Re: Practical reality [captioning L1 or L2]

Hi Roberto,

Thanks for your comments.

<blockquote>
From a technical point of view, I think it is really easy for the authors
to make synchronized alternatives tracks, and in my opinion 1.2 L1 SC1
and 1.2 L1 SC2 have the same greatest importance in Multimedia
accessibility, so I think the better solution is to maintain them to L1.

Without synchronized alternatives movies, animations or slide shows will
be a barrier for deaf or hearing impaired, blind or visually impaired viewers
and for people with cognitive disabilities, and Multimedia is increasingly
important on the Web.
</blockquote>

I understood the imporatnce of the captioning and audio description for
the multimedia accessibility for people with disabilities and it also
can benefit people without disabilities.

My point is that I'd like to know WCAG 2.0 need to consider the
"practical reality" or not. If not, it should be L1. If consider, it can
be L2. My decision on L1 or L2 depend on it. 

I'm relatively new to the group and thought people in the working group
seem not to have same standpoint when thinking about captioning and
audio description. I'd like to confirm it in order to reach the
consensus.

As Andi wrote in another discussion, "Part of what we struggle with in
trying to reach consensus is that we all have different environments
that we represent." We need to discuss any issues based on the same
premise reached consensus in the working group.


Cheers,
Makoto


On Fri, 4 Nov 2005 19:11:54 +0100
"Roberto Ellero" <rellero@webaccessibile.org> wrote:

> 
> Makoto:
> At the today's teleconference, we discussed the captioning and the audio
> description. It'll depend on the premise the WCAG WG has.
> CASE 1:
> WCAG 2.0 doesn't consider the "practical reality" but will define what
> the accessible web content is.
> In this case, we should keep the captioning and the audio description at
> Level 1. But it is really hard for the authors to do that at this moment.
> Both the captioning and the audio description require specialist expertise
> to be done correctly. It could result in the situation that many web
> designers/developers would give up the conformance with WCAG 2.0.
> [...]
> 
> 
> Ellero:
> Of course I consider correct that the "practical reality" in Japanese
> authoring is a great problem about captioning, but for the rest I really
> think that making captions and audio descriptions synchronized with SAMI and
> SMIL in QuickTime, Real and WMP movies is not an issue of technical
> difficulty, but "only" a "work required" issue.
> In other words, Multimedia accessibility is in my opinion a part of
> knowledge of Content editors. In fact, to make captions and audio
> descriptions as in this examples in a my testing - in all formats - is easy
> and doable for everybody, using MAGpie or other tools [1]:
> 
> http://www.test.robertoellero.it/elaborazioni_sottotitoli/
> [needs to set wm and Real players to "show captions", the code is valid and
> crossbrowser using Object]
> 
> On the contrary it is often difficult to "reconstruct" the scenario (the
> original text) in order to communicate what is happening (not dialogical) to
> visually impaired users. That's an interpretative expertise for Content
> editors, obviously, and an emphasis regard the importance of planning
> multimedia content with accessibility in mind.
> 
> >From a technical point of view, I think it is really easy for the authors to
> make synchronized alternatives tracks, and in my opinion 1.2 L1 SC1 and 1.2
> L1 SC2 have the same greatest importance in Multimedia accessibility, so I
> think the better solution is to maintain them to L1.
> 
> Without synchronized alternatives movies, animations or slide shows will be
> a barrier for deaf or hearing impaired, blind or visually impaired
> viewers and for people with cognitive disabilities, and Multimedia is
> increasingly important on the Web.
> Consider that the BBC, by 2008, will be providing subtitles on 100% of
> programming across the entire BBC network (TV and Web). [2]
> 
> Best regards,
> Roberto Ellero
> 
> 
> 1. http://www.captions.org/softlinks.cfm
> 2. http://www.redbeemedia.com/access/index.shtml
>     http://www.bbc.co.uk/jobs/microsites/steno/index.shtml
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>

Received on Saturday, 5 November 2005 00:34:36 UTC