Cal-Berkeley Forced by Justice Department to Remove Lectures from YouTube

[LTC8K6]

:. .: ;.; :: . .:

I can't feel that on my monitor screen.

I am writing up the complaint now.

 

[Minoosh]

In Canada, all TV broadcasts must be closed captioned. CC costs about $100 per half hour.

Do you know have any idea how a person might get into that line of work?

I have captioning on lots of times, especially with stuff made in Australia or the UK. Otherwise I would miss a lot of dialog.

 

[zooterkin]

Well, that's pretty stupid.

Uh-oh!

 

[Minoosh]

Do you know have any idea how a person might get into that line of work?

Turns out you need mad stenography skills which can largely be self-taught. You need to spit out 225 words a minute on a stenotype machine which then feeds into a computer to be translated back into English.

 

[a_unique_person]

Well, that's pretty stupid.

Would it be that hard to add subtitles? It's a very common process that is being applied every day to other video content.

 

[Minoosh]

Would it be that hard to add subtitles? It's a very common process that is being applied every day to other video content.

I've just started a thread about captioning. No, it wouldn't be that hard, especially the non-real-time stuff. I tested my real-time skills based on comedian/activist Russell Brand, figuring he would be one of the hardest people to caption in real time. Hah. Hah. I quickly learned my limitations. There was captioning on YouTube but it was wildly off the mark; so that it was not only useless but actively counterproductive.

But I'd love to do piece work on non-real-time stuff and at universities it seems there would be access to cheap labor for captioning lectures, especially because lectures are usually given with consistent tone and diction. Words like "indeed" come up a lot. Academic language is not known for its spontaneity.

 

[Beerina]

Get the reason why:



I mean seriously? Just because not everybody can use the lectures and podcasts, nobody can use them? Why is this even a federal government concern?

The Justice Department's neck needs snapping by the Supreme Court quoting the First Amendment.

 

[HoverBoarder]

I've just started a thread about captioning. No, it wouldn't be that hard, especially the non-real-time stuff. I tested my real-time skills based on comedian/activist Russell Brand, figuring he would be one of the hardest people to caption in real time. Hah. Hah. I quickly learned my limitations. There was captioning on YouTube but it was wildly off the mark; so that it was not only useless but actively counterproductive.

But I'd love to do piece work on non-real-time stuff and at universities it seems there would be access to cheap labor for captioning lectures, especially because lectures are usually given with consistent tone and diction. Words like "indeed" come up a lot. Academic language is not known for its spontaneity.

Can some program like Dragon Naturally speaking or similar dictation software be used?

Even if more development is needed, it seems like some government department could develop and provide that for free for a fraction of what ADA lawsuits cost litigating the issue.

 

[Meadmaker]

So a few disability rights advocacy groups filed a complaint. In 2015 there was a settlement with edX to make sure the contact of the online courses would be accessible to people with disabilities.

I wonder if this explains the decline in content I've observed on edX. I have been using edX since 2013, and the best courses were the ones that shadowed regular university classes. In 2016 it seemed that the nature of the courses changed. I assumed it was just a response to the market. There was frustration by providers that the completion rate was so incredibly small, and that so few people opted in with the nominal (usually 50 dollar) fee. (For those not familiar, you could usually either take the course for free, or pay 50 bucks for a "verified certificate". I often threw in the fifty bucks more as a "thank you" than as a means of getting a credential.)

Things are a bit different now. There are "micro masters" which are much more expensive, but at least have the potential in some cases to be converted to real credit hours. I don't see nearly as many instances where a professor just tapes his lectures and lets people just play along with the home version of the class. I wonder if it is because doing so used to be much easier, but with ADA compliance a requirement is no longer worth the effort.

 

[Meadmaker]

Uh-oh!

If this be ableism, then let's make the most of it! It's stupid!

 

[blutoski]

Do you know have any idea how a person might get into that line of work?

I have captioning on lots of times, especially with stuff made in Australia or the UK. Otherwise I would miss a lot of dialog.

Some of it's volunteer.

When I was a student, it's one of the community volunteering activities I did.
Most of my hours were reading science textbooks into audiobook for the sight impaired.

$100/30mins sounds like somebody's getting gouged... or exaggerating costs.

When I calculated my research grants, a portion of my budget was for translations and paper copy printing. If I wanted to pocket some extra dough, I could have padded my estimate. I have a feeling the $100/30min estimate comes from this sort of exaggeration.

Remember back in the 1980s when Bell was hacked and they estimated that a stolen file cost them $25 million even though it was just a copy of a regulatory document that's public and available in any library?

 

[Minoosh]

Can some program like Dragon Naturally speaking or similar dictation software be used?

Yes, which isn't good news for humans who want to go into the field. There are circumstances when a stenographer is preferable, but there are voice recognition programs that can learn different accents, so that if a Glaswegian gave a lecture the software would eventually catch on. My only experience is with Siri, which is pretty useless.

Even if more development is needed, it seems like some government department could develop and provide that for free for a fraction of what ADA lawsuits cost litigating the issue.

This is all some passive-aggressive BS which is very common among bureaucrats. Say a school gets a federal mandate to provide captioning, but the university has no funding. They keep lobbing the problem back to each other (your move!) and it becomes a perpetual motion machine. Much like the litigation process itself.

I'd love to caption lectures. I'd probably do it for $12 an hour.

 

[Minoosh]

Remember back in the 1980s when Bell was hacked and they estimated that a stolen file cost them $25 million even though it was just a copy of a regulatory document that's public and available in any library?

The late '80s were a blur to me. Did they get away with it? Were they trying to get a rate increase to pay for it?

I assume you're talking about the phone company not the helicopter people.

 

[blutoski]

The late '80s were a blur to me. Did they get away with it? Were they trying to get a rate increase to pay for it?

I assume you're talking about the phone company not the helicopter people.

Phone company, and the motive for exaggerating was that they wanted the hacker to go to jail for a thousand consecutive lifetimes, as a deterrent. (because punitive public fear was less expensive than actually upgrading their security)

This would have been a couple of years after War Games, and phreaking was really becoming a problem.

It's one of a series of examples in Bruce Sterling's nonfiction history, The Hacker Crackdown^WP.



I'm also reminded of a movie where police seize a coke stash and throughout the film, the 'estimated street value' climbed by an order of magnitude every time the police are interviewed.