133: Inclusive Experiences in React Applications: Championing Neurodivergent Accessibility w/ Amera White

[00:00:00] Robbie: What's going on everybody? Welcome to Whiskey Web and Whatnot, your favorite podcast about carpentry. With your hosts, RobbieTheWagner, and Charles William Carpenter, the

[00:00:15] Chuck: third. That's right. I do all the plumbing though. You do. It's ironic. Yes. Okay. ,

[00:00:19] Robbie: our guest today is Amera White. What's going on,

[00:00:22] Amera: Amera? I'm, I'm good today.

I am excited .

[00:00:26] Robbie: Nice, nice, cool. Can you give everyone a few sentences about who you are

[00:00:29] Amera: and what you do? Alright, I am a front end engineer. I love dealing with React, JavaScript, things like that. I'm also a mom. I'm a girl mom, all four girls. Oh, wow. Yeah, I know, it's, it's interesting. And I am an autism awareness advocate.

So, I am always trying to share more, learn more, and just Make other people informed, so

[00:00:56] Chuck: yeah. Very cool, very cool. All very positive things. We can't [00:01:00] wait to find out about the dark side. Ooh,

[00:01:02] Amera: I don't know, don't put anything in my cup.

[00:01:05] Chuck: Well, speaking of, so today's whiskey is Teeling Single Grain. So it's an Irish whiskey.

This one is aged just under five, or just under six years. It is Let's see here. Oh, 92 proof. Thank you, Robbie. And

[00:01:22] Robbie: aged in Cab Sav

[00:01:26] Chuck: Used Cab Sav cast, so that's gonna give it a little bit of the flavor. Well, that's kind of the gist of it. Oh, I think the mash bill was 95% up.

[00:01:35] Robbie: Thank you corn and 5% malted.

Parley. Yeah. There

[00:01:37] Chuck: you go. Didn't you write this up? I did write it. You need to be bigger. I can't read it there. I've got some bright lights in here. There's a, you know, you should be nicer. Okay. Okay. Anyway, we'll start down here. You may pour all of it if you want. Yeah,

[00:01:49] Amera: fill that. Oh, I won't do that.

I think that's a nice

[00:01:57] Robbie: start, right? Yeah, that seems reasonable. You can always [00:02:00] come back for

[00:02:00] Chuck: more. Yeah, we don't cap you at one pour, so. There we go. So, Tibby, give it a little bit of a smell. I'm not sure if you are

[00:02:11] Amera: I am a little bit. I'm not, I'm not a connoisseur. I don't, I don't know everything, but I do know that I've had a little bit, you know, tasted it a couple of times.

Lucky me, Shandae was very nice. And she allowed me to taste some of the when she had When she was here. Yeah, it was good. It was a little spicy.

[00:02:30] Robbie: Yeah. Yeah, it was nice. Yeah, that was a good one. Yeah, I have not had this one. Don't know how

[00:02:34] Chuck: it is. We'll see. Yeah, I've had a few other tealings though and Irish whiskey in general.

It tends to be smoother. Yeah.

Okay, we're getting in the nose here. Smells like raspberry. Schnauzberries. The schnauzberries taste just like schnauzberries.

[00:02:53] Amera: Yeah, it is nice. It does have like a little sweet hint to

[00:02:56] Chuck: it. Yeah, I'm definitely getting a little sweetness maybe a little bit of [00:03:00] Maple or something in it. Like oh, yeah Oh, yeah, a little flower a little little maple and I can't really I'm not good at identifying floral notes So I'll just drink it pick something amaryllis.

Mm hmm.

[00:03:12] Robbie: Yep. That's right

[00:03:16] Chuck: Oh, yeah tons of sweet Yeah, very sweet. It is mostly corn, so. Right, so it's got the corn going for it and

[00:03:22] Amera: some of the, like, red wine. Now that you said maple, though, I can definitely, I catch that maple a lot. Like, you can, you can definitely,

[00:03:28] Chuck: yeah. Yeah, I would say I'm getting slightly fruity in the beginning, and maybe it's your raspberry thing.

So that's another thing about tasting spirits or whatever. If somebody says some words beforehand, it tends to influence. You're like, oh, that's it.

[00:03:41] Robbie: Yeah, unless it's very strange words, which I

[00:03:43] Chuck: try to throw out there. Yeah, like, Mmm, tastes like yellow Legos.

[00:03:47] Amera: Like, oh yeah, I might taste that.

[00:03:49] Chuck: No, that's blue Legos, you're totally wrong.

Yeah, definitely fruitiness, definitely bits of maple in there. And a little light cinnamon in the finish, cause it has a [00:04:00] little burn, but it's fairly smooth in general. For me. There's no right answer, that's the fun part about it too. Is, what, if you like it or dislike it, that's You know, that's all personal

[00:04:10] Amera: preference.

I like it. I think it, I actually do like it. I don't think it's got too much like It's a good moderate burn. Yeah,

[00:04:18] Chuck: I like it. I like it to give me a little hug. It lets me know it's there. It's a little

[00:04:24] Amera: too smooth. I'm

[00:04:26] Chuck: around. Don't drink me too fast. Sip slow. So, our rating system is highly technical. And as an engineer yourself, you know, we have to start at zero, not at one, you must start at zero.

Other than that, we'll go up to eight based on tentacles and and octopus is like our character. So, that's the basis of all of that, but zero being horrible, I never want this again, four being like, ah, it's fine. Not amazing, and not terrible. Middle of the road, however you want to compare that. 8 is incredible.

This is basically the only [00:05:00] thing I would buy if I saw it on a shelf. That's a hard one to get to, so. I keep, I usually make Robbie go first. Do you feel prepared? Should I take the I can go first if you want. I don't like to force our guests

[00:05:13] Robbie: to go first. Yeah, don't force me to go first.

[00:05:15] Chuck: Yeah. Somebody sets the bar, and then she can go second or third, whichever.

Yeah,

[00:05:20] Robbie: okay, I can go. Yep. Yes, this is Irish, right? I wasn't really paying attention. It is probably Irish. Yeah, so Irish ones I think in terms of that This one is one of the better ones I've had. I feel like the red breasts are kind of fall flat for me I know we had another tealing which I think

[00:05:38] Chuck: maybe was better.

It was finished in rum casks It would have been probably

[00:05:42] Robbie: worse because I would think Cabernet would be better I'm gonna say

[00:05:48] Chuck: 6. 9 Ooh, that's a good number. Yeah, it is. This is a family show.

[00:05:55] Robbie: I don't know what's wrong with you. I can't say anything. [00:06:00] Maybe

[00:06:00] Chuck: you should scale it up or down a little.

[00:06:02] Robbie: Alright, 6. 8, how about that?

Perfect. There we go. No,

[00:06:07] Amera: I agree. I was like leaning toward like 6. You know, 6. 3, 6, you know, around that 6, I like it. It's a, it's, it's like, it's, it's nice.

[00:06:18] Chuck: So, yeah. Yeah. I'm gonna go, I do also quite enjoy it. I, I take into account things like presentation, price, and all of that thing. I think it was like 50 bucks, so 50 bucks, this is a, a nice one that you'd be happy and proud to serve with friends.

I like, again, Irish whiskeys. I want them to have more flavor. This has great flavor a lot of times, so I'm happy about that. I'm gonna give it a 6. 49 repeating. Boom. Just to be weird, like everybody else. Do like a pie times two? Right, exactly. No, and then square rooted. Okay, you lost me. You lost me on that one.

You lost me the first time around. I just didn't want to admit that. Yes, exactly. [00:07:00] So we should talk about hot takes?

[00:07:01] Robbie: We should. Yeah, these are not very hot because they are older now. But. The first one, first, I guess, initial question before this, do

[00:07:12] Chuck: you use

[00:07:12] Amera: TypeScript? I, I'm learning TypeScript. Okay. I look at TypeScript and I remember when I first started, cause I'm, I'm, was trying, I'm trying to figure it out and I was like, why?

You know? Yeah. That was my first like, why? And then when you get started and you're trying to look more into it, you're like, oh, okay. It makes sense what this what it's trying to do now How do I merge the two because your brain wants to tell you what

[00:07:38] Chuck: for yeah

[00:07:42] Amera: Just keep doing what you were doing, you know, so I I'm easing towards It because I'm learning that there are so many benefits, so I'm, I'm trying to get to a point where I'm like, okay, let me just, this should be my fallback. This should be my default, like I should start here.

[00:07:59] Chuck: Right, right. So yeah. [00:08:00] Yeah, I know, but I think you're right in the sense of like introducing tools, it has to bring some clear benefit to the work you're trying to accomplish.

And if at that time it makes you slower than you need and you need to be more productive, well then maybe that's not a good trade off, right? Everything's a trade off. And sort of like incrementally introducing or getting into those things. When the stakes are lower, it's usually a better time to.

[00:08:21] Robbie: Yeah, so the follow up to that then is, Inferred

[00:08:26] Chuck: types or explicit types?

[00:08:28] Amera: I would say explicit then. Like I just What is it? Get to the, I don't You want to see it? Yes, I'm very, very much like, what is it? I need to see it. I might as well, like, if we're going to do it, I need to see it. Like, you know, follow through.

[00:08:44] Chuck: Yeah, that's fair. Yeah, you don't want to trust other people. No. You thought it was this.

It's not, at least not for me. I'm going to steal Robbie's favorite question, which is Tailwind CSS or Vanilla

[00:08:57] Amera: CSS. Oh, I'm tailwind all day. [00:09:00] Team Tailwind. Yeah, I love it. I know some people are like, it's so much and, you know, but I love it. Yeah, it gets big sometimes. It does. It gets big sometimes, but I like it.

It's so, it just starts to flow. Like once you get it, you can just,

[00:09:13] Chuck: yeah, I love it. Again, can make you super productive. And I think it's learning curve is a lot lower than things like TypeScript. And then conversely, Like, it makes you super productive, and, You know, like, the biggest argument at that point is just, Oh, do I not like a billion class names?

Well, I mean, you know, do you like ugly CSS files? Because sometimes that can happen

[00:09:36] Amera: to you. Yeah, and now you have a CSS file that's you

[00:09:39] Chuck: know, huge. Right, exactly. And you do weird janky stuff there. We agreed what the jank is on Tailwind, so it's like, all right. Standardized

[00:09:48] Robbie: jank. The new tagline

[00:09:49] Chuck: for Tailwind.

I'm going to make that a t shirt for the next Tailwind Conf. I'll

[00:09:54] Amera: put it on a hoodie next

[00:09:56] Chuck: time we come.

[00:09:58] Robbie: Alright get [00:10:00] rebase or get merge?

[00:10:04] Amera: Whichever works. That's fair. Whatever works in the situation. I'm down to try them both.

[00:10:12] Chuck: Alright, that's fine. Yeah, you just need to get with a team that has a strong opinion, and that'll basically force you in one direction or the other. Yeah, you'll be like, they beat me into this, so that's what

[00:10:23] Robbie: I do. That is true, I merged until you meet that person who makes you rebase, and then it's, alright.

It's like, okay, I

[00:10:29] Chuck: guess that's what it is. Yeah, I'm that person now. That tracks, yeah. Anybody who's worked with you is like, oh yeah, that guy. Yep, yep. I don't know. Alright, so then along that lines, I actually have two questions as well. Do you use VS Code? Yes. Okay, sidebar on the left default or do you move it

[00:10:48] Amera White: to

[00:10:48] Amera: the right?

I'm default all day. I think I did try to do that where I moved it over and it completely threw me off. I'm very I am very like, I like things in a particular [00:11:00] way. Don't change. Sure. I don't like it. It throws me off, right? So I attempted to do like I'm gonna, you know, personalize them. No. It was meant to be

[00:11:11] Chuck: there.

They

[00:11:12] Robbie: probably put it there for

[00:11:13] Chuck: a reason, right? They did a bunch of product research and said this is the best default. This is what works.

[00:11:20] Robbie: I do remember hating that it existed at all when I first started using it, because like I think things before had a lot more at the top. So I like it at the top. But I don't think

[00:11:29] Chuck: that's an option.

Yeah, I don't think so. I mean you just have it closed by default and then you use the hotkeys, right? Yeah, that's kind of I don't know. Yeah. What do

[00:11:38] Amera White: you

[00:11:38] Robbie: got? Is HTML a

[00:11:40] Chuck: programming language?

[00:11:41] Robbie: No.

Oh, strong feelings.

[00:11:47] Amera: Because you can just say it. Like, oh yeah, I'm proficient. Like, this is, no, but it's, you know, it'd be nice, but no,

[00:11:53] Chuck: it's not. Not according to resumes. No. So, you said that you [00:12:00] work in React? Right. Are you using just like plain react library along with like create react app or something like that?

Are you using next? Are you using a meta

[00:12:08] Amera: framework? I use, I use, Vite a lot. Am I saying it right? I know there's a thing about it. Yeah, it's Vite. And I do use Next. js. I'm still trying to get used to it because they did a lot of changes. Oh, yeah. And I'm just trying to make sure that I I'm not missing anything.

Yeah, because it becomes like a lot after a while. You're like, okay Well now you change this and let me make sure that I'm following it the correct way You know, you don't want to put anything out and say, okay, that's not really how you yeah, you know But I I do enjoy I do enjoy next a lot Yeah, I just it's just more of just trying to really familiarize yourself with all the changes and stay

[00:12:46] Chuck: caught up Right.

So are you still enjoying the current next really is like the follow up

[00:12:51] Amera: question. I think so. Yeah. Yeah I think so. I think I see a lot of potential in in using I think it's gonna be like obviously it's [00:13:00] it's huge But I definitely see myself using it more the more I get comfortable with it. Yeah.

[00:13:07] Chuck: Yeah No, and it definitely still has like strong opinions, which is valuable when you're trying to find best practices, but yeah It's just whether you embrace like, oh, yeah, the best practices were left and now they're right.

[00:13:20] Amera: Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah Adaptation. Yes, just getting familiar and you know adapting

[00:13:30] Robbie: Yeah, yeah, I get annoyed with them because they change stuff too much like every year is like I'll do it totally differently

[00:13:36] Amera: We'll see that's the thing that's because when I first got introduced to it, I was like, okay, this is cool.

And then shortly after it's Like re you have to like redo everything yeah and get more, you know, go over the documentation and figure out Okay, I'm not supposed to do it like this. They want you to do it this way. Okay. Yeah.

[00:13:57] Robbie: All right. No Yeah, I wonder if they talk [00:14:00] about the why at all like Why or did you know do they say and when they're like, this is the new version Do they say why they changed it or they're just like

[00:14:08] Chuck: we say this is better Kind of that I mean at least like you know the I got introduced to it from the conference and then the conference talks Introducing those new features, and it was a little jarring I think to like Midway through a component have this like use server directive and then do some other things there So you can be like you can kind of like the main file is server And then you have a client one and but it also has a nested server one and some of that gets to be a little bit weird, so They don't, they didn't necessarily say why, they actually were like, look at these benefits we're giving you.

Yeah, and that's really how I felt

[00:14:48] Amera: it was presented. That's how the pitch went. So it's like, oh, okay, the benefits look like they're worth doing. Right. Yeah,

[00:14:53] Chuck: let's do that. Okay. I think the jury's out on that one, and we'll find out.

[00:14:59] Amera: Yeah. We'll

[00:14:59] Chuck: [00:15:00] see. Yeah.

[00:15:01] Robbie: Alright, so I do want to dive a little bit into the talk that you gave, and I want to start by Like, can we define neurodivergent?

What all does that

[00:15:11] Amera: include? Oh my God. So I, I am, I love this topic so much and I think it's so important for just everybody to recognize. So neurodivergent or being neurodivergent is basically acknowledging that your brain works differently than. Than a typical, and I hate the word typical because like, what is that, right?

But like in a more standard manner, like somebody, the way that somebody thinks or predicts you're going to react to something. And so, bringing awareness to the fact that your brain's different from your brain and your brain's different from mine. And we process information just differently. It doesn't mean that there's something physically wrong with you, [00:16:00] or there's an impairment that's implied.

It's just different. And so that's basically neurodivergent. Like, the way you perceive information or the way, a person might socialize or take different cues or communicate. They take a, it might take a different set of skills than somebody that's more typical.

[00:16:26] Chuck: Gotcha. Yeah.

[00:16:28] Robbie: Yeah. Yeah. I read a, I just thought of a quote that I saw somebody say on Twitter, I think, so I have no attribution to who it was, but it was like, people think about like autism as this thing we want to try to solve.

And they're like, can't

[00:16:39] Amera: like it doesn't. Yeah. It's just, and it's crazy because I wasn't familiar with autism, at all until I don't, my, my daughter is how I learned about autism. I have she's, she's eight. She'll be eight soon, but, when she was born, we [00:17:00] started or, you know, growing, we've, I started noticing there was things that were slightly, like, I wasn't familiar with.

I was like, Oh, cause I have three older daughters and she's my youngest. And so when I was catching up on like different cues, like, okay, well, she's not talking or I'm calling her name and she's not responding to me or just different things. And I'm like, okay, I don't. quite know what's happening here. And then after some time, we ended up going to see a neurologist and I was told that she was diagnosed with being autistic.

And I was like, what is that? Like, you know, like, what does that mean? I've never met anyone that was autistic or on the spectrum or anything. And so I had to dig deep and do all this research to figure out like. What does that mean and how does that pertain to her? Right? And I, I mean, that is just completely changed How I look at everything, right?

Because I wouldn't have I wouldn't have, I just didn't understand, I didn't [00:18:00] know. And I think that's the biggest deal, there's a lot of people that just don't know. They, it, you can't solve something that

[00:18:06] Chuck: doesn't need to be fixed.

[00:18:07] Robbie: Yeah, yeah, that was the whole thing, it seems like, it's like arguing that your Windows PC needs Mac OS installed.

It's like, it's different, you can't compare them, it's just a different way of thinking. It's a

[00:18:18] Chuck: different way of interacting, a different way of, yeah, like, change your expectations and assumptions, right, yes. Yeah.

[00:18:26] Robbie: Yeah, so. Now that we know some about what this is, tell us about the mistakes people make in their websites that are not able to capture some of this demographic

[00:18:35] Amera: and some of that.

I think because people you know, the idea is typical, right? Like, you don't, a lot of people don't consider how certain things affect someone. And they might not think they have an effect at all. And so again, that goes with like, we can go off with just line spacing and like the top the font faces and [00:19:00] things like that.

It's like, yeah, I like this because it looks nice, right? But that doesn't mean that somebody can read that. Like, so if you're dyslexic. You might look at this and like, I, I don't understand what's happening here, you know, or when it comes to, I know people like to like sometimes use those big blocks of code of text and to explain, like you might be explaining something really, you know, detailed and that's fine, but that doesn't mean it has to be this huge wall of text that nobody can see through because you don't understand it.

Some people like if you're neurodivergent, you might look at this. And it's just so much that you can't get through it. Right. You literally will shut down and just I'm done. And that's not what you want. If you want somebody to come, you want them to follow through and when you create a barrier like that, they, they can't like some people can't.

Another thing that I'm big about is motion. So I'm going to refer to my daughter [00:20:00] again. She is, she gets hyper fixated on things. So it's like, there's some people that get really affected by motion, like the vestibular, right? And they start feeling sick and things like that. She's the opposite.

She gets stimulated by it. So she'll focus on something that's moving and then won't move forward. She gets like stuck almost. And, and so you'd have to like redirect her. And I'm just like, okay, yeah that card that flipped over was cool when you in the and when you scroll down and everything shifted. Oh, the parallax stuff.

Like, yeah, I get the idea of it being cool, but like No, it makes people, it doesn't make everybody feel good. And you don't understand the effects that it does have on someone at all. And so I'm really big on like No motion, like, not even just prefers reduced motion. That's cool. Do that too, but start with no motion.

If somebody wants things to move, allow [00:21:00] them, give them the preference to say, Hey, I want to do this and then turn it on. But I wouldn't, I don't like it.

[00:21:06] Chuck: Like,

[00:21:07] Robbie: Like, flip the default. So if you want, if you want to see an animation, like, click here to do it. Yeah, and

[00:21:12] Amera: then we'll, like, opt into

[00:21:14] Chuck: the, yeah, I mean Opt into animation, like, this page includes animations, would you like

[00:21:18] Amera: to opt into them?

And I mean, one of the biggest things that I told this, I talked about this in my talk, is the thing that really brought it to my attention was how she reacted to sound and, and visual stimulus. Because, My example was opening up the S. T. A. R. S. application. I don't know if any of you have S. T. A. R.

S., but if you open up the S. application, like, on your television, the first thing that happens is the logo gets huge. It, like, blasts across the screen, then it shrinks, and then you hear a loud, like, boom boom, like a, like a, like a like a sound, you know, comes out, and she, like, it just sent her into, she covered her ears, and it just, she had this, like, really, [00:22:00] Adverse reaction that I was just like, oh my god, like What's happening here?

