Caption vis a vis Transcript {Was: Text Subteam Minutes for Tuesday 29 May]

Silvia Pfeiffer writes:
> Just a comment inline on my "confusion of transcripts and captions"...
> 
> On Wed, May 30, 2012 at 3:59 AM, Janina Sajka <janina@rednote.net> wrote:
> [..]
> >
> >   194- transcript
> >   jf: A modified proposal presented by Silvia overnight
> >   <JF> http://www.w3.org/html/wg/wiki/ISSUE-194/TranscriptElement
<snip>
> >   <JF> JS: have 1 concern - hearing caption being used interchanged with transcript
> >
> >   <JF> not a substitute for caption
> >
> >   <JF> JF: suspect that silvia is being somewhat loose when she uses the 2 interchangably
> >
> >   <JF> JB: want to make sure that she is very clear - correct any confusion
> >
> >   <JF> JS: agreed, need to be clear there is a distinction
> 
> If you read the change proposal carefully, you may find the word
> "captions" (and indeed the word "descriptions") used a few times.
> These are not used as a place-holder for transcript. However,
> *interactive transcripts* can be created from caption files (as
> described in our requirements document). They can even better be
> created from captions+descriptions files because then then end up
> having all the information included. This is in fact done in the
> example that I sent the other day:
> http://dispatch.media.gbuild.net/video/14 .
> 
> Hope that clarifies that point.
> 

No, unfortunately not. The words are not synonyms, and we must be
careful not to confuse why, and for whom, we support these three
alternative media types.

It is indeed the case that our User Requirements document discusses
transcript with reference both to captions and to video transcripts.
We do say: "A full text transcript should include information that
would be in both the caption and video description,  ..."

http://www.w3.org/TR/media-accessibility-reqs/#transcripts

However, in this very same section we also say:  "The full transcript
supports different user needs and is
   not a replacement for captioning."

We also explain why this is so--namely because captions, video
descriptions, and transcripts serve the needs of different user
communities.

Why cannot we simply serve all the various user needs from one
alternative media resource? We answer that as well when we point out
that:  "... even with ordinary captions, it is possible to miss some
information as the captions and the video require two separate loci of
attention." The unstated implication, of course, is that there is evern
more risk of this with a full transcript (that also contains the video
description information).

Captioning is primarily for deaf and hard of hearing persons. Their
alternative accomodation is a version they can use of what happens in
audio -- both what is spoken and what key sound events are occurring.
The video description information is superfluous to these users, and
they will certainly object to conflating the two.

Similarly, video description is the alternative mechanism for those who
cannot see what is transpiring visually. Captioning information is
superfluous to these users, and they will certainly also object to
conflating the two.

We should most expressly not use these terms interchangeably, though it
is certainly reasonable to generate transcripts by combining captions and
video descriptions.

> If there is any wording that could be used in the CP to make it
> clearer for those that got confused, do propose it.
> 


I'll take another look, Silvia, thanks.

Janina

> Thanks,
> Silvia.

-- 

Janina Sajka,	Phone:	+1.443.300.2200
			sip:janina@asterisk.rednote.net
		Email:	janina@rednote.net

The Linux Foundation
Chair, Open Accessibility:	http://a11y.org

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI)
Chair,	Protocols & Formats	http://www.w3.org/wai/pf
	Indie UI			http://www.w3.org/WAI/IndieUI/

Received on Wednesday, 30 May 2012 02:53:56 UTC