CAPTIONING MULTIMEDIA Are You Listening?

Captioning Learning Objectives ► Define Captioning, Accessibility & Disability ► Is Captioning Required by Law? ► Benefits of Captioning ► UT Case Study ► Captioning Research ► Resources & Next Steps 2

First, let me introduced myself… Glenda (the goodwitch) Sims glendathegood.com glendathegood.com ► Accessibility Consultant, Judge, Trainer Knowbility knowbility.org knowbility.org ► Senior Accessibility Consultant Deque 3

What is Captioning? Captioning – synchronized text transcript of multimedia content. Transcript – text representation of the spoken words and sounds. Audio Description – verbal statement of on-screen visuals. 4

Captioning Software CaptionTube - (for YouTube video) MAGpie – ncam.wgbh.org/webaccess/magpie Hi-Caption – WebAim Tutorial on Captioning – 5

Is Captioning Important? Let’s see these two gentlemen have to say 6

Audio Descriptions the visual made verbal ► Audio Described Excerpt from “The Miracle Worker” ► ► 7

5 Stages of Accessibility Awareness * ► Denial – Accessibility laws don’t apply to my organization. ► Anger – Accessibility laws are so unfair and unreasonable! ► Bargaining – I’ll make my home page accessible, but I can’t possibly make software for all my employees and customers. ► Depression – I’m so overwhelmed. I don’t even know where to start. This is impossible. I give up. ► Acceptance – I understand accessibility is key to universal design. I’m moving in the right direction. 8 * inspired by Derek Featherstone

Objectives of Accessibility Laws ► Equal opportunity ► Independence 9 For most people technology makes things easier. For people with disabilities, technology makes things possible. President’s Council on Disabilities

Accessibility Laws: Federal United States Federal Laws Section 504 of the 1973 Rehabilitation Act (Federal) “No otherwise qualified individual with a disability in the United States …shall be excluded fromthe participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance” ericec.org/sect504.html ericec.org/sect504.html Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) of 1990 (Federal) National mandate to eliminate discrimination against individuals with disabilities Section 508 of the 1973 Rehabilitation Act (1998) (Federal) Applies accessibility standards to procurement and development of electronic and information technologies by federal government agencies International Guideline Web Content Accessibility Guideline 2.0 (WCAG) of 2008 (W3C) WCAG

U.S. Section 508 ► ► Part of the Federal Rehabilitation Act ► Amended in 1998 to include standards on electronic information technology ► Subpart B - technical standards ► 16 rules of web-based intranet and internet accessibility standards ► In process of “Refresh” to harmonize with W3C WCAG

Captioning in 508 & WCAG § Web-based intranet and internet information and applications. ► (b) Equivalent alternatives for any multimedia presentation shall be synchronized with the presentation. § Video and multimedia products. ► (c) All training and informational video and multimedia productions which support the agency's mission, regardless of format, that contain speech or other audio information necessary for the comprehension of the content, shall be open or closed captioned. ► (d) All training and informational video and multimedia productions which support the agency's mission, regardless of format, that contain visual information necessary for the comprehension of the content, shall be audio described. WCAG Time-based Media: Provide alternatives for time-based media. 12

Benefits of Captioning ► Legal Compliance ► Universal Access ► Improved Comprehension ► Findability 13

Legal Compliance Now ► International - W3C WCAG 2.0 ► US ► Americans with Disabilities Act ► Title I – ► Title II ► Title III – Public Accomodations ► Federal Rehabilitation Act – Section 508 ► 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act - October 8, ► State Law 14 Don’t be a Target or a Netflix!

21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act Passed October 8, 2010 – Signed into law by Obama Extends closed captioning obligations to video programming provided by, or generally considered comparable to programming provided by, a television broadcast station, even when distributed over the Internet: Covers video programming that was previously captioned for television viewing, live video programming, and new video programming provided by or generally considered to be comparable to programming provided by multichannel programming distributors; Does not cover user-generated content (e.g., YouTube videos posted by individuals) (Current Broadcast Law: Captioning required on most broadcast, cable and satellite TV shows) Congressman Ed Markey of Massachusetts

Captioning & Universal Accessibility  Universal Access:  Accommodate hearing and learning disabilities  Usable by as many people as possible  Remove Language Barriers:  Student not a native English speaker (ESL)  Lecturer not a native English speaker (ESL)  Improving Comprehension:  Studies show captioning improves comprehension and retention for all viewers  Mobile/Noisy Environments:  Students access content in all unexpected places 16

Captioning & Improved Comprehension “Augmenting an auditory experience with captions more than doubles the retention and comprehension levels.” Gary Robson, The Closed Captioning Handbook “People retain about 20% of what they hear, 30% of what they see, and 50% of what they hear and see.” Dales Learning Cone of Experience ( Adult students that used captioned video presentations progressed significantly better than those using traditional literacy techniques. Benjamin Michael Rogner, Adult Literacy: Captioned Videotapes and Word Recognition Dual Coding Theory postulates that both visual and verbal information are processed differently and along distinct channels with the human mind creating separate representations for information processed in each channel. Allan Paivio, University of Western Ontario 17

Captioning & Findability Is your multimedia... Easy to Search? Easy to Navigate? Easy to Discover? Or, is it a bunch of black boxes? 18

Captioning & Findability ► Hot Transcript – Search Court Proceedings Transcript ►

