4 ms·

At Stanford, we have similar requirements to caption any video publicly available. This meant that some professors simply stopped posting the videos publicly.

At Stanford, we have similar requirements to caption any video publicly available. This meant that some professors simply stopped posting the videos publicly. I understand the intent of the regulation, but there should be other ways than do not disincentivize releasing content for free.

danso 10y ago
That's interesting, Stanford's not a "public entity" and would seemingly not be beholden to these regulations (which I'm assuming is different than the law requiring handicap-accessible facilities by private entities).
- protomyth 10y ago
  Most of these laws apply to anyone taking federal money and quite a few apply to private entities.
  - WillPostForFood 10y ago
    INdeed, Netflix was sued in 2010 by the National Association of the Deaf, under provisions of the ADA, for not having captions on all their videos.
    - protomyth 10y ago
      Also, the Target case which probably is a good reminder for web developers https://www.w3.org/WAI/bcase/target-case-study https://www.w3.org/WAI/bcase/target-case-study
    - gydfi 10y ago
      What if I'm both deaf and blind? Should Netflix have to cater to me through some kind of touch system? If I'm blind and I go to an art gallery should there be an audio track to somehow explain what I'm not seeing? What about a play? Are plays specifically exempted or is it just that nobody has bothered to sue a theatre for a lack of subtitling just yet? What if I go to a fancy restaurant but have no sense of taste or smell? How will that restaurant compensate me for the experience I'm missing out on?
      - russelluresti 10y ago
        You're mixing up equal access to educational materials with an equal sensory experience. Giving sighted and hearing people access to educational materials that the blind or deaf can't access is discrimination. The ADA also covers things like plays (classified as "entertainment"), and plays like Hamilton were sued for not providing audio descriptions of what is happening on stage. Movie theaters have to provide the same service to blind users and this also applies to Netflix movies and shows. Restaurants probably wouldn't fall into the entertainment category, so they're not covered by the ADA. For the "deaf and blind" scenario, most litigation is held off by the provision that says the establishment doesn't need to provide an accessible experience if providing such experience would be "unduly burdensome". For example, a blind and deaf man sued Cinemark for not providing tactile ASL interpreters for him (he communicates using sign language and by touching the hands of someone signing to him). The theater said it costs $60 per hour for an interpreter and a movie would require 2 interpreters, so $120 per hour is a bit nuts. But audio descriptions and subtitles are not considered unduly burdensome - they're not that difficult and are basically seen as a requirement at this point.
        alphapapa 10y ago
        > Giving sighted and hearing people access to educational materials that the blind or deaf can't access is discrimination. Doesn't that mean that libraries must remove books that are not also available in braille?
        russelluresti 10y ago
        Well, for blind users, an audio book would suffice. For blind + deaf, braille would be the only option, and if a library couldn't provide that option, there would need to be a resolution. In most cases, the resolution is to provide the material in the format required to the user. This is usually a trivial matter as books can be ordered in braille fairly easily. The university decided that making their content available to all users was too difficult, so their resolution is to make it available to no one. A library could do the same and that resolution would be legal. It's just stupid. Which is why people are saying what the university is doing is stupid.
logicallee 10y ago
Voice recognition is astoundingly fantastic even on poor hardware. If you want to see the state of the art try dictating a few lines here - https://speechnotes.co/ https://speechnotes.co/ no registration required, no training required, use any microphone you want. I was absolutely astounded when I found out the state of the art today. I was used to, "Computer, how do you wreck a nice beach" from a couple of decades ago. Why can't a place like Stanford auto-caption things? Especially things like lectures which are super easy - a single speaker droning on in a silent room using high-quality speakers. without any editing the output should be absolutely useable. The only time it really wouldn't work at all is in a very noisy environment where you can hardly understand it anyway. I realize some of the captions might end up garbage, but I don't think enough would to make it into a complaint.
- detaro 10y ago
  Your link uses Google APIs, nothing local, so it would be weird if Youtube (which apparently isn't good enough) used a worse version of those. But who knows...
  - logicallee 10y ago
    How did you find my link? (I mean, what did you think of it, assuming you tried it). By the way, I find Google's autogenerated CC is useless on any video no matter the type or audio quality. (For example a lecture.) Another reason to think the link uses something else is that it takes several seconds (during pauses) to come up with the result - it is slower than real-time. I don't know if Google takes the time to slowly process every video in case someone clicks the autogenerated CC... The quality definitely strikes me as different. (And one of the reasons I was so surprised that the above link is actually useable.)
- Nimitz14 10y ago
  speechmatics.com

danso 10y ago

That's interesting, Stanford's not a "public entity" and would seemingly not be beholden to these regulations (which I'm assuming is different than the law requiring handicap-accessible facilities by private entities).

