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ADA May Force Netflix To Provide Closed Captioning On Content
Shivetya writes "Last year Netflix was sued by the National Association for the Deaf for failing to provide closed captioned text through its on-demand streaming service. Now, a judge has denied Netflix's attempt to have the suit thrown out, saying that the Americans with Disabilities Act prohibits discrimination in any venue — not just physical structures. The easiest means to comply would be to remove all videos which do not have a closed captioning component, the other route would require Netflix to pay to have this done to any video it wants to provide. The implications to other providers is immense as well. The plaintiffs will still need to prove that Netflix is legally obligated to provide closed-captioning, but the ruling is still significant for recognizing that Internet sites may fall under the purview of the Americans with Disabilities Act."
On one hand this sucks. The amount of revenue you bring in by making your content accessible is not going to pay the cost of doing so. Same can be said with making websites accessible to the blind (and really probably most brick n’ mortar establishments.. especially if retrofit).
On the other hand that’s part of living in a civilized society. Most of us could easily by freak accident be in a position where we’d want these services... and doing non-profitable stuff like this just becomes another cost of business.
The implications on other content and especially user supplied content where no/very little revenue is being generated are of course the most scary. Where do you (or do you) draw the line between content that is “real” enough to require closed captioning (commercial productions, movies, etc..), and content that doesn’t (videos taken on cell phones, etc..).
The obvious answer would be monetization. If the video author isn’t getting money, the requirement goes away. But trying to turn that into a concrete policy becomes very mucky, as sites like youtube are profiting from it either directly from ad revenue, or indirectly through increased traffic/draw to their site.
Quite seriously, is that normal in the US that every program needs to have CC or are TV networks trying to push the competition out of business? Just asking...
Another question, does it say anything about the quality of the CC? I mean, how expensive could it be to have some Chinese or NKor people create yet another Backstroke of the West style CC?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Used to have a deaf roommate who was big into "deaf culture" (and was very annoying about it). We're talking Malcolm X militant about it. He wasn't alone either. There are a lot of people into deaf rights who think it should be illegal to air or play anything non-CC'ed. And they *will* sue.
Great for them, not so great for the rest of us who get cut off from all non-CC'ed content. And getting something CC'ed is pretty expensive--prohibitively so for a lot of indies.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Why can't the law just require buildings to have handicapped ramps if they "can"?
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
Would this include YouTube?
Netflix will need to mail a Braille transcript.
What if Netflix doesn't consider the deaf to be its target audience and specifically indicates this fact? Why can a private service which requires people to pay before viewing content be forced to accommodate people who may not be their target market?
By this same token, a duochrome-colorblind person can petition for color-adjusted films. A blind person can request a specific voice feed that describes the actions of the characters in a film, and so forth. Why not just let some other service create closed captions for deaf viewers to subscribe to?
Viable Slashdot alternatives: https://pipedot.org/ and http://soylentnews.org/
Probably because they wouldn't do it at all.
Like everything else, we can't seem to find a happy medium. Making something (anything) accessible is almost always a financial loss. You spend thousands of dollars adding ramps, special bathrooms, etc and might gain 4 new customers.. you add CC to a video and again, you probably won't draw enough extra traffic to pay the cost of doing so.
We have decided as a society that simply having no accessibility is unacceptable. So we have to bite the bullet and call it a cost of business. Unfortunately as usual, we went to far.. and now as you said, we end up putting unreasonable burdens on people for very little benifit.
if this is about discrimination in any venue, then there are millions of porn sites and otherwise that are not ADA compliant.
insensitive clod overlords obligatory xkcd car analogy russian reversals whoosh pedant fanbois ftfy in 3...2...1..PROFIT
Most of the videos on Netflix are movies or TV shows. Every movie I've seen since DVDs came out have subtitling on them, it should just be a matter of including that information in the streamed video (assuming Flash allows for displaying subtitles). Most TV shows are close-captioned already, again it should be just a matter of including the close-captioning information in the stream. There should only be a minority of content that isn't already ADA-compliant.
