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Andrew Macdonald Powney
Andrew Macdonald Powney

12 Followers

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Accessibility 10: Editors & Others

Wagnerians will know about the Gesamtkunstwerk: the complete work of art. Wagner wanted his operas to fuse and meld stage and sound so that his composition was seamless and total in all human dimensions. That went against the entire trend of society before Romanticism, which had been towards specialisation, division…

Writing

2 min read

Accessibility 10: Editors & Others
Accessibility 10: Editors & Others
Writing

2 min read


Pinned

Now You See It, Now You Don’t

A completely underestimated part of our constitution came into being 150 years ago today, 18th July 2022. This was the Secret Ballot Act. Before 1872, anyone emancipated by the Reform Acts of 1832 and 1867 would still have had no real vote. Anyone who held their land from someone else…

Politics And Elections

4 min read

Now You See It, Now You Don’t
Now You See It, Now You Don’t
Politics And Elections

4 min read


Nov 23, 2022

Accessibility 9: Alt Text

When you think about alternative text, it is sometimes better not to think about text at all. Think, instead, about listening. Imagine someone (or remember someone!) who blethers on, and on, and on. What did you listen to; what did you hear? Think, also, about speaking. …

Writing

2 min read

Accessibility 9: Alt Text
Accessibility 9: Alt Text
Writing

2 min read


Nov 14, 2022

Accessibility 8: Light & Shade

They tell you that there is a straightforward standard for colour contrasts, but for thing, it’s about the contrasts — not the colours. Forget red and green. Not everyone sees red; not everyone can tell red from green. Think: blue. Blue does not ‘have a good contrast’. Navy blue against…

Editing And Proofreading

2 min read

Accessibility 8: Light & Shade
Accessibility 8: Light & Shade
Editing And Proofreading

2 min read


Nov 7, 2022

Accessibility 7: Repurposable Content

Magnetic paint can be encoded. A monitor screen can be made into a bendy sheet, like a roll of paper. The code that tells a screenreader to speak one word aloud is the same code that tells a computer what word to represent as a series of lights on a…

Writing

2 min read

Accessibility 7: Repurposable Content
Accessibility 7: Repurposable Content
Writing

2 min read


Nov 1, 2022

Accessibility 6: Align Left

You know the first ten seconds of the interview? How the handshake, meeting the eye, standing appropriately, being dressed for the part — all make a first impression that probably, you cannot undo? When sighted people read a screen or a page, they have already had their first impression. They…

Writing

2 min read

Accessibility 6: Align Left
Accessibility 6: Align Left
Writing

2 min read


Nov 1, 2022

God Means Going ‘Off Grid’

There are Christians in America who cluster the flag, the Bible, and the handgun, together. I can’t imagine what ‘Christian nationalism’ could be, given that the Church is a ‘pilgrim Church’; given that every one of us is peregrinus in terra aliena, with our patria in heaven. But while all…

Christian Nationalism

3 min read

Christian Nationalism

3 min read


Oct 31, 2022

Accessibility 5: That’s Style

Using the shortcut which is the software app, I can ‘program’ documents that only forty years ago you would have to be an actual programmer to construct. …

Writing

2 min read

Accessibility 5: That’s Style
Accessibility 5: That’s Style
Writing

2 min read


Oct 24, 2022

Accessibility 4: Shortcuts

When I was young, available computers were the BBC Acorn and the Sinclair Spectrum. Coding was ‘programming’. To use the computer, you had to know how to ‘program’ it (we used the American spelling). Now computers have a visual interface — the imaginary page, or window, of the screen. …

Writing

2 min read

Accessibility 4: Shortcuts
Accessibility 4: Shortcuts
Writing

2 min read


Oct 21, 2022

Accessibility 3: Vroom. What Drives A Document.

Accessibility is not readability. Readability is part of accessibility, but it is not accessibility’s whole story; therefore, Plain English is not the whole story. Plain English is a specialism in itself, and so is Easy Read — something else again. Just as the engine of a car has a structure…

Writing

2 min read

Accessibility 3: Vroom. What Drives A Document.
Accessibility 3: Vroom. What Drives A Document.
Writing

2 min read

Andrew Macdonald Powney

Andrew Macdonald Powney

12 Followers

Proofreader, editor, writer — in Edinburgh, Scotland.

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