protomyth 10y ago
Most of these laws apply to anyone taking federal money and quite a few apply to private entities.
- WillPostForFood 10y ago
  INdeed, Netflix was sued in 2010 by the National Association of the Deaf, under provisions of the ADA, for not having captions on all their videos.
  - protomyth 10y ago
    Also, the Target case which probably is a good reminder for web developers https://www.w3.org/WAI/bcase/target-case-study https://www.w3.org/WAI/bcase/target-case-study
  - gydfi 10y ago
    What if I'm both deaf and blind? Should Netflix have to cater to me through some kind of touch system? If I'm blind and I go to an art gallery should there be an audio track to somehow explain what I'm not seeing? What about a play? Are plays specifically exempted or is it just that nobody has bothered to sue a theatre for a lack of subtitling just yet? What if I go to a fancy restaurant but have no sense of taste or smell? How will that restaurant compensate me for the experience I'm missing out on?
    - russelluresti 10y ago
      You're mixing up equal access to educational materials with an equal sensory experience. Giving sighted and hearing people access to educational materials that the blind or deaf can't access is discrimination. The ADA also covers things like plays (classified as "entertainment"), and plays like Hamilton were sued for not providing audio descriptions of what is happening on stage. Movie theaters have to provide the same service to blind users and this also applies to Netflix movies and shows. Restaurants probably wouldn't fall into the entertainment category, so they're not covered by the ADA. For the "deaf and blind" scenario, most litigation is held off by the provision that says the establishment doesn't need to provide an accessible experience if providing such experience would be "unduly burdensome". For example, a blind and deaf man sued Cinemark for not providing tactile ASL interpreters for him (he communicates using sign language and by touching the hands of someone signing to him). The theater said it costs $60 per hour for an interpreter and a movie would require 2 interpreters, so $120 per hour is a bit nuts. But audio descriptions and subtitles are not considered unduly burdensome - they're not that difficult and are basically seen as a requirement at this point.
      - alphapapa 10y ago
        > Giving sighted and hearing people access to educational materials that the blind or deaf can't access is discrimination. Doesn't that mean that libraries must remove books that are not also available in braille?
        russelluresti 10y ago
        Well, for blind users, an audio book would suffice. For blind + deaf, braille would be the only option, and if a library couldn't provide that option, there would need to be a resolution. In most cases, the resolution is to provide the material in the format required to the user. This is usually a trivial matter as books can be ordered in braille fairly easily. The university decided that making their content available to all users was too difficult, so their resolution is to make it available to no one. A library could do the same and that resolution would be legal. It's just stupid. Which is why people are saying what the university is doing is stupid.

logicallee 10y ago

Voice recognition is astoundingly fantastic even on poor hardware. If you want to see the state of the art try dictating a few lines here - https://speechnotes.co/ https://speechnotes.co/ no registration required, no training required, use any microphone you want. I was absolutely astounded when I found out the state of the art today. I was used to, "Computer, how do you wreck a nice beach" from a couple of decades ago. Why can't a place like Stanford auto-caption things? Especially things like lectures which are super easy - a single speaker droning on in a silent room using high-quality speakers. without any editing the output should be absolutely useable. The only time it really wouldn't work at all is in a very noisy environment where you can hardly understand it anyway. I realize some of the captions might end up garbage, but I don't think enough would to make it into a complaint.

detaro 10y ago
Your link uses Google APIs, nothing local, so it would be weird if Youtube (which apparently isn't good enough) used a worse version of those. But who knows...
- logicallee 10y ago
  How did you find my link? (I mean, what did you think of it, assuming you tried it). By the way, I find Google's autogenerated CC is useless on any video no matter the type or audio quality. (For example a lecture.) Another reason to think the link uses something else is that it takes several seconds (during pauses) to come up with the result - it is slower than real-time. I don't know if Google takes the time to slowly process every video in case someone clicks the autogenerated CC... The quality definitely strikes me as different. (And one of the reasons I was so surprised that the above link is actually useable.)
Nimitz14 10y ago
speechmatics.com