There are a lot of people who would participate in typing up the CC track for movies, especially if it was allowed to be copied around for noncommercial use. Unfortunately, I seriously doubt that the MPAA would allow it, for the same reason they don't want you to rip your own DVD for backup purposes -- their policies are directed by lawyers whose priorities rarely overlap with what's good for consumers. If they could sue the IMDB project, they probably would.
As a deaf American, I am happy this is happening. It makes Netflix useful, and I'd like to see it expand to all online video. What excuse do CNN or Fox news online have NOT to captioning the video on their websites? Not a single one.
As an American businessman, I can understand what a collosal pain in the ass it is for business... but it's not the fault of ME or any other deaf person that Netflix chose to ignore us.
Would you use Netflix if all the movies and shows had no sound? Course not. There's no excuse not to have closed captioning, not from a technical stand point at least. Almost all original video has captioning enclosed nowadays. ALL broadcasts in the US are required to have closed captioning. Claiming they don't have access to the captioning is horse feces.
The bigger issue is the LICENSING costs, I believe. Captioning is often treated as a separate performance from the primary material. This, I believe, its also horse feces. Is the sound a separate performance from the video? No, it goes together to produce the performance.
I'd also like to see it expanded to the movie theaters, where a deaf person is often treated like a fool for asking if a movie has captioning... and having to seek out 2nd or 3rd run options, when there is plentiful technology to present this without issues (Rear Window, specifically) with other movie goers.
Again, I understand this costs money, but... if you did it in the first place, it wouldn't be an issue, would it? Or should be all be watching silent movies still?
Do you give them a reward for providing sound so people who can hear have no issues watching the movie? You know, they give out refunds if the movie plays without sound... Do I ever get a refund if the RW or Open Captioning advertised doesn't play? No.
Awesome. So does this mean that section 508 has to be extended to non-governmental entities, too? (Btw, /., you're in violation; I see at least two non-text elements without text equivalents while I'm typing on this page.)
Those who fail to understand communication protocols, are doomed to repeat them over port 80.
Because then every business would argue that it can't install ramps. And usually the argument would boil down to it being possible, it'd just cost money and the business doesn't want to spend money.
Society, OTOH, has decided that it's not in it's best interests for a significant number of it's members to not be able to do the basic things everyone else can, like get into a store and shop for goods or go to the theater and watch a movie. Just like it decided it wasn't in it's best interests for a significant number of it's members to be relegated to the back of the bus and to second-rate schools just because of the color of their skin. Businesses don't like it now, just like they didn't like it then, but society doesn't make it's decisions based on what's best for businesses (just like businesses don't make their decisions based on what's best for society, apparently). I've a little sympathy for them, but since in large part they've demonstrated that nothing short of application of a blunt instrument will get them to behave my general attitude's become "If they don't like the terms society wants, they're free to pack their businesses up and go elsewhere.".
"As of January 1, 2008, 75 percent of “pre-rule” English language programming, defined as analog programming first shown before January 1, 1998, and digital programming first shown before July 1, 2002, must be captioned, with some exceptions."
citation:http://transition.fcc.gov/cgb/consumerfacts/closedcaption.pdf
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
If NetFlix is required, then are theaters? What about YouTube? More importantly what about online porn?
I'm so confused...
Netflix cannot comply with the ADA in this case, because doing so would create a derivative work of the original, without the permission of the copyright holder.
Simple as that.
Now, whether or not Netflix still has to comply... Well, perhaps we can twist this to our own gain - Does the obligation to make their content "accessible" trump copyright? If so, you can bet your left nut I'll have a business model the very next day designed to exploit that fact.
Your turn, courts - Punish us all to protect the weak, or give up your paternalistic attitude toward Big Media.
That's a false analogy. It costs businesses nothing to serve people of color. If anything, it brings in more profits.
It costs businesses money to install ramps and other handicap accessibility features. I'm not saying people shouldn't have a heart and invest in making their buildings accessible - I'm simply trying to show you that your analogy is false.
More silliness caused by a right to free speech. I can create a film or other work, without complying with ADA.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
closed captioning didn't become "all tv's" and all programming until 1990
Cite:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Closed_captioning#Legislative_development_in_the_U.S.
Netflix has 3035 videos from 1914 to 1989
and 10,937 from 1990 to 2012
pre 1998 videos total 4,440
cite:instantwatchdb.com
"As of January 1, 2008, 75 percent of “pre-rule” English language programming, defined as analog programming first shown before January 1, 1998, and digital programming first shown before July 1, 2002, must be captioned, with some exceptions."
citation:http://transition.fcc.gov/cgb/consumerfacts/closedcaption.pdf
which means they have to provide CC on 75% of 4440 videos, or drop them...
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
what about all the youtube videos?
in order to make a decision the judge would have to hold a hearing!
I used to be involved with ADA, and I believe the lawsuit will eventually fail. There are two components to ADA that they might go after, Telecommunications or Public Accommodation. However, The language of the law is pretty specific, and there's no way Netflix will fall under either of these categories. As many have already pointed out, Netflix losing would be a catastrophically slippery slope, and no court would initiate that without clear intent from Congress. Just because a case isn't summarily dismissed doesn't mean it will win, it simply means the judge believes it's worth hearing.
some subtitles already exist
Those closed captions already exist and they also should have the rights for them.
False. Not everything includes closed captions. And often the rights are not bundled with the video content. This is especially true when CC is provided by a third party for TV broadcast of a movie, but not retroactively applied to the original film.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
This is just a preliminary ruling. Netflix tried to have the suit dismissed, that didn't work, and now it gets tried on the merits.
At some point, the ADA runs into the First Amendment, which prohibits "forced speech". (Broadcast TV is a special case, because it involves publicly owned RF spectrum.) Book publishers aren't required to produce audio or Braille editions, or translations to another language.
In general I agree with the "If they don't like the terms society wants, they're free to pack their businesses up and go elsewhere." sentiment.
Your analogy is a bit off though. Cost of taking down the "whites only" sign is negliable. Making a building accessible costs a small fortune and usually won't generate substantial revenue.
Taking down that sign might actually increase your profits.. making your building accessible will probably eat into them. Regardless, society has decided that this is just a cost of doing business. It sucks, but so would being blind in a society that had coldly decided you wern't worth the money.
Does not mean total access.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
This is an absurd argument. Netflix is providing something to be consumed for a fee. They throw it out there and say, here's our food. This is what we are serving and here is the price. So, let's say I have a gluten allergy. I can't walk in to the local bakery and scream that they are obligated to provide me with gluten free bread? I am not entitled to any of the products or services of the bakery. I can either buy it or not. Same with Netflix. I have sympathy for the deaf, but private business does not have to change to accommodate their disadvantage.
Oh, yeah! Wise guy, huh? Woob woob woob woob! Nyuk! Nyuk!
How is preventing Netflix from distributing expressive works unless they first add captions not a violation of the First Amendment to the US Constitution?
I'd rather see the government legalize distribution of community-sourced captions along with the tools needed to circumvent any technical measures that would prevent their application. This would serve the law's purpose of empowering those who suffer from disabilities while guaranteeing the constitutional freedoms of those who would rather not be forced to speak as well as those who wish to speak for the sake of those who can't hear.
"In prison you just have to shut your eyes and take it. Here you have to shut your eyes and give it."
I put CC on every movie I watch with the kids. They are loud and it's nice not missing the dialog. Also there are many Movies that have their sound so skewed that I can't hear the dialog without turning the volume up load enough to shake the house during the loud scenes.
I love Jesus, except for his foreign policy.
whoosh....
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harrison_Bergeron
We have decided as a society that simply having no accessibility is unacceptable.
As a society, we can always decide differently. It's not like there aren't choices for disabled people without legal mandates, just less of them.
>but the ruling is still significant for recognizing that Internet sites may fall under the purview of the Americans with Disabilities Act."
Web designers have ignored the sight impaired for far too long and had it far too easy. They have ignored standards, done stupid shit as use pictures for blocks of text, flash-only (like the IOC did once) and engaged in "get the hell out, you peon with a screen-reader" nonsense ever since the term "rich content" slipped out of someone's lips 15+ years ago.
Every web designer should spend a week using the Internet blindfolded, using only JAWS.