You know, it completely threw me off. And so I didn't understand. I didn't know that She's autistic and she has a sensory Processing disorder and so it sounded fine to me. Yeah. No, it was painful to her like it caused her to have this really intense reaction that I just Wasn't prepared for. Right. Yeah.

You know, and so like, that's, that's what was like Yeah. You like how many other people feel this way? Yeah. When, when they turn on a, you know, they open up a website or, or an application and all of a sudden there's a sound plan already that they didn't ask for. Yeah. Or somebody, there's an ad or a video already going.

[00:22:44] Chuck: Yeah. I mean, and some sites can

[00:22:46] Amera: just be boom, boom, boom. Ads and else. Yeah. Sometimes there's just so much going on that it's so overstimulating or these noises, you don't even realize that noises sound. What they sound like, you know, and so it's just like we have to do something [00:23:00] like I just immediately was like, okay how do you fix this because Where's the where's the information that that we can use to not

[00:23:07] Chuck: make people does it let you opt

[00:23:08] Amera: out on that?

Some people don't have options for that. Yeah, like it shouldn't even start

[00:23:13] Chuck: that

[00:23:14] Robbie: way cuz like I'm thinking about it now, like Netflix

[00:23:16] Chuck: does that, that you

[00:23:17] Amera: have to, and then, right, yeah, but that's, but that's the issue that, that was the other part, because not only does it do that, cause even to now, now to this day, she does the same thing, like she knows it's happening, when you're, and she'll, and we, we, our mute button is our favorite button, because, I'm like, hey, don't start the movie without hitting mute first.

Like, literally hit mute because I don't even know if it lets you off. I've never seen an option. Maybe. And if there is, somebody let me

[00:23:39] Chuck: know. On an intro screen, I bet they don't even

[00:23:41] Amera: think about that. Because it's like a huge, the Netflix does the time or whatever. And then, then there's an array of lights.

And then, that's the worst

[00:23:50] Chuck: for her. And you're basically discovering all this stuff real time. I'm

[00:23:53] Amera: discovering it real time and then I have to put it together, two and two together to find out like, what is What's the trigger here [00:24:00] and what's triggering her and then you fall into this like deep hole of research because I'm like I have to figure out what what this is and you realize like, oh, it's it's this colors that are, you know, these bright colors.

She doesn't see them the same way I see them, right? You know, a lot of colors. What I've learned is that a lot of people that are autistic, their colors seem more fluorescent, they're brighter and they give off this like weird glow and like, It's too stimulating for her, or even the noises, like, I didn't know noises could cause pain, like, could feel painful.

It's, that's, what, it was blowing my mind, and I was like, how do I figure out more, and how do I figure out ways to, or learn more ways that I can share with other people to work past this, and like, not allow, to make people more comfortable. Yeah. Because everybody should be able to Use your product or your, your, you know, and not feel like, Oh, this, I'm not included in this.

You didn't think about me when you were creating this. And so, that's

[00:24:59] Chuck: so [00:25:00] important. That's a, that's a tough battle to like, kind of consider like everyone making a website or an application or whatever else. I wonder if that's something that could really be targeted at the platform level, right? Like.

Apple TV, Roku's, you know, whoever at the platform level that's, they do things with accessibility now, and they do things around like parental controls. Like, why can't they also have this level of, again, I consider it like an accessibility issue. So, you know, Mac OS could be addressing this, Apple TV, or Chrome browser,

[00:25:34] Amera: things, know it's such a wide subject of, because, because neurodivergence carries a whole bunch of different, you know, it could be somebody that's dyslexic all the way to autism and ADHD, and so it's such a huge array of, of different, you know, names and things, and so, and even things that don't have names, and, and how, Certain things affect them is wider, right?

And so [00:26:00] I know that everything won't be covered. You won't be able to cover everything, but at least acknowledging or working towards something. I mean, even a little bit goes a long

[00:26:08] Chuck: way. Yeah, and I haven't been around for a little while. I mean, yeah, you know,

[00:26:13] Robbie: yeah I hadn't really considered like that does make it harder that it's more of a spectrum because like if you're blind you're blind We can fix that, right?

Well, we can't fix that. You know what I mean? We can address that in our applications. But if you have this, like, everyone's affected a little bit differently by things, and you have a lot more to consider, so it's harder to get that right. So,

[00:26:31] Amera: yeah. But that's, see, and then that's when you lean more into allowing people to personalize things, right?

At least, even if you chose to You know, go with motion first or whatever. Okay, fine, even though I don't think that you should, but at least give the option, at least offer the option to, or give a warning, like a good warning, like, hey, let me know, although, like, hey, just in case you're wondering, like, yeah, this is coming, some

[00:26:58] Chuck: sites do that for like, [00:27:00] concerns around cause people will have seizures, yeah, epilepsy, yeah, exactly, so, there are sometimes that, but it's very, It's very minimal.

It's like, you come across it and you usually remember and notice it because it's so

[00:27:13] Amera: infrequent. It's so funny because I think about movies, right? Like, sometimes you'll watch a movie like I'm just gonna bring this up, like a Marvels movie, and like, they'll put the little like a little warning like at the top, but it's like, it's on top of the image, you can't even, and it goes on and off real quick.

So you're like, okay, well, what did it say? Yeah. But it's like, hey, I'll let you know. You know, and I'm like, I wish that was There was a way to say, hey, like, this is coming, do you not want to do that? Like, you want to skip this part, you know what I mean? Or at least give me the option to say no. Don't just be like, hey, well, here it is.

[00:27:50] Chuck: You know. And then we're going to start in a big space battle, so be like that. Yeah, I, I, I tend to think, the more we talk about this, I tend to have, like, a strong feeling that on the platform level, they should be doing a better [00:28:00] job. Yeah. And at the app level. Yeah, I mean, absolutely. Like, Netflix could do this.

They could, because they can afford to add more into that,

[00:28:07] Robbie: right? Yes. I feel like they have some money. Yeah,

[00:28:09] Chuck: exactly. I mean, at least at the platform level, you can kind of turn on some things and maybe get some warnings, maybe get things as, like, you know, we don't recommend opening this app because blah, blah, blah things.

But I also realize that even across the web as a whole, as long as the web has been a thing already, we do poor accessibility, right?

[00:28:33] Amera: We're better now than we used to be, asking, we're talking about something like, hey, could you do this now? But there's like little things that still aren't being, like you said, the web's been around for a long time, and people don't want to do alt tags still, like, you know, like,

[00:28:44] Chuck: come on.

Yeah, you gotta be nudged on that. People are lazy. You gotta add it to your prettier or something if you want to force developers to do it. Yes. Yeah, it's a shame. And it is a lot of work, though, too, so then there's a whole side of, like, yourself, you have a personal [00:29:00] experience, so you've learned a lot more about it, but, like, you know, we've had slight waves within our industry where folks, where folks absolutely, like, do become subject matter experts around this, but it feels, like, so infrequent, right?