Searchable Video 20

Captions + Transcripts = Win 21 Captions Full Transcript

January 2011 Leader: Accessibility Evangelists Proactive Review: Manual & Worldspace Resources: Accessibility Training Help:1-on-1 Accessibility Consulting Guidelines: Accessibility Policy Competition: Accessibility Internet Rally (AIR) with Knowbility Creating a Culture of Accessibility 22

UT Austin Case Study John Slatin Captioning Project ► Inherited small grant Fall 2008 ► Partnered with UT Services for Students with Disabilities ► Identified media to caption ► Outsourced Transcription and Captioning to Automatic Sync Technologies ► Grant paid for captions 23 Details posted at wikis.utexas.edu/display/access/

John Slatin Captioning Project ► Turn Around Time ► Regular – 3 Days / Rush – 24 hours ► Funding Options ► Grants ► Centralized funding / Student fee assessment ► Charge Departments 24 CaptionSync PricingCaptioning OnlyTranscript OnlyCaptioning & Transcript Immediate Turnaround $1.48 / minute ($88.80 / media hour) Standard 3-Day Turnaround $1.60 / minute ($96 / media hour) $3.08 / minute ($ / media hour) Rush 24-hour Turnaround $2.16 / minute ($ / media hour) $3.64 / minute ($ / media hour)

Captioning Research Funded by Dept of Education / Focus on Efficient Captioning ► Intelligibility ► What do you think is a tolerable word error rate? 0% 5% 10% 15% 25

0% Word Error Rate 26 Everyone loves a booming market, and most booms happen on the back of technological change. The world's venture capitalists, having fed on the computing boom of the 1980s, the internet boom of the 1990s and the biotech and nanotech boomlets of the early 2000s, are now looking around for the next one. They think they have found it: energy. Many past booms have been energy-fed: coal-fired steam power, oil-fired internal-combustion engines, the rise of electricity, even the mass tourism of the jet era. But the past few decades have been quiet on that front. Coal has been cheap. Natural gas has been cheap. The 1970s aside, oil has been cheap. The one real novelty, nuclear power, went spectacularly off the rails. The pressure to innovate has been minimal. In the space of a couple of years, all that has changed. Oil is no longer cheap; indeed, it has never been more expensive. Moreover, there is growing concern that the supply of oil may soon peak as consumption continues to grow, known supplies run out and new reserves become harder to find. The idea of growing what you put in the tank of your car, rather than sucking it out of a hole in the ground, no longer looks like economic madness. Nor does the idea of throwing away the tank and plugging your car into an electric socket instead.

10% Word Error Rate 27 Boot hoses a booming market, gloved capote booms happen heart the back of technological change. The world's venture capitalists, house fed gem's the computing boom of the 1980s, the internet boom of the 1990s and the biotech and nanotech boomlets of the early 2000s, are now looking around for the road one. They gaunt they have found bubonic: energy. Many past booms have been energy-fed: coal-fired steam power, oil-fired internal-combustion engines, the rise of electricity, even the brushy tourism of the jet era. But the past few decades have been quiet on magic front. Coal has been cheap. Natural gas gross hoist cheap. Jennifer 1970s aside, oil has been cheap. The one real novelty, nuclear power, went spectacularly off tabloid rails. The burping to innovate has been minimal. In local space of a couple of years, all that has paycheck. Oil is no longer cheap; indeed, it has never been more expensive. Moreover, there is fizzled translogic that the supply of oil may soon peak as consumption rains to grow, known supplies run out and new reserves become zipper to find. The idea of growing what you put in the tank of your car, rather saber sucking it out of a hole in grim ground, no longer looks like economic madness.

Effect of Errors on Intelligibility 28 Predicted Results Actual Results

Error Rates for General Captioning SourceTypical Error Rate Result Trained Stenographer0.5% to 1%No problems Student transcriber??Expect to be worse than stenographer Speech Rec: trained3% to 5+%Varies from acceptable to poor Speech Rec: untrained20% to 40%Unintelligible 29

Cost of Repairing Bad Transcripts 30 Example only: not real data

Research Conclusions ► Speech-to-text not ready for this task (error rates > 20%). ► Cost of correcting bad transcript (5%+ error rate) is higher than starting over. ► Using cheap labor costs more due to increased management and quality review costs. ► Need to use trained stenographers for acceptable (compliant) result, but limit their role to only what you need: a transcript. ► Automate everything else. ► Focus on workflow efficiency to minimize resource waste. 31

What Will You Do? ► Wait until you get sued ► In-house solutions ► Out source ► Hybrid 32

How To Get Started – Develop a “Caption Action Plan” 1. Identify multimedia to caption this year Priorities – public? employees? high-profile content? 2. Select how you will transcribe/caption In-house Outsource Hybrid 3. Obtain necessary training/resources 4. Caption multimedia 5. Conduct a Plus/Delta Plus – what went well? Delta – what can be improved? 6. Set Phase 2 Caption Action Plan Goals 7. Repeat 33

Learning Resources Accessibility Standards ► US Federal ► International WCAG John Slatin Captioning Project - wikis.utexas.edu/display/access/ wikis.utexas.edu/display/access/ Knowbility – Non-profit Accessibility Consultants Webaim Captioning Tutorial - webaim.org/techniques/captions/ webaim.org/techniques/captions/ ► MAGpie ncam.wgbh.org/webaccess/magpiencam.wgbh.org/webaccess/magpie ► Hi-Caption ► CaptionTube captiontube.appspot.com/ (for YouTube video)captiontube.appspot.com/ 34

Accessibility – Barrier Free IT 35 Good Design is Accessible Design – Dr. John Slatin