"But who cares about the blind?"
There but for the grace of the Universe go you.
--
BMO
Basically they are requiring them to fansub everything on there site, which is illegal in the us isnt it ? These wouldnt and couldnt be official subtitles, and netflix doesnt have the rights to the media just distribution rights so they cant legally fansub material can they ?
http://interserver.net/
Why do they deserve it? Lets assume for a second that netflix gets it's content from content providers. Some of it comes with close captioning, some not. It's a limitation they have no control over. The service costs next to nothing per month. Are the rest of us going to have to pay extra so the good people at netfix can afford to insert extra content (close captioning) for disabled people to watch those movies?
Well, about how much extra are we talking about? Will it drive you in the bankruptcy? Will you need to cut your food allowance significantly? Or is it a petty amount? Until some can estimate, the "sky is falling over CC on NetFlix" may as well be just a matter of "teabag-ims to extreme".
Lets say I owned a house and then decided to move and had a garage sale. The house has stairs up to the yard and not a wheelchair ramp. Should I be sued because someone in a wheelchair wanted at my yardsale even tho I didnt have the easy means to include them?
Is selling your house for the sake of having a "garage sale" your everyday business (or can one look on it as "one-off"... or as a "hobby", at most)?
Im all for anti-descrimination, but at what point does this become un-deserved entitlement?
Yeah... you are stepping on a slippery-slope here: the moment you start caring about the "goat in the neighbors' yard and how much your neighbor deserves it"... What's next? Assessing by yourself that it is undeserved thus go and kill it?
Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
Larry Goldberg from NCAM says that it typically costs $400-$800 to caption a movie from scratch. If you add to that the fact that most Hollywood movies are already captioned by their content owners, it becomes the proverbial drop in the bucket.
ATMs are mostly Windows PCs under the hood, so they should have been able to add one by handing just about any random person a drill and a panel-mount audio jack pre-wired to an 1/8" mini plug on the other end.... Maybe with a Y cable for the internal speaker. Sounds to me more like your Credit Union was looking for an excuse to upgrade their crappy, old ATMs. :-)
Just saying.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
Are you telling me that disabled people don't spend money? The analogy may be off - but it's not entirely false.
This is an absurd argument. Netflix is providing something to be consumed for a fee. They throw it out there and say, here's our food. This is what we are serving and here is the price. So, let's say I have a gluten allergy. I can't walk in to the local bakery and scream that they are obligated to provide me with gluten free bread? I am not entitled to any of the products or services of the bakery. I can either buy it or not. Same with Netflix. I have sympathy for the deaf, but private business does not have to change to accommodate their disadvantage.
Sorry, but the law as explicitly provided by the US Congress disagrees, and your analogy is inapt, as the ADA does provide for the accommodation to have to be reasonable. Making you produce an entirely different variety of bread? That would be a bit much.
Being able to ask you not to put something on the bread? That'd be more on the reasonable side.
But more likely, what they'd ask you to do is be able to tell a blind person what's on the menu and the prices.
You, as a business, by engaging in Commerce with the Public subject yourself to the laws that are in place, which includes preventing discrimination.
Don't like it?
Convince us to change the laws, don't give a pointless story about how you don't think they should be able to do that, because that can be matched by me saying...I disagree with your principles.
I would get more into it, but it gets complicated from there, and it's a long argument that ultimately doesn't lead to much persuasion.
As a person with Celiac Disease, which by the way is not an allergy, but an auto immune reation to gluten in the villi in the small intesting, I certainly do not wish ill will or accomodation from any place that is not gluten free friendly, I just don't give them my business.
If I was deaf, I'd find the quality of television CC to be unacceptable (constant transmission glitches and horrible delays). So then you're left with DVDs with CC and that's it. Who wants to constantly buy DVDs? That's sort of why Netflix was invented. They could easily corner the market on convenient media for the deaf and hearing impaired as well as select English Second Language people who find reading easier than realtime audio conversion. I know my crappy Spanish can only process text in realtime, not audio so it probably goes both ways. There's a lot of money to be made and closed captioning costs, when they have the volume to hire someone to do it in-house, would be way less than 1% of what they pay for most licensing for most movies. It's just stupid but clearly the entire company has proven it has ODD (oppositional defiance disorder) when it comes to their customers. They're dedicated to ruining their own image in any way possible even if it costs them potential income.
