**Molly Miriam Esther Holzschlag ** (January 25, 1963 – September 5, 2023) was an American author, lecturer and advocate of the Open Web. She wrote or co-authored 35 books on web design and open standards, including The Zen of CSS Design: Visual Enlightenment for the Web (co-authored with Dave Shea). She was nicknamed the "Fairy Godmother of the Web".

Campaigning for web standards

Holzschlag conceived and led the first five years of Open Web Camp, a free event in Silicon Valley from 2009 to 2013. Her work focused on Open Web technologies, web design, and accessibility. She was the 2004–2006 group lead for the Web Standards Project (WaSP), a coalition that campaigned browser makers such as Microsoft, Opera, and Netscape to support modern web standards. Her obituary in the Tucson Sentinel reported that "more than once, she challenged Bill Gates face-to-face to fix problems with Internet Explorer". She participated as a World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) invited expert on the CSS Working Group, chaired the CSS Accessibility Community Group, and was an invited expert on the HTML and GEO working groups.

Teaching work

In 2011, Holzschlag worked for Knowbility, teaching classes on Open Web technologies such as HTML5 and ARIA, with a strong emphasis on using inclusive design to overcome accessibility barriers. She also taught webmaster courses for the University of Arizona, University of Georgia, University of Phoenix, New School University, and Pima Community College.

Writing

Holzschlag wrote or co-authored 35 books on web design and open standards, including The Zen of CSS Design: Visual Enlightenment for the Web (co-authored with Dave Shea). She also reported on music for the Tucson Weekly in the 1990s.

Personal life

Holzschlag was born on January 25, 1963 in Brooklyn. She was diagnosed with aplastic anemia in 2014. She had spoken about the problems with health care funding and raised over $70,000 through GoFundMe in 2013 to fund her chemotherapy. Holzschlag was found dead at home in Tucson, Arizona on September 5, 2023, at age 60.

Notable awards