It's like a

[00:29:15] Amera: small collective of people. And we were talking about that yesterday, because it was almost like, okay, well, That's why it should be more incorporated into the process. Don't do it after don't, it should literally be through the process.

[00:29:29] Chuck: Yeah. You know, not to make light of it, but it's like testing, you know, if you don't bolt testing along with your work, the.

That becomes a bunch of tech debt that you, you know, the company never values enough

[00:29:41] Amera: for whatever else. But then nobody wants to even go back and fix stuff. Exactly. So it really, you know, people get angry because you're like, hey, you didn't add this. And they don't want to go, no one wants to go backwards because you've already done this thing.

[00:29:52] Chuck: Right, yeah, I don't want to touch this again to add more attributes or whatever else. Or, oh no, we got a design, it [00:30:00] actually is like really poor for this kind of experience. Oh, are we going to go back and redo the whole thing? Like, yeah. Unfortunately, corporate responsibility around it doesn't, you know.

[00:30:09] Robbie: Well, this is a bigger problem, that corporations are just like, Hey, let's you know, do something quick, spend a little bit of money. Like, if you ever ask for time for tech debt or testing, they're like, No, why would we give you time for that? Yeah, no, no, it works, right? So you just don't ask. Like, your team needs to have higher standards, and just do it,

[00:30:25] Amera: because That's, that's, I feel like it should just be a natural part, right?

Like, just naturally add it. Don't make it seem like it's an extra thing, because it shouldn't be extra, it should

[00:30:34] Chuck: just be in the process. Right, yep. I mean, I don't know, it took a bunch of worldwide Lawsuits and courts and whatever else to get freaking banners for cookies up

Cookies yeah cookies annoying, but like cookies be cookies and they they just find they'll just find another way to do it It's all in local storage now, you know stuff and tracking and whatever else just make people be more clever [00:31:00] So yeah, yeah, if you if the standard of having a site legally within the United States required a certain level of accessibility Which technically it is supposed to, but nobody checks, there's no follow up, right?

There's too many websites for them to check them all. There's gotta be some lawsuits that actually matter. Yep, that's true. And that enforces

[00:31:18] Amera: the next level of it. But I mean, like, we already know that accessibility, it benefits everybody. Like, so if you know that your, your company is going to benefit from it, or your platform is, then why not?

Like, it doesn't, it almost doesn't make sense to not want to put it at the forefront. Yeah. You're, when you, when you're not, you're blocking, you're creating a barrier for so many people. So you want these people to be able to access your, so why would you not? Like, it almost doesn't, it doesn't make

[00:31:45] Chuck: sense.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Things that seem logical don't seem to apply to corporations and business standards and things of

[00:31:54] Robbie: that nature. So you also, like, the bigger the business, the less you can focus on how experienced all your [00:32:00] employees are. So maybe they don't know about this and they're just cranking away.

You know, how they've always done it. Everything's a div. We don't care about keyboard navigation,

[00:32:08] Chuck: like.

[00:32:08] Amera: Right, yeah. But see, that's a problem too then, right? Because instead of just teaching someone, like, grazing over accessibility, because the thing is, when you're first learning or when you're going through the process, you learn HTML, and you learn, you know, some CSS, and you throw in a little JavaScript, and they're like, Oh, you're free.

But what it really should be is, while you're doing each one, you're also, looking at accessibility throughout the whole process.

[00:32:30] Chuck: A mastery level of each

[00:32:32] Amera: bit. And not making it seem like it's a thing that you should learn after. And more of incorporating it with the whole process. You know, I think that then you wouldn't look at it as if it was, Additional like it was something that you have to add on.

Yeah, because it's already ingrained in the

[00:32:49] Chuck: process I remember for a minute that Google had some of their like SEO around Accessibility and they would rate sites sites higher with certain definitely have the color contrast for sure. I don't [00:33:00] know what else they have But yeah, I think that it's pretty shallow pool

[00:33:05] Amera: Make a huge difference though if if people Put more, like, it was more based on, like, how accessible it is.

I mean, people would force people to want to do

[00:33:15] Robbie: better. Then it's

[00:33:16] Chuck: worth a ton of money.

[00:33:17] Amera: Then there you go. Yeah, that's all they need to do. That

[00:33:20] Robbie: seems like the solution. Well, SEO might go away with AI anyway. Right. So yeah, it's hard to open AI. Do this, please.

[00:33:29] Chuck: So there you go. Yeah. Rewrite it with, you know, that might, that might, that'd be terrible here.

Here's my HTML, make it more accessible. For these points, you know, and then see what happens a little scrub through yeah Exactly as you must but still some you know, 80 percent it's not a bad not a

[00:33:47] Amera: bad job higher than none, right? Yeah, a little bit goes a long way, you know At least acknowledging that this thing needs to happen or paying attention to [00:34:00] it and even adding just a little bit like hey You know

[00:34:03] Chuck: and all the adults know that We should be doing it right and then it's just not happening still so

[00:34:10] Robbie: yes Yeah, I mean, I don't really understand where like budgets and requirements even come from it's like so many levels above the people doing the work that it's like Why did you decide we can't do these things?

Well, it's like, oh, well, my manager said we can't, and his manager said we can't,

[00:34:26] Chuck: and their manager said

[00:34:27] Amera: we can't. That's when you need people to come back downstairs. Yeah. You need people, those people that are saying whatever. There's a disconnect. Yeah. And instead of you sending the message up, they need to come down.

Yeah. They need to come down to figure out, okay, well, why did you make this decision? Or, you know, and be more involved. People like to get to a spot where they think that because I'm here, I don't have to come and figure out what y'all are doing. Just do what, do what I said. But you don't, you don't know if what you said fits.

If it makes sense, so you, you need to come back down. [00:35:00]

[00:35:00] Chuck: That's an interesting thing. If you could actually tie some of it to like ROI directly to, oh, here's a percentage of people that we're keeping out of the business because of these different things, these choices we've made. And if we actually put some efforts there rather than another new shiny feature or whatever else you would think that would be a easier sell, even than things like testing.

A hundred percent. Yeah. Yeah. We should, we should test so we save human hours, but you don't care because

[00:35:27] Robbie: you frontload them here again. You can't quantify that as well as you can, you're missing these users. They would

[00:35:33] Chuck: rather you iterate on a feature or add a new feature or do something else so they can A B test on some pricing model for AI thing, you know.

You gotta get AI into your application, so there's no time to do accessibility. Yeah. Oh, God. Yeah.

[00:35:48] Robbie: We don't need to AI everything so much. I

[00:35:50] Amera: mean, right now, it seems like that's exactly what's happening. Yeah,

[00:35:53] Chuck: everything has a chatbot

[00:35:54] Amera: to help you do stuff faster. Oh, and those are an accessibility issue, because I'm like, you'll go to [00:36:00] a A website or something and there's a chat box.

Hey, do you need help? Do you, do you, do you, do you, and you can't get rid of it. You're like, could you just, no, I don't. It makes it like if you're, if you are neurodivergent or you have like you know, anxiety and things like that. This thing coming on the screen every two seconds asking you if you need it.

No, I don't. Like it can make you feel anxious. And then a lot of times. You can't really get rid of it. It just kind of goes into the corner, but you know, it's there, you know, like I went to a website. I'm not going to say what it was, but like every time you went to a new page, it popped right back up. And I was like, Oh my God, my brain is going to explode.

[00:36:38] Robbie: I don't think anyone has ever wanted. Anything to pop up. No. Like, you turn on your computer, and it's like, Let me boot up the last 20 apps you had open. I'm like, no, I'm trying to type in this one.

[00:36:49] Amera: Right, yeah. I close

[00:36:50] Chuck: my computer. No, I don't want to go back to that. That's true, and it's always the ones where I do need customer service, where I can't find that.

There's no chatbot, there's no whatever. They're like, we work from the hours of 8 to 10 AM, [00:37:00] Eastern Standard Time. Only on Mondays. Yeah, only on Mondays. Like, I can't. Alright, well, you still have my money.

[00:37:07] Amera: Yeah. Great. And then the ones that you don't want are popping up like, hey, and they're always on the screen.

It's like, okay,

[00:37:13] Chuck: it's always new apps that you're trying out. And they're like, oh, you're in the trial period. Can we help? Yeah. No, you cannot.

[00:37:20] Amera: You are annoying. It's not. Yeah, it's annoying. It's very like off putting. Like, I don't want your help. I also don't want to be here anymore.

[00:37:28] Chuck: So somehow or another, like those are.

The user experience studies that get land on, landed on like that rather than, and maybe that's a like lack of diversity in user

[00:37:41] Amera: studies or something of that nature, right? I think so too. I think that people have to be more willing to Dig in an area that they're unfamiliar with and not stay so surface because some people I think things are like paperwork purposes Right, like you'll do something because it has to be done.

So like we did it. So here's the paperwork say we did it [00:38:00] But like did you do it? Did

[00:38:01] Chuck: you do it

[00:38:03] Amera: like how deep did you go and did you really care about doing it because I feel like if you Really wanted to know you're gonna you're gonna find the information and there's a benefit to that There's a bit like you're you're gonna benefit from diving a little deeper and really trying to figure out Like did this really work and how did these people feel and you know, what effect did it have?

but if you just want to do it just to check the box, then you're doing yourself a disservice because You're going to end up with, it's still a shitty product, you know, like it's not gonna, you're gonna, you're pushing people away

[00:38:40] Chuck: still. You're just affirming your own assumptions at that point. And then, are you really learning anything?

Be prepared to be wrong. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah,

[00:38:49] Robbie: so I do want to pivot a little bit and I looked at your LinkedIn It's all you had like 10 years of government work and stuff and like Some stuff with the TSA and airline so [00:39:00] twofold one How did you get from that to coding and two do you have any fun TSA stories for?

Oh my

[00:39:06] Amera: god, I got a lot of fun I gotta learn TSA, TSA is in like it's so crazy because People are, the people, there's a saying that we all say, if you, I've worked in the airport in general for a long time. Like when I graduated from high school, my first job out of high school was Working in the airport, right?

I used to work at Starbucks and then I went from Starbucks and I used to work for TSA and I've also worked for Delta Airlines, you know, and so you get immersed in the airport and how the airport functions. And it's so funny that we have a saying that like when people walk into the airport, they lose their mind.

Like every, they forget everything. Everything's a problem. They don't know where to go. Some, I remember somebody asking me and they were like, we were doing some type of security and And we were shifting, like, the traffic to another checkpoint or something, and this guy was [00:40:00] like, You don't, we don't know where to go, and you need to be better at helping us.

And he was like, kind of fussing at me. And he was like, you need, you know, better signage and more directions and all that. And I said, sir, there's a sign right there. I was literally standing under a sign to give you directions. And I was trying to give him grace because I'm like, You might be stressed out.

I don't know where you're going and where you're traveling to, but like It's right here. Yeah, you know like people and and I know I understand traveling it gets really hard and people do lose their minds Because all they think about is where they need to be. Yeah, they don't they're not thinking about who's around them and everything like that So, you know, it's fun you get, it's very customer service based no matter what you're doing.

Like, even if it's from TSA to when I was being at a, a gate agent, ticketing agent. Everything is about, like, people. And it's, it gets very draining, but you're also, like very understand, [00:41:00] you learn people. And I think, I think that's the best part about it. Because you get to interact with so many different people and personalities.

And and just, just in general, and you're so, cause you learn how to be calm in, in tough situations. Cause they're high strung. People are traveling in a high, they're, they're already on 10.

[00:41:19] Chuck: They probably had

[00:41:20] Amera: a few drinks. Yeah, they're on 10 and you're on 2 because guess what? I won't be here for the next 8 hours.

[00:41:26] Chuck: I'm not going anywhere. I'm going to go home. I don't

[00:41:29] Amera: know where you're going. So like, I remember like, I have a story, like it was bad storm outside. Like it was. Tsunami weather like the weather was ridiculous and like this guy walks up to me, and I'm a gate agent at the time and He just starts going off like he's angry He's mad and he's like my flight is canceled blah blah blah and you need to help me And you know all this stuff, and I was like I was really calm And I think that threw him off too because I didn't react to him.

Yeah, and then I was like okay, sir Well, how can I [00:42:00] help you and then? He started going through this thing, and he wasn't even flying my airline. And I was like, but I'm gonna still help you. Because I understand that you're frustrated. And I, I'm good at bringing people back down. And I think that's a good trait of mine.

Because, I understand it, I get it, I get it, you're stressed out. But like, let me help you anyway. You know, like, so, I, I enjoy it. I think that I've gotten the best of, it's, it's such a very, like, You get a little bit of everything. And I think it's like a little universe when you're at an airport and just in general.

Yeah. And being able to touch, I've, I've been like I said, I've worked on all facets, right. Like I worked through security and so I know how that goes. Yeah. And the things that people travel with, that they're embarrassed by , they think they're, they're embarrassed by it, but like you see it every day.

Yeah. Sounds, but you get to play little games with people.

[00:42:51] Chuck: because was

[00:42:52] Robbie: gonna, they.

[00:42:53] Chuck: What are some of the things

[00:42:54] Amera: you see? Come over here,

[00:42:55] Chuck: let me

[00:42:55] Robbie: look in your bag real quick. I know what you're doing right here.

[00:42:59] Amera: Right? Like, [00:43:00] you know, but it's, it's funny because they're more nervous than you are. But you already know, like, I'm gonna just look in here real quick, and I'm gonna close it.

You can go about your business, but like, let me give you a little stress. Yeah.

[00:43:11] Chuck: Like, it's, it's really funny. That's your way to get back at them a little bit. Just a little bit. I was gonna say, with the x rays and all of that, like, you see

[00:43:21] Amera: I mean, yeah, but it's so funny that, like, people think that you, I think people think that you can't see certain things, but you can, you can see it all, can't you?

