I'm running for the W3C's AB election. This is my nomination statement.
My name is Hidde de Vries, accessibility standards specialist at Logius (part of the Dutch government). I would appreciate your support of my running for the W3C's Advisory Board.
AC members can vote via the voting form (AC-only).
I fell in love with the web ever since I built my first website in high school, almost 20 years ago. What a cool platform to build for! Since then, I worked professionally as a web developer and accessibility specialist, often building bridges between these fields.
At the W3C, I've been a member of the Team (at WAI, 2019-2022), where I worked on accessibility guidance, authoring tool accesibility, the WCAG Report Tool and the ATAG Report Tool. I'm currently a participant in the Open UI Community Group, various accessibility-related Working Groups and the Web Sustainability Interest Group.
If elected, I want to:
- help improve what engagement with the AB looks like, by doing more outreach to Members and the wider community, to ensure their input is represented in our advice, and by working to find consensus on governance issues between Board, TAG, Members and groups.
- make W3C more attractive; people go to the W3C for web standardisation today, but we can reach more potential if we improve onboarding. I want to find out what stops people from getting started or engaging with our work and use that to make improvements.
- bring fresh perspective on the future; though I can't say I'm new to the W3C community, I am new to most governance aspects of it. My hope is this fresh perspective can be an asset to an AB that is orienting towards a new identity and mission.
- advocate for users, the primary constituents of the web. Almost too obvious to call out, as users are central to the W3C vision, and who else would we advocate for? In practice, though, user needs around accessibility, internationalisation and privacy are easily overlooked. They require matching up (deep) technical specifics with user needs. I want to use my experience with both to help improve the process.
What I'd like to bring to the AB, in no particular order:
- specialism in web accessibility (for long) and web sustainability (as of recently). Also a fast learner happy to dive into things I'm not specialised in.
- worked in a broad range of sectors that use and need the web: public sector, including government, a browser vendor and an authoring tool vendor.
- proven record of communicating about standards development to tech communities, the web developer community in particular (see my blog and talks). Also co-organised developer conferences.
- previous experience at W3C, as an Invited Expert, Member and Team.
- hands-on experience and deep technical knowledge of web development
- background in Philosophy and (briefly) AI, meaning I could bring a humanities perspective and not just a technological view, and that I am trained to view issues from many angles.
Any questions: feel free to reach out via W3C Slack or email me on hidde@hiddedevries.nl.
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@lolaodelola thank youu!
Foreword
The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is holding its regular annual Advisory Board (AB) election this month. I was elected two years ago after being elected to a six month term (See full AB members history). This is my 2025 AB election nomination statement posted on my blog, in addition to the official Nominations and Statements for W3C Advisory Board 2025 Election page.
Tantek Çelik is nominated by Mozilla Foundation.
Nomination statement from Tantek Çelik:
Hi, I'm Tantek Çelik and I'm running for the W3C Advisory Board (AB) to build on the momentum the AB has built with transitioning W3C to a community-led and values-driven organization. I have been participating in and contributing to W3C groups and specifications for over 25 years.
I am Mozilla’s Advisory Committee (AC) representative and previously served on the AB for several terms, starting in 2013, with a two year break before returning in 2020. In early years I drove the movement to shift W3C to more open licenses for specifications, and more responsiveness to the needs of open source communities and independent website publishers.
Most recently on the AB I led the AB’s Priority Project for a W3C Vision as contributor and editor, taking it through wide review, and consensus at the AB to a vote by the AC to adopt the Vision as an official W3C Statement.
Previously I also co-chaired the W3C Social Web Working Group that produced several widely interoperably deployed Social Web Standards. Mastodon and other open source software projects built a social network on ActivityPub and other social web specs which now require maintenance from implementation experience. As such, I have participated in the Social Web Incubator Community Group and helped draft a new charter to restart the Social Web Working Group and maintain these widely adopted specifications.
With several members stepping down, the AB is experiencing much higher than usual turnover in this election.
I am running for re-election to both help with continuity, on the Vision project and other efforts, and work with new and continuing Advisory Board members to build a fresh, forward looking focus for the AB.
I believe governance of W3C, and advising thereof, is most effectively done by those who have the experience of actively collaborating in working groups producing interoperable specifications, and especially those who directly create on the web using W3C standards. This direct connection to the actual work of the web is essential to prioritizing the purpose & scope of governance of that work.
Beyond effective governance, the AB has played the more crucial role of a member-driven change agent for W3C. While the Board and Team focus on the operations of keeping the W3C legal entity running smoothly, the AB has been and should continue to be where Members go to both fix problems and drive forward-looking improvements in W3C to better fulfill our Vision and Mission.
I have Mozilla's financial support to spend my time pursuing these goals, and ask for your support to build the broad consensus required to achieve them.
I post on my personal site tantek.com. You may follow my posts there or from Mastodon: @tantek.com@tantek.com
If you have any questions or want to chat about the W3C Advisory Board, Values, Vision, or anything else W3C related, please reach out by email: tantek at mozilla.com. Thank you for your consideration.
Addendum: More Candidates Blogged Nomination Statements
Several other candidates (all new candidates) have also blogged their nomination statements, on their personal websites, naturally. This is the first AB election I know of where more than one candidate blogged their nomination statement. Ordered earliest published first: