Today, the Federal Communications Commission has published its final ruling on the responsibilities related to the provision and quality of closed captions on television programming. The FCC will now be moving to a shared responsibility model that, while still imposing primary responsibility on video program distributors (VPDs), will now shift some of that responsibility directly to the video programmers (VPs) that produce the content. Each entity will be responsible for closed captioning issues that are primarily within its control.Read
Effective August 1, 2016, a new law authored by Minnesota politician Brian Daniels now requires all televisions in common areas at medical facilities in Minnesota to turn on the closed captioning feature.
The bill, which was signed into law on May 22 of this year, was an effort by Mr. Daniels to address a problem brought to his attention by the Minnesota State Academy for the Deaf. According to Daniels, he can recall the exact story that triggered his motivation to move forward in pursuing this matter. He had heard of a family sitting in a hospital waiting room one morning struggling to make sense of the breaking news of a horrific tragedy unfolding in New York. That was the morning of September 11, 2001.
It was not a difficult task for the Minnesota State Academy for the Deaf to gain his attention on this matter. Back in 1996, Daniels and his family relocated to the city of Faribault so his son, Jeremiah, who is severely hard of hearing, could attend the MSAD. He highlighted his joy in serving the deaf community of Minnesota, saying, “I’m just so proud of it because it affects my family and so many people we know in the community.”
In addition to waiting rooms in hospitals, other medical facilities include surgical centers, birth centers, and certain group homes. Group Homes affected are those that provide housing, meals, and services to five or more people who are developmentally or physically disabled, chemically dependent, or mentally ill. However, it does not apply to medical clinics, nursing homes, or assisted living facilities.
This was one of several new laws to go into effect on August 1st and another promising example of the increasing efforts of lawmakers to help gain accessibility for all.
Today, in a partnership with Trinity Broadcasting Network, Hillsong Church has launched The Hillsong Channel. The 24-hour channel will feature Hillsong Church’s globally recognized worship performances, conferences, documentaries, children’s programming, talk shows, and messages from Christian leaders – including Hillsong Senior Pastor Brian Houston and his wife Bobbi Houston. Read
Aberdeen would like to extend our heartfelt praises to our client and trusted AberFast station partner, GEB America for being the recipient of the 2016 Full Power TV Station of the Year Award presented at the NRB Proclaim conference last month. The award was given as part of NRB’s Annual Media Awards program, which honors and celebrates excellence in production, service to the community, faithfulness to the mission, commitment to the Gospel, and personal integrity.
Every year on March 2 (Dr. Seuss’ birthday), kids head off to school and celebrate reading with a program called Read Across America. Teachers set up cozy areas of the classroom where kids can relax and get lost in their favorite books.
But have you heard of Read Captions Across America? It is celebrated just like Read Across America but with an added twist—kids are encouraged to “read” educational programming that has the closed captioning turned on. The purpose is to raise awareness that closed captioning can promote literacy and foster reading skills. This celebration was founded by the Described and Captioned Media Program (DCMP) in partnership with the National Education Association.
Described and Captioned Media Program (DCMP)
DCMP promotes and provides equal access to learning for students who are blind, deaf, or hard of hearing. Funded by the U.S. Department of Education and administered by the National Association of the Deaf, the DCMP verifies and monitors the capabilities of captioning companies on their ability to meet their captioning requirements.
DCMP sets standards and offers guidelines for closed captioning, adhering to a reading speed (also called words per minute) that is appropriate for beginning readers to follow. Aberdeen Broadcast Services relies on DCMP’s Captioning Key as the basis for our closed captioning rules. We use it to train our new caption editors and transcribers on the importance of closed captioning quality. These guidelines help us adhere to the preferred captioning style of the deaf and hard-of-hearing community.
In 2011, Aberdeen Broadcast Services produced a PSA to help promote this event. You can view the video below, but remember to turn on the captions!
To learn more, visit the Read Captions Across America site here. There you will find access to appropriate media to share with students on this special day. DCMP even offers classic Dr. Seuss cartoons that are closed-captioned.
Gogo Business Aviation, in its continuing efforts to be the leading provider of in-flight entertainment, has made an admirable step towards accessibility with an agreement with the US National Association of the Deaf (NAD) to add closed captioning to their on-demand streaming service, Gogo Vision. Despite the Department of Transportation’s directive on the presence of closed captioning on video monitors in airport terminals, this agreement is the first of its kind with an in-flight entertainment company.
“This is a monumental step in making in-flight entertainment accessible to the 48 million deaf and hard of hearing people in the United States alone. Personalized in-flight entertainment has made air travel exciting again. The ability to access and watch an extensive library of movies or television shows helps pass the time on long flights. The NAD is thus thrilled by Gogo’s decision to make the in-flight entertainment experience equally accessible to deaf and hard of hearing passengers.”
NAD CEO Howard Rosenblum
The first step of the deal between the two parties includes Gogo developing the technology that supports closed captioning on their media players accessed by passengers on their WiFi-enabled devices. Once that is effectively implemented, they will begin sourcing content from their library with captions with the entire venture finalized by June 30, 2017. This modest 18-month cushion should provide ample time for a successful roll-out.
Gogo Vision is currently on board (pun intended) with 2200 aircraft domestically. Although the agreement is focused only on US domestic flights initially, an international implementation should not be far behind. This is an exciting step in the right direction to ensure an equally accessible, and enjoyable, flying experience for all passengers.
All captions offered in the Gogo Vision library will be compliant with current FCC captioning standards.
The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), the global web-standards organization, accepted an Emmy Award earlier this month for its work developing standards to make video content more accessible on the web with text captioning and subtitling. In the category of “Standardization and Pioneering Development of Non-live Broadcast Captioning,” the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences has recognized W3C’s development of Timed Text Markup Language (TTML).Read
Not shortly after Portland became the first state to require enabled captions in all public establishments, Hawaii has just become the first state in the nation to recognize the importance of accommodating a positive movie-going experience for the deaf and hard of hearing. The bill, introduced by Kauai Representative and father of a hearing-impaired son, James Tokioka, was signed into law by Governor David Ige and is now in effect as of January 1, 2016.Read
It’s official. Starting today, the City of Portland, Oregon, will require all televisions visible in public establishments to activate the closed caption function. Prompted by a complaint from accessibility activists that they were often met with resistance when requesting closed captions in local restaurants and bars, the Portland City Council met and passed the ordinance on November 18th, 2015 with a unanimous 5-0 decision.Read
On November 10, 2015, the FCC held a roundtable event concentrating on the accessibility of public, educational, and government (PEG) video programming. With the increasing number of local governments and educational institutions feeling the pressure to become compliant, this all-day event was focused on promoting a discussion on the benefits, best practices, current obligations, and solutions - both technical and financial - of adding closed captioning to PEG video programming. The event was comprised of local government professionals, policymakers, captioning vendors, consumer groups, engineers, and others working in applicable fields of video programming.Read