Well, we have folks say that this is entirely reasonable, and if Neflix makes enough profit they should be forced to do it.
We have folks say that Netflix is not the content creator and has no obligation whatsoever, as a distributor, to alter the items it is distributing.
Now, we have had someone say that adding subtitles is a $5-$9 dollar a minute thing.
We had someone else say that the total catalogue was around 4400 items that are not CC'd.
We had others say that everything distributed since "X" is already CC'd.
At (being generous) 150 minutes a film, that comes to... $3.3M on the low and ~$6M on the high.
Now, are they also to provide CC translations in any other language than English?
If so, which?
What I have not heard is that it is probably the obligation of the distributors to go fix their own Items, since they are the ones actually disaccomodating the deaf.
Of course, that would not go over too well. They would probably just pull the titles instead of incur the ~$6M cost.
Why aren't they suing the content providers?
If someone could answer this, I would really appreciate it!
Yeah, great argument:
OP: "This law is wrong"
You: "Nah-uh. It's the law, therefore it's right"
Sounds like you, with your worship of the status quo, are more likely to support Jim Crow laws. After all, it's the law!
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
Speaking as someone who was married to a deaf person: fuck them and their entitlement attitude. Seriously, the deaf are hands down the worst of all of the disabled when it comes to expecting others to bend over backwards to placate them. Fortunately, the ex wasn't too bad (until after the divorce) but I got to witness it. It is particularly egregious when one considers that many cases of deafness can be cured with cochlear implants. But nooooo, this would destroy 'deaf culture'. Genocide.
Keep the lot of them. Burn Gallaudet while you're at it.
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
The trouble is even if you win going to court is both expensive and a massive waste of time.
So people don't just comply with their understanding of the regulations, they put a large safety margin between themselves and any chance of being seen not to comply with the regulations.
For example the site you linked talked about "When a primary function area is altered, the path of travel to the altered area and the amenities serving the altered area must be made accessible, unless the costs for these changes are disproportionate. The costs for the added alterations are considered disproportionate if they exceed 20 percent of the cost of the overall alteration.", it also says that "There is no inspection process for the ADA. The building owner as well as those responsible for design and construction are responsible for complying with the ADA."
I'm not an american but there sounds to me like there is a lot of room for interpretation in there, who gets to decide what make the call as to what an alteration would have cost and as-such whether that cost was dispropotionate? will they have to defend that descision in a court of law?
note: i'm known as plugwash most places but i screwd up registering that here somehow in the past and now can't register
TV should already have closed captions, and it should be a minor technical hurdle for Netflix to provide it.
If they show US television shows and films shown in US cinemas then shouldn't ALL their content already have subtitles for the deaf? If not then why does Netflix have to provide this when cinemas and TV companies do not?
we end up putting unreasonable burdens on people for very little benifit.
I'd love to see what you have to say about Closed Captioning after you find out that all that loud music you've been listening to has ruined your hearing to the point that even with hearing aids you're still having trouble understanding your favorite TV shows unless the captions are turned on. That's exactly my situation, except for the reason: not loud music but too much outbound shore bombardment back in '72.
Good, inexpensive web hosting
Right, and I think it's perfectly reasonable to expect companies who are making significant profits from media to be required to pay out the money and make their content more accessible.
Unreasonable is requiring CC on every quick cellphone video on youtube (imo).
That's nice, but I should point out that your "petty amount" is my "I'm dropping Netflix". Economy sucks, my friend.
Incorrect. The reason many businesses didn't want to serve people of colour was that it cost them more profitable white clientele to do so.
All they have to do is prove that the cost of making the accommodation is unreasonably excessive, or fiscally irresponsible to their business, and the ADA won't require they do that.
However, maybe Netflix's selection of streaming content is not massive enough, that it would hurt their business, in that case the ADA would be working as designed, and shame on Netflix, for taking steps to make reasonable accomadations for members of the public who are disabled.
