Forbes Announces First-Ever ‘Accessibility 100’ list

In surprising news, Forbes this week released its “Accessibility 100” list. As the name implies, the publication is using its famous who’s who lists to spotlight 100 people who are doing notable work in the accessibility arena. The Accessibility 100 is a Forbes first.

“Accessibility is about far more than wheelchair ramps or live captioning,” Alan Schwarz, assistant managing editor of Forbes Media, writes in the lede of the introductory portion of the list. “The field has emerged as a bustling innovation hub, an educational imperative and—unapologetically—an untapped business opportunity.”

The list is a veritable all-star team of A-listers in the accessibility space. People from Apple’s Sarah Herrlinger to her counterpart in Google’s Eve Andersson to Microsoft’s Jenny Lay-Flurrie, amongst others, all are people I have interviewed numerous times in the past. As Schwarz notes, Forbes defined accessibility in terms of software; this explains why folks like the aforementioned Herrlinger and Andersson appear on the list.

The disability community deserves more time in the limelight like the Accessibility 100.

“[Prioritizing work on accessibility] isn’t [merely] a legal obligation or ‘We just want to do nice things for those poor people,’” Marcie Roth, executive director of the World Institute on Disability, said in a statement to Schwarz. “You’re leaving money on the table because you’re only marketing to three out of four people.”

Who knows, maybe I’ll make next year’s list should Forbes include us newspeople.