I've been following TPGi's weekly reading lists for years, and this week's February 2nd edition hit me differently. Maybe it's because we're well into 2026 now, or maybe it's the particular mix of stories, but this collection feels like a status report on where we actually stand as a field.

The standout piece for me was Eric Bailey's prediction that "compliance deadlines and automated tools risk creating performative accessibility that fails users." As someone who's spent the last few years watching organizations scramble to meet various accessibility requirements, this rings uncomfortably true. We're seeing more accessibility activity than ever, but are we seeing better outcomes for disabled users?

The Automation Paradox in Digital Accessibility

Maria Korneeva's piece on automated testing limitations pairs perfectly with Bailey's warning. She points out that "a significant portion of barriers remain invisible even with the most modern automation." This is something I see constantly in my work with development teams. They'll run axe-core or WAVE, fix the obvious issues, and think they're done. Meanwhile, the real usability barriers—the ones that actually prevent disabled people from completing tasks—remain untouched.

The problem isn't the tools themselves. It's that we've created a culture where passing automated tests feels like success, when it's really just the starting point. WCAG guidelines exist to help us ensure disabled people can actually use our digital products—they can't be reduced to a checklist that machines can verify.

What's particularly frustrating is seeing this play out in the SaaS world I know well. Startups will integrate an automated scanning tool, get a dashboard showing 90% compliance, and consider accessibility "handled." But when actual disabled users try to use their product, they hit wall after wall of unusable interfaces that technically meet the guidelines but fail to serve real people's needs.

The Technical Bright Spots in Web Accessibility

Not everything in this week's roundup was discouraging. Josh Tumath's work on text scaling support in Chrome Canary represents the kind of foundational infrastructure work we desperately need. When he notes that "text gets bigger everywhere except on the web" when users increase system text size, he's highlighting a fundamental disconnect between platform accessibility and web accessibility.

This is exactly the kind of operational thinking we need more of. Instead of asking developers to manually implement text scaling for every component, we should be building it into the platform. The new CSS features Jemima Abu discusses—particularly the improvements to native <select> styling—follow the same philosophy. Make the accessible choice the easy choice.

This approach aligns with guidance from organizations like the Pacific ADA Center, which has long advocated for building accessibility into the tools developers already use. When accessibility is baked into the platform, ensuring equal access becomes a natural byproduct rather than an additional burden.

The Community Reality Check

Diana Khalipina's multiple contributions this week paint a complex picture of where accessibility intersects with real life. Her piece on how "the same content can create clarity for one person and confusion, stress, or exclusion for another" gets at something we don't talk about enough: the inherent tension in designing for cognitive diversity.

As developers, we're trained to think in terms of consistent, predictable interfaces. But cognitive accessibility often requires flexibility and multiple ways of presenting the same information. This isn't just a design challenge—it's an architectural one. Our content management systems, our component libraries, our deployment pipelines all need to support this kind of flexibility.

According to Khalipina's research, 93% of European websites still fail basic accessibility checks—particularly sobering given all the regulatory activity we've seen. The European Accessibility Act is in effect, we have the Web Accessibility Directive, yet disabled people are still being excluded from basic digital participation. This suggests we're solving the wrong problems.

The Burnout Factor in Accessibility Advocacy

Kelly Mack's piece on burnout—"Being Strong Is Exhausting"—deserves special attention. The accessibility field has a retention problem that nobody wants to talk about. We expect people to be constantly advocating, constantly educating, constantly fighting for basic inclusion. That's not sustainable.

This connects directly to operational capacity issues I see in organizations. They'll hire one accessibility person, expect them to transform the entire company culture, then wonder why that person burns out or leaves. Meanwhile, the fundamental systems that exclude disabled people remain unchanged.

The solution isn't just hiring more accessibility specialists—though that helps. It's building accessibility competency across roles. When product managers understand how to ensure equal access, when engineers know how to test with screen readers, when designers consider cognitive load, the work becomes distributed rather than concentrated on a few advocates.

What This Means for Digital Accessibility in 2026

Looking at this collection of articles, I see a field at an inflection point. We have better tools, more awareness, and stronger legal frameworks than ever before. But we also have more sophisticated ways of avoiding the hard work of actual inclusion.

The path forward isn't more compliance theater. It's not more automated testing dashboards or AI-powered alt text generators. It's building accessibility into the fundamental infrastructure of how we create digital experiences—because disabled people deserve to participate fully in digital spaces.

That means investing in platform-level solutions like Chrome's text scaling work. It means training developers to understand disability as a design reality, not an edge case. It means creating organizational structures that support sustained accessibility work rather than burning out individual advocates.

Most importantly, it means remembering that accessibility is fundamentally about people being able to participate fully in digital spaces. All the compliance frameworks and testing tools in the world won't matter if we lose sight of that basic goal—ensuring disabled people can access, use, and benefit from digital products and services just like everyone else.

The reading list this week suggests we're not there yet. But for the first time in a while, I'm seeing the technical and cultural pieces that could actually get us there. The question is whether we'll choose to build them.