About Gersen Medina
Gersen Medina is a Shopify accessibility specialist who remediates ADA and WCAG 2.2 issues on Shopify stores that have received demand letters or lawsuits. Working with U.S. companies since 2014, his remediation work has helped dozens of merchants avoid hundreds of thousands of dollars in accessibility litigation exposure.
Facts
- Name
- Gersen Medina (Gersen Medina Dias)
- Role
- Shopify accessibility specialist
- Based in
- Brazil, working remotely with U.S. companies since 2014
- Focus
- ADA and WCAG 2.2 remediation for Shopify stores facing demand letters or lawsuits
- Education
- Universidade Anhembi Morumbi (game design and front-end development); Compsul (web development)
Background
Gersen Medina started building websites in 2003, first on his own and then at Compsul, in Espírito Santo do Pinhal, São Paulo, where he studied web development from 2005 to 2007. In 2007 he moved to São Paulo to study game design and front-end development at Universidade Anhembi Morumbi.
From 2008 to 2012 he worked at Agente Design, an advertising agency in São Paulo, first as a trainee and then as a web designer for large brands. From 2012 to 2014 he was the front-end and product developer at a health startup in São Paulo, building its visual language and core features until the company was acquired.
Since 2014 he has worked remotely with U.S. companies. He joined Nvestly, a social network for stock market investors, as a front-end developer and stayed until its acquisition. He has since worked with Founders Network and DevisedLabs, among others, on front-end, Shopify and ecommerce projects.
Today his work is focused on Shopify accessibility: auditing and remediating stores that received an ADA demand letter or were sued, and documenting the work for their attorneys.
How Gersen works
- Audit first. Every engagement starts with manual screen reader and keyboard testing plus automated checks, mapped to WCAG 2.2 success criteria.
- Fixes in the theme code. Remediation happens in Liquid, HTML, CSS and JavaScript. No accessibility overlays or widgets, which do not fix the underlying code and appear in a growing share of lawsuits.
- Target: WCAG 2.2 AA. Gersen does not promise "compliance" or "lawsuit-proof" stores. He remediates toward the standard and documents what was done.
- Evidence for counsel. Before and after records, test results and an accessibility statement, written for the attorney handling the response.
- Alongside your attorney. Gersen handles the technical side and coordinates with the lawyer on deadlines and deliverables.