If John ever got his own body the first thing he'd do is drown because he has no idea that it actually takes skill to tread water and these fuckers are always getting into dangerous aquatic situations
i now dislike everything about my blog and sideblogs organization but it turns out that i cant just switch them. which isnt that bad since my account is still fairly empty (i had no clue what to post, which is why i dumped a ton of headcanons lol), so i can just delete posts and reorganize them manually but is still pretty annoying
I'm happy seeing more and more ALT/descriptive text online than I used to! However, I do see a lot of well-meaning but probably too wordy image descriptions?
ALT text doesn't need to be complicated. The general advice is to imagine you're reading your post out loud to a friend on the phone. Whatever you would say to describe the image, write that down.
Recently I came across this site that's a treasure trove of great advice: Veroniiiica With Four Eyes.
Here's a few helpful pages I think are Tumblr relevant, including tips on what's useful to include/exclude for popular image types shared on social media:
How to Write Helpful Alt Text (a general guide)
How to Write ALT text for Artwork (including fanart)
How to Write ALT text for Animated GIFs
How to Write ALT text for Memes
How to Write ALT text for Food
How to Write ALT text for Cosplay
How to Write ALT text for Digital Comics
I went down such a rabbit hole browsing her website this afternoon. I haven't been perfect about tagging my own content, but I can try to be better!
I'm not visually impaired or an accessibility expert, but I am a web developer whose job includes knowing and applying WCAG standards. Since not all of our clients heed our advice to get an actual accessibility expert review, we do our best to drill them on the basics and dispel the "it's too complicated/we don't have time/we don't need to be accessible" myth.
You're doing great! Really love what you've done with the place so far. Now here's something important moving forward. If you are making a neocities - especially if you are doing so with the motivation to fight back against Web 3.0 and reclaim the web as a space for individual users instead of for companies - please, keep the following in mind:
An inaccessible web is not a free web.
Repeat after me: An inaccessible web is not a free web.
Resources for Beginners to Learn About Web Accessibility and Web Design:
W3C's Introduction to Web Accessibility | W3C is the organization that decides on the standards of Accessibility on the web. They are an invaluable direct resource.
A Beginner's Guide to Understanding Web Accessibility
Mozilla's Accessibility Overview
WebAIM's Introduction to Web Accessibility
What is Web Accesibility in 60 Seconds! [YouTube Video]
Accessibility: What's the difference between WCAG Levels A and AA? [YouTube Video]
FreeCodeCamp | FCC provides an extremely beginner friendly Responsive Web Design course. The lessons for this course integrate accessibility standards naturally, and also have individual lessons specifically for teaching accessibility.
FreeCodeCamp's Accessibility Tag on their News Page
HTML Dog's Tutorial's for HTML, CSS, and Javascript
MarkSheet's Free HTML and CSS Tutorial
W3C's Easy Checks
W3C's QuickRef on How to Meet WCAG | I have filtered the QuickRef link to only show Level A requirements. This is the easiest level to meet and is considered the "bare minimum."
i kinda want to make this into a personal blog but idk if i should delete my old headcanon posts cause mainly did it because i didn't have a clue what else to post
SOME ILLEGIBLE RAMBLES AND REFLECTIONS: MISSING WYLL
Jumping off my last analytical post for BG3, I actually do want to talk about Wyll a little.
Wyll has been the companion I've had the trickiest time sorting thoughts out on. I do have thoughts on him, and frankly I want to invite people who are mainly Wyll fans to chime in if they have any observations that I might've missed! I don't know if this is the best way to explain it, but my perspective is if his story were a song I'd say he has the makings of a beautiful one--but there are notes missing. Notes that really, really should be there . I don't know why they aren't there, or if they've been hidden somewhere I haven't found yet.
As usual, longass discussion under the cut.
Here is my understanding of Wyll currently, without grabbing specific quotes.
Ulder Ravegard is his dad, who was a humble blacksmith who rose to nobility through some exceptional effort and personal achievement. Pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps sort of guy, takes pride in being compassionate and dealing with others in good faith. Raised Wyll not to consider himself better than anyone due to his status, but also seems to have imparted a lot of lawful good mentalities tbh. One thing that stood out a lot to me was a line Wyll said in Act III about how as a kid, he used to pretend to kill monsters in the park all the time. When he became an actual monster hunter as the Blade of Frontiers he had the disquieting realization that most monsters in reality are only people, just like him and his friends. This is interesting to me because it was NOT a lesson he got as a kid, and from how Ulder treats Wyll I don't think it's something Ulder is quite comfortable with himself. I'd go so far as to argue that, while Ulder's definition of 'good' is genuinely very good--it doesn't leave a lot of tolerance for anyone outside that. His compassion only goes so far and no farther. He's a little black-and-white in his thinking.
Side note: Wyll seems to treat being Blade of Frontiers like being a two-dimensional hero in a storybook at times. The Act III line where he admits it's all just messy people was so fucking interesting, and I wish there was more examination of the messy morality of trying to fight monsters or even understand what monsters are for him. Being good isn't easy or guaranteed and the most impressive title in the world doesn't guarantee you're actually a hero. Actions come before reputation.
Wyll was, according to the previous point, raised to be the embodiment of lawful good as Ulder saw it. Be selfless, don't indulge in finery or status, be noble, make sacrifices for the greater good. With that in-mind, I want to point out that for all Wyll doesn't like courtly life he loves to dance as something more aligned to that courtly lifestyle. It's one of the things he has left that continues to give him joy. It's an indulgence.
Wyll, as raised by Ulder, sacrifices his own well-being and future in his pact with Mizora to ensure no one else in Baldur's Gate came to harm. He was also bound in such a way that prevented him from explaining what happened or why. When Ulder saw his son return home with one eye, pacted to a devil, obviously in a lot of distress and struggling to explain something... Ulder's reaction wasn't to trust his son's morality or feel concern for him. Ulder decided to hurl out all history, all individual understanding of Wyll's character, and hurl Wyll out like he was a pure evil aligned monster and always had been. He just assumed Wyll was the embodiment of every selfish and evil impulse he could imagine and a traitor to every cause he believed in. He also does not change his mind on this unless forcibly shown through the tadpole what actually transpired. He is not willing to listen or consider alternate perspectives, and I'd argue he loved his son as an abstract concept/extension of his own moral beliefs more than as his own person. (And as an aside: given how Ulder reacted to Wyll without even knowing his situation, do you think he would be ready to show compassion to someone like Astarion who has done horrific things to others under coercion?)
Note, Wyll never actually deals with previous point emotionally. He never allows himself to feel anger or grief over the way his own father treated him. He never lashes out at Ulder on his own behalf for not seeing him as a person, for not treating him as a person, for not loving him as a person or as his son. Ulder talks almost casually about having misjudged Wyll. 'Whoops my bad, I might be an asshole'. We're in a game where Astarion kills Cazador and just starts screaming and sobbing on his knees over everything that happened. Why isn't Wyll pissed off that everything he endured ALONE, the realization that his father never really saw or trusted him, was met with 'whoops'? Why isn't Ulder more horrified over what he did to Wyll? The fact that he isn't so much as in the same breath as other characters expressing anguish makes me think he still, STILL does not understand what he put Wyll through as his father. And Wyll having no reaction other than 'yay Dad likes me again :D' doesn't ring true imo. It's possible to love someone but be absolutely furious with or hurt by them. Mizora was not the only one who did Wyll dirty.
Wyll's pact with Mizora in the first place hinged on Wyll not trusting himself to keep Baldur's Gate safe from the cult of Tiamat AND Wyll not considering himself someone also worthy of protection too. Wyll is part of the tradition 'other people's suffering counts but not mine, I exist to be a shield for others'. I don't think Wyll has ever been taught he is also part of Baldur's Gate who should be kept safe. Self-sacrifice under those circumstances isn't an informed choice but like a self-destructive person offering their life up for cheap, when it isn't strictly necessary. First resort rather than last kinda deal.
Unless I've forgotten something, Wyll breaking his pact is framed not only by Mizora but the narrative as Wyll being selfish and deciding his father should die instead of keeping himself bound. The narrative itself doesn't really challenge this idea even if Wyll does successfully save Ulder unbound by his pact with Mizora. In my experience, out of all the cast members I think Wyll is the only one who is framed as possibly a worse person for opting out of the abusive relationship he's in. I really don't think he should be. Healthy selfishness (self-care, self-esteem) is not a bad thing. We have sayings about not setting ourselves on fire to keep others warm. I don't know why Wyll isn't given room to realize, discuss, and embrace this. In addition to everything else I've mentioned it kind of kills the shape of his character arc imo. Wyll starts off selfless to a fault. Having him remain selfless to a fault and continue making the same choices he did at the beginning sets him up for spiritual death as a character, which would make him staying pacted to Mizora fitting to articulate that concept in a way. It's total self-destruction and it's tragic. But when he breaks the cycle, any degree of selfishness is still narratively condemned. He only gets "redeemed" if he saves Ulder, in the sense that he is still enforced as a selfless person/he is only so good as he is selfless. ADDITIONALLY! He's given a choice between protecting people as Archduke or protecting people as Blade of Avernus but there isn't actually a whole lot of discussion about Wyll's own happiness regardless of others. Wyll isn't given room to feel ugly emotions, anger on his own behalf, or basic self-preservation without the game itself side-eyeing him. Wyll should not have to be a "perfect" and selfless person to be a good and worthwhile person worth protecting.
Like... what bothers me, is that Wyll isn't given room to express or examine anything. He isn't allowed to feel conflicted or angry. He isn't allowed to want for himself. He isn't allowed to be furious with his father or to wonder if his anger at his father (who he still loves) fuels his desire to break his pact with Mizora or if it's just treating himself like he's worth something too. It kind of feels like the narrative itself is dehumanizing Wyll by denying him room to be selfish at all, even when he really needs to be. Even when it would give room for emotional and complex scenes that could resonate.
When I've thought about what kind of romantic partner would be most interesting for Wyll imo, what struck me was it should be someone who is selfish and actually encourages his selfishness a bit. Not in a corrupting way (even if he worries it might be at times) but someone who can encourage some balance in him and vice versa. I don't think Wyll works as a narrative tool to show how nice another character already is or be their trophy boyfriend. As a character, him being imperfect I think is intrinsically important to him feeling real. And guy really does deserve to feel real, you know?
It's been weird, since Wyll approaches some of my absolute favorite themes as a character for being a hero who needs to understand not being heroic all the time is okay/heroes need protecting too sometimes. But he doesn't really do anything with them currently as far as I'm aware. That's made it harder for me to engage with him. If his romance route touches on it more like then that's awesome. But I feel like if we could see full character arcs for other companions regardless of romance, it should be doable for Wyll too.
i dont think ill be able to do a durge run after killing someone in a normal playthrough and nearly crying because theres a letter in their inventory from their parents saying how proud they are of them
Branching off from one of my last posts, hopes peak could've also helped the reserve course develop in a hobby, but it would be more based on what the students want to go to. Since they don't have talents. But hopes peak is just a normal but shiny expensive highschool.
turnnoffyourmind
dededos
janainaart
ellievsbear
