Closed Captioning Urged for Online Series

Closed Captioning Urged for Online Series

Posted on July 7, 2011 at 8:00 am

As more original content is being created for the web, deaf and hard of hearing audiences are urging producers to include closed captions. The Washington Post reports:

Last year, President Obama signed into law the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act, requiring that captioned television shows must be captioned online. But there’s a loophole: The law does not require original online programming to be captioned.

The story reports on grass roots efforts to persuade producers and distributors of online content to include closed captions through social media and some lawsuits against Time Warner and Netflix, charging discrimination.  There is a petition calling on Netflix to improve and expand their closed captioning and search functions.

My dad, Newton Minow, was one of those who fought for closed captioning of television shows, in part because his older brother was hard of hearing but mostly because he has always worked for choice and accessibility.  The networks objected for years.  But once forced to comply, it turned out to be one of the best things that ever happened to them because the captions are what make it possible for TIVO and DVRs to find the shows they record.

Earlier this year, Regal and Cinemark made a commitment to full captioning in their movie theaters by the end of 2012.  Netflix and the producers of web series should do the same.

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Roger Ebert on What’s Wrong With Projectors

Posted on May 30, 2011 at 8:00 am

Studios spend tens of millions of dollars to get the best equipment to photograph and record the most beautiful performers wearing the most gorgeous clothes in the most spectacular settings.  And then we go to see them in a movie theater with the wrong lens on the projector, badly focused, and an inadequate bulb.

Roger Ebert writes:

Do you remember what a movie should look like? Do you notice when one doesn’t look right? Do you feel the vague sense that something is missing? I do. I know in my bones how a movie should look. I have been trained by the best projection in the world, at film festivals and in expert screening rooms. When I see a film that looks wrong, I want to get up and complain to the manager and ask that the projectionist be informed. But these days the projectionist is tending a dozen digital projectors, and I will be told, “That’s how it’s supposed to look. It came that way from the studio.”

He explains that some theaters are showing 2D movies through a 3D lens, which dims the image as much as 50 percent, even up to 85 percent in some cases.

If you are concerned about this, write to the National Association of Theater Ownersnato@natodc.com

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