You get to make that argument after you sever your spine. Not before.
Just pass everything through voice recognition (even shitty M$ one) and all of a sudden you comply. This is how YT is doing it.
Who logs in to gdm? Not I, said the duck.
More silliness caused by a right to free speech. I can create a film or other work, without complying with ADA.
So? As long as distributing/publishing it is not your core business, I think you should be fine.
Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
That's nice, but I should point out that your "petty amount" is my "I'm dropping Netflix". Economy sucks, my friend.
Your choice... should netflix keep you as a customer instead of making the movie available to deaf people? (economy sucks both ways).
Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
do not require the distributor to pay to have all this stuff captioned!
they already paid for the right to distribute it, and paid for each audio track they plan to offer, and will pay for any subtitle tracks that have been made.
if the licensor hasn't bothered to make a CC track, make THEM fucking pay for it!
the film production process is just a complex way of ignoring important things and passing the problem down the line. in my case, DVD is the end of the line, but in Netflix's case it's them. they have to fix everything that should have been fixed before it came in the door, because the filmmakers have blown their own budgets and wont meet their obligations.
how about, if a film is to be rated by the MPAA (i understand classification is voluntary in the USA), it should come with a closed caption track. if the filmmakers don't want to do that, they can suffer the losses from releasing an unrated film on less screens.
requiring the distributor to create their own media is like asking ebay to make their own products. it can be done, but doesn't really make a lot of sense.
No, society did not decide anything.
Several high paid lobbyists in Washington greased the palms of the right politicians who then decided we would do these things.
You need to learn how the real world works.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
netflix don't make the movies. they buy the rights and distribute them. this costs less.
making a subtitle track is pricey. look up "captioning services" and get a quote... it's a few days' work for 1 person who you need to pay.
unless it's goddamned anime, in which case some basement dweller has already done it for free :)
not enough to offset the cost of providing the access you dolt. the poster spoke of renovations to existing structures, not new buildings.
The cost of taking down the "whites only" sign in many communities was loss of business from the racists in the community along with the possibility of the premises being vandalized. Taking down the sign (or not having one in the first place) was certainly the moral thing to do, but don't imagine that it was inexpensive, easy or safe in all cases. Overturning institutionalized racism is not an easy thing. Having laws in place forcing store owners to take the sign down levelled the playing field.
So if this atrocity somehow survives through SCOTUS will this mean authors who self publish are now required to provide braille copies or else be sued too? Will I have to spend thousands of dollars to sell one or two copies of my book to a blind person? Are you fucking kidding me? ADA has morphed from 'we should try where we can to do what is reasonably possible to help the handicapped' to 'gimme gimme gimme or else!'
Disgusting.
My post was poorly worded. I was specifically referring to legally mandated requirements.
It's hard to draw parallels between race discrimination and <politically correct term> discrimination. One is active (specifically preventing a group from doing business with you) and one is passive (preventing a group from doing business with you due to inaction).
In the case of race discrimination, it was driven by hatred (or as you pointed out, playing the part..) .. in the case of <politically correct term> discrimination, I don't think anyone really has anything against <politically correct term> people .. they don't want to take the required active steps to allow them to do business for financial reasons. I've always had a problem with this being called "discrimination". To me discrimination is active.. not passive.
This may bring us closer to the choice of subbed or dubbed. :)
Get off my launchpad!
Bullshit. By your logic, people with disabilities could demand anything they want by virtue of being disabled. That's not how a free society works.
You, as a business, by engaging in Commerce with the Public subject yourself to the laws that are in place, which includes preventing discrimination.
Nope. My comment was an accurate representation of at least part of your position.
I just didn't feel a need to expound on why.
Which makes your post quite useless on a discussion forum. You should have just posted "No it's not, I said so" and saved us all some bandwidth.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
They can crowd source it. Let volunteers add captions to old movies. There is a site called viki.com where volunteers subtitle and translate Korean television. Netflix could buy the tech and provide CC and subtitles in 22 languages for free.
