International policy and legislation

Error message

Deprecated function: Array and string offset access syntax with curly braces is deprecated in include_once() (line 14 of /home/mediacc/public_html/themes/engines/phptemplate/phptemplate.engine).

Awareness of audio description increases in the UK

no
Show on home page

New research released by Ofcom, the UK communications regulator, shows that over 60% of people are aware of the service, which gives blind and vision impaired people access to television programs.

Audio description was first broadcast on British television in 1994, and by 2009 most of the main channels were required to provide it on 10% of their programs. However, research commissioned by Ofcom in that year showed that awareness of it among the general public was low. Following a public awareness campaign initiated by Ofcom and carried out by broadcasters, awareness rose to 37%.

Taxonomy: 
General
Television
International policy and legislation
Audio description
Research & policy
News
Ofcom, Office of Communications
News alert taxonomy: 
Blind/vision impaired TV, DVD, Cinema & the Arts news
Research & Policy news

Top of page

UK regulator seeks to improve live TV captioning

no
Show on home page

The UK communications regulator Ofcom has announced proposals aimed at improving the quality of live captioning on television, including asking broadcasters to report on the quality of their captions.

Ofcom notes that the quality of pre-prepared captions (which are called ‘subtitles’ in the UK) is generally very good, and the majority of complaints it receives are related to live captioning. As caption quotas have risen, so have the number of programs being captioned live. Most of this captioning is now undertaken using speech recognition technology, but this is imperfect and errors are common. 

Following consultation with viewers and representative groups, Ofcom has concluded that the four key dimensions that affect the quality of live captions are:

Taxonomy: 
General
Captions
Television
International policy and legislation
Deaf or hearing impaired
Research & policy
News
News alert taxonomy: 
Deaf/hearing impaired TV, DVD, Cinema & the Arts news
Research & Policy news

Top of page

Blind taxpayers sue for inaccessible website

no
Show on home page

The National Federation of the Blind (NFB) in the USA and two Massachusetts residents who are legally blind have filed a lawsuit against one of the largest tax preparation firms in the country for failing to make their online tax services accessible to people who are blind and vision impaired. Filed earlier in April, the lawsuit claims H&R Block violates the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and article 114 of the Massachusetts Constitution.

Mika Pyyhkala and Lindsay Yazzolino claim they could not get past the H&R Block log-in page when they attempted to file their tax returns in 2012. The complaint alleges H&R Block's website excludes blind taxpayers from accessing the same online service available to other taxpayers.

Article 114 of the Massachusetts Constitution states:

Taxonomy: 
General
International policy and legislation
Web
Research & policy
News
News alert taxonomy: 
Blind/vision impaired Digital Technology & Online Media news
Research & Policy news

Top of page

Audio description on British TV

no
Show on home page

A new video produced by the UK’s Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB) celebrates some recent advances which have made TV more accessible for the blind and vision impaired, including audio description and a new generation of ‘talking TVs’.

Speaking on the video, Get the Picture – making television easier for people with a sight loss (below), audio description user James Risdon says that the service “is absolutely fantastic for someone like myself who hasn’t got enough sight to see what’s happening on screen”.

Taxonomy: 
General
Television
International policy and legislation
Audio description
Research & policy
News
News alert taxonomy: 
Blind/vision impaired TV, DVD, Cinema & the Arts news
Research & Policy news

Top of page

Pages

Subscribe to RSS - International policy and legislation