There's some people that think that, like, oh, I'm gonna pack this, and, and, you know, and you get so used to, you, that's where your job is, right? Like, I, I can see it. I don't care if you wrapped it in tinfoil or whatever. Like, you know, like, they think that there's some things that people think that they can bypass, but, like, You know, like, even the little body scanner, I think people think that we can see them.

Like, it's meant to, like, x, it's not an x

[00:43:54] Chuck: ray. No, no, it's more of, like, body shape,

[00:43:57] Amera: right? Like, it's not the bones. But, you know, some people get really, like, [00:44:00] and I understand it, and I respect your feelings about it. There's some people that are like, I'm not going through there. Because I don't want to get radiation.

And I'm like that's not what we're doing here. It's not really what it is. And then they think we're taking pictures. Nobody's doing that.

[00:44:16] Chuck: Mental

[00:44:17] Amera: pictures. Not even that. We're just like, please come on. Please

[00:44:22] Chuck: come on. Well that's the funny thing. Most people are like, I don't want to see that anyway.

Whatever it

[00:44:26] Amera: is, I don't want to see it. You get good at catching numbers, right? So you know how many people are going to come in a certain amount of hours. And it's just like any other job. You're just like, alright, let's get through this. Like, what makes you think that I want to sit here and stay with you and do, like, no, let's Let's keep this going,

[00:44:44] Chuck: you know, but you want to fly.

I want you to

[00:44:46] Amera: fly. Yeah, I want, yeah, I want to get you there, you know, and like, we like, they like to use us as the default when they mess up. So like if they missed their flight. Or, like, they don't make, or something happens, and they're like, well, they did it. [00:45:00] They're the reason why I'm late. Like, no, he didn't.

Yeah, maybe get there earlier. No, like, listen, my, my DPI, I love that. Like, hey, we tell you to get here at least two hours in advance. Yep, yep. What time do you get

[00:45:10] Chuck: here? Right, oftentimes you don't need that time, but the time you do, you'll feel better.

[00:45:14] Amera: Yeah, you'll, yeah, like, listen, you should've been here.

Right. You should've got

[00:45:17] Robbie: here on time. Just like taking the express lanes, like. The one time you don't, there's a lot of traffic.

[00:45:21] Chuck: There you go. Yeah, I know. And whose fault is that? Yeah, right. So that's why I like PreCheck and the Global Entry and all those things. That's like the express lane through.

[00:45:31] Amera: Yeah, and people don't even realize how great that is.

Like, I heard somebody like complaining about PreCheck and I'm like, Listen, PreCheck is great. They're only like 75 for like four years. Yeah, exactly. I don't remember the amount of time, but like, you don't even have to do it again. Like, that's, like

[00:45:47] Chuck: It's a while. Pay the money. Yeah. And it's 100 for, or at least was, for global entry, so you got pre check, and if you ever go out of the hand in hand.

You come

[00:45:55] Amera: right through. Oh man. Yeah, I'm like, if you fly, you know you're flying, please, just pay [00:46:00] it. Yeah, but you don't, it's a benefit. You're, it's great. Just,

[00:46:03] Chuck: just do it. I think the, there's like that company clear now. Yeah. That also does a thing that it's like super fast, but it

[00:46:09] Amera: feels like I don't wanna It's not the same thing.

Bad. No, it's not. You should say bad. The funny thing, I don't want to, but the,

[00:46:15] Robbie: the funny Sponsored by Clear

[00:46:17] Chuck: today's episode, sponsored by Clear, clear provide all your biometric data and your firstborn and Right.

[00:46:23] Amera: Get to the gate very quickly. What, what's funny is people, like, they used to get mad at us though, like.

Because they're like, I have clear, and we're like Alright.

[00:46:31] Chuck: I know, they're very entitled. It's irrelevant.

[00:46:33] Robbie: Thanks for letting me know

[00:46:34] Amera: though. But you're like, let me see your ID. Right. That's cool you have clear but we still need to verify your information.

[00:46:40] Chuck: Yeah,

[00:46:40] Robbie: there's still a thing. It just like skips the initial line.

Because

[00:46:42] Amera: like we're, we're a government agency. Yeah. Like it's a, it's still a, a process in security in general. Yeah. What makes you think that you're, you don't get to bypass us. Yeah, exactly. Like so that's not how this works. You

[00:46:54] Chuck: just don't have to wait in that other

[00:46:55] Robbie: line. That's all it is. Yeah, I think you have to have both.

You do clear and pre check. And then [00:47:00] you're. Like, a little bit faster. Like, clear as

[00:47:03] Amera: I think it does work. I think it only, it only works when precheck line is long, right? Yeah, exactly. Because then you're like, well, I get to, you know. Yeah, I jump to the head of that line. But if it's not, then you just, other than that, there's really no benefit.

That's true, that's true, yeah. Like if the line is like, if there's no one, why are you over

[00:47:18] Chuck: there? So you heard it here Clear is a waste of your money. I did

[00:47:22] Robbie: not say that. Hey, you can verify yourself on LinkedIn with Clear.

[00:47:26] Chuck: Have you done that? No, really? Yeah, have you seen that? I don't go back on LinkedIn.

Remember we talked about how Taylor wouldn't like to hear this, but cause he thinks that, not really, I am the CEO of HTMX on LinkedIn currently. I'll put it on my LinkedIn, cause I think it's all ridiculous and a joke. Anyway. I'm not a recruiter though, and I respect those in that particular profession.

Well, that whole game has kind of cooled down. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, with the change in the marketplace, and where people were laid off so much and they're trying to backdoor through things. Yeah. It's kind of [00:48:00] like that's a serious time. But

[00:48:01] Robbie: yeah. Don't wanna get into that, but I do want to hear how did you transition from, from

[00:48:06] Amera: that to tech and I had just always been into tech.

I, I didn't know. So the funny thing is, it's kind of, it's not even funny. It's kind of sad, right? Like, because. Growing up, they, you, you know, you get pushed like this, Hey, go be a doctor, go be a lawyer, and you don't realize that some things are tangible, right? So, you kind of get conditioned and thinking that like, I gotta go here or here or here or here.

Like, these are the fields that'll be the most successful and you'll make the most money or you'll be, you right? And so, and it doesn't mean that you can't be passionate about those things, but like You kind of like, push back some of the things that you think you're passionate about, right? You, you, you think.

Because you are, though. And so, I, I really like, me and my brother used to like, play around with computers. We used to go to the thrift store and buy old computers. And we used to play games like King's [00:49:00] Quest and floppy disks. Yeah, and like. It was, like, those are the things that, like, we, I enjoyed, and, I remember playing, like, old school, like, Family Feud, when the computer screen was, like, green and black, and, like, you know, like, stuff like that, and, like, I liked it, and I didn't know that You could learn more, build games, or just do anything computer, like, I didn't know that it was something that I could do, or even that I was already doing something like that, by tinkering around, and I didn't know that it could turn into, like, a career path, because they don't tell you a like, computer science is a thing, or software engineering is a thing, which they should, they're doing it better now, right, but like, It almost made it seem like it was an intangible like feel like you couldn't reach especially for me I'm like I'm a young black girl like from Atlanta, you know what I mean?

