. In 2015 Martine's children's book Programming Languages ABC++ was published by Inedo, and in 2016 the Workbook Edition sold over 20,000 copies.

Chapters: 0:36 - Dave introduces the show and Martine Dowden3:18 - Martine's interest in psychology5:15 - Martine's interest in accessibility8:06 - Are accessibility concerns edge cases?12:36 - Ways of testing for accessibility14:22 - How Martine became interested in accessibility17:05 - Connecting art and psychology to technology and complementary skills and personalities21:24 - Deliberate lifestyle decisions24:07 - The Programming Languages ABC++ book project26:09 - Martine's story of failure - increasingly bad ideas from increasingly more organizationally powerful people in the heat of a crisis31:11 - Martine's book book recommendations33:47 - Martine's experience with speaking at conferences36:04 - Barriers to fully embracing a commitment to accessibility39:00 - How Martine stays current with what she needs to know40:51 - Martine's top 3 tips for delivering more value42:24 - Keeping up with Martine

Resources: Martine on GitHub Programming Languanges ABC++ - Michael Dowden, Martine Dowden Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) Section 508 Michael Dowden on Developer On Fire Alex Papadimoulis on Developer On Fire Typeface Indy.Code() Jon Mills on Developer On Fire Jeffrey Strauss

Martine's book recommendation: The Little Prince - Antoine de Saint-Exupéry Just My Type: A Book About Fonts - Simon Garfield

Martine's top 3 tips for delivering more value: Take care of yourself If you ever quit loving what you do, move on Be a mentor and have a mentor