Majority of content on Netflix is old stuff that was released prior to the caption requirement. They would have to find captions for 75% of those older shows. Many of these captions exist but are not owned by people who licensed the show to Netflix. Broadcaster B captioned content that they licenced from publisher A. Publisher sold rights to content to Netflix. Netflix now needs to create captions or buy them from Broadcaster B. Broadcaster B hates Netflix and won't sell at reasonable rates.
Line 21 captions contain 2 characters per vertical blanking interval. That is plenty to maintain real-time text for the fastest speaker, even considering the overhead for positioning, attributes, and control characters.
The captioning (or at least subtitling) exists for most content already, as almost every other form of media supports it (whether physical or broadcast). Moreover, it would seem that it would make good business sense to willingly provide captioning, as they won't be doing it themselves (and shouldn't have to - in fact, as a content provider, I wouldn't want them to caption it, I would want to provide them with the captioning). If they provide captioning to customers, then they will likely gain revenue via subscriptions within the Deaf community from people who otherwise would not be able to properly enjoy the content.
The onus should be on the content providers to create and distribute the captioning. The only requirement on the part of the distributors should be to pass through captioning when it is provided with the media.
FC Closer
movies are an "art" form that has two components - sound and video. If you're blind or deaf, you're missing part of it - that's not netflix's fault. Supermarkets don't have as a requisite part of the experience audio or video. Supermarkets are also a necessity. It's a silly analogy. Besides, to add captioning, netflix would be altering the video...which they don't have the license to do. Why would the content providers not be the responsible parties for captioning, versus the distributor? Would you sue a record store for not making captioned versions of every LP? Would that make sense at all? Or sue the Louvre for not providing a braile version of the Mona Lisa? How is suing netflix in this case any different?
First Amendment likely trumps the ADA for videos the public places on Youtube. Requiring CC on Youtube would prevent speech. Commercial works from broadcasters likely would not be protected.
Nope, it was a total misrepresentation of what I said, and your quoting one line out of context shows it again.
Repeating something doesn't make it true, neither does calling me names constitute a cogent argument, even if it takes you four paragraphs to do so. Your "terse" posts are nothing more than paragraph after paragraph giving reasons why you decided you didn't actually need to make an argument. Despite you not providing an argument, those arguing against you are wrong anyway, you're just not giving any reason why in the name of brevity. Also, any criticism of your non-existent points is wrong, because your points were "taken out out of context".
In other words, a whole lot of fluff and no substance.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
If netflix loses, so do disabled people. Because netflix will simply remove the videos that dont have CC. Then nobody will see those movies. At least prviously disabled people could use transcribing software.
Well look at viki.com
This is a site that is crowd sourcing its subtitles. Basically it is organized licensed fansubs. It doesn't cost them $5-$9 a minute to do this because it is all volunteer. There are people who love old TV. Many of them would go in and CC shows if given a pat on the back and a community. Anime has been fansubbed at no cost for years.
I keep hearing this argument over and over, but ramps and 'special' bathrooms make life easier for a lot of other customers. Kids for one things. Those special bathrooms give you plenty of room to change diapers. Ramps come in handy for parents with strollers. Not to mention that someone in a wheelchair probably has friends and family that would like to come with them.
It really is an absurd argument. If you only gain 4 customers than you probably didn't have many customers to begin with.
---------- Open Source is capitalism applied to IP.
Instead of suing, why not crowdsource people to begin the task of transcribing the movies and just give it to Netflix? That way, you can even do it on a per-demand basis so that the most popular movies are transcribed first. It's a bummer that so many of these movies don't have CC already, but that's the way it is, and it doesn't seem productive to get belligerent about it. Just get some people together and fix the problem instead of crying to the man, resulting possibly in the removal of movies to the detriment of everyone.
I'd be willing to do a movie a week, for free. Why not, I watch movies anyway.
Which is why businesses were stumbling over themselves to make their establishments accessible prior to being forced to by law?
4 is probably serious hyperbole, but the sentiment I think is correct. It's nice to think that these things pay for themselves and that businesses would be motivated to willingly make their establishments accessible as it represents an increase in profit, but this was tried (see: before ADA, countries without ADA like laws) and the free market coldly and pretty much unilaterally said "nope, not worth it".