And so it wasn't something that was always like put in front of you And I don't know if it was done like on purpose by like just [00:50:00] in general or like, you know Some things are kept like gatekeeping almost right? Yeah, and so it's so at through time I just kind of like moved past it and I was like, okay, well, you know, job security is over here or doing things that make you feel comfortable because I know that, I know that, like, I know this thing.

I know this, this, what my outcome in income is going to be. And, and you know, that traditional, like, Staying on this like, you know, and it works, right? Like, oh, put in the work and you don't edit and look at it anymore because it's not a thing. It's not in your mind at all. And so then when I realized that, and I'm going to bring up Shondae again.

We're really good friends and we've, we go back a long time. And we've had we have like a, over a decade of history together. Right. When I remember when she doesn't probably didn't even know this story, but like I remember going online and [00:51:00] I Seen her post something to like her stories and it was like a really it's a really bad Really bad, but it was like her learning right and I didn't realize it at the time and she made like a little Like a portfolio like of just her name and like, hey, this is what I like and whatever.

It was just very generic I really really plain but I was like, oh my gosh, she's doing something that I was interested in but like she's doing it now You know like and I'm like, I know I don't know anybody like that's doing this thing or in this field And then when I seen her doing it and like sharing things she was sharing really slowly and quietly like and if you Didn't know Or what was happening.

You wouldn't know what she was doing. Does that make sense? Yeah. Yeah, totally. And so, when I seen it, I was like, okay, she's doing it. She's doing this thing that I, I know about and I like. Yep. And the more I watched her progress, it inspired me to be like, you know what? I think I'm gonna pick this up again.

I think I'm [00:52:00] gonna try to learn this skill that I, I really like and I, and I love and I just wanna be happy doing this thing. Right. Problem solving. I love building puzzles and like, I think that's how I think about coding. I think it's like a big puzzle that never ends, right? Like you're always like fitting things together.

And I'm like, I didn't know until I was watching. Her career growth and like just how her path was going. And it was just so inspiring. I was like, okay, you know what? I'm gonna get outta my own way. Yeah. I'm gonna step into this, this light that, and I'm gonna go, I'm just gonna put it out there and start journey.

I'm just put it,

[00:52:37] Chuck: I'm just gonna start learning. Yeah. I love that passion answer too. I mean, and you know, no shade to anyone who is just trying to have more money, security and options. That's good, I mean there's a path for those people too, but I think that success in this industry comes very much from that kind of thing.

Like, I'm curious, I like the challenge, I just really have fun and enjoy doing this. [00:53:00] Some of that fun for myself sometimes is like you're garbage and I hate this and you know, whatever you gotta go through some of that Impostor syndrome is real

[00:53:08] Amera: You should have seen me yesterday. I was like in full panic mode I've been in full panic mode for like six months It wasn't until like After my talk was over that I like calm down, you know But like I got him really inspired by by her process and I was like, yeah And then hand in hand with the experience that I had with My daughter being autistic and, and then the new information, it just made me feel like I want to make sure that I build applications that people like her, that feel like her, that experience things like her, could use, and I, how can I make this better?

How can I, it just, it makes you feel like, yeah, I want to do this, and I want to be better, and I want to be great. And

[00:53:50] Chuck: you want to share that with people, right? Yeah. You want to like, help us learn and help. Other folks that are here. There's probably tons of people that have like just no idea that those things [00:54:00] like I just think parallax is annoying at this point But I didn't even think about like

Everything is Was it like dark various shades of purple and then they're gonna start parallaxing again or something that yeah every other site you see But is this so, or do you have any more talks this year planned

[00:54:19] Amera: so far? Listen, this was my first talk. Okay. Yeah, I know, like, it was my first talk, I was super nervous about it.

And I, I feel like I feel much more confident. Yeah. And I feel much more confident and comfortable now that I've kind of went through the process. Yeah. And I mean, I'm so excited. Like, I, I just want more people to be aware and just know, right? Absolutely. And like, my goal is to make, make as many people informed as possible.

So, like, if somebody would have me, I'm definitely going. I would, I just want to share. Like, if I can bring more people in and just let them know why this is important and what they can do to make a difference. Or just even Having somebody want to just [00:55:00] learn more about this thing. Like, we all benefit from that.

Everybody benefits from accessibility across the board. So if I can be, like, a little piece of the puzzle

[00:55:11] Chuck: I feel like you could continue to iterate and evolve this talk probably for years on end and still be bringing

[00:55:17] Amera: benefit to many places. And that's what I, that's what I want to do. Like, I just want to keep adding on it, on to it.

If I find out more information, if I find ways to incorporate more people or, or, you know, whatever I can do to, to be, a piece of the progress,

[00:55:34] Chuck: I'm down. Yeah, that's awesome. I think you should definitely pursue that. You're obligated to be at render at some

[00:55:39] Amera: point, right? Listen, if they'll let me in, I'll go.

Like, wherever they'll have me, I'm willing.

[00:55:46] Chuck: Yeah, just gotta keep putting those CFPs in. Yeah.

[00:55:49] Robbie: Yeah, fun process. So something I do want to touch on is I have a big lack of Beyoncé on every page of my websites. Can you tell me how I can [00:56:00] fix that

[00:56:00] Amera: problem? You can definitely fix that problem. Like, look, I'm H Town all day.

Like, listen, H Town all day, Beyoncé. I'm in the hives. So you're welcome to come over to the dark side if you'd like. So I just did this for fun, but I did do a Chrome extension. So if you're looking for more Beyonce, go ahead and go, go to Google, get you a Chrome extension. So that way, I don't even remember what I called it.

[00:56:27] Robbie: But like, yeah. It's like Beyonce's internet or something

[00:56:29] Amera: like that. Yeah, because it is Beyonce's internet. That's the thing. People don't realize that like, we're, we're, we're. We're all just using it. Everybody, yeah, we're just using her space. We should all give her grace and thanks. So, thank you, Beyonce, for letting us on your internet.

Because we wouldn't be here without you. So, if you feel like you need more Beyonce across the earth, go ahead and download that extension and let it change your life. Yeah, absolutely.

[00:56:54] Chuck: That's perfect.

[00:56:55] Robbie: Cool. Yeah, alright, so before we end, is there anything you want to [00:57:00] plug or anything we mentioned? Anything we missed?

I

[00:57:02] Chuck: don't think you can get better

[00:57:03] Amera: than that, Accenture. That's it, like, no, I just appreciate your, you know, you guys platform and the way that you allow people to share and engage with you. Like, it's dope, it's change, it's life changing, it's very chill. Like, I love it. I love what you guys are doing. Thank you.

And I enjoy it. I know, I've listened to y'all. You were the one. Like, I'm excited to be here, this is great. Like, I'm, I'm, y'all don't even know that you've changed my life, so I appreciate you guys.

[00:57:30] Chuck: Well, thanks, thanks. Yeah.

[00:57:31] Robbie: Alright thanks everyone for listening. If you liked it, please subscribe, leave us some ratings and reviews.

We appreciate it, and we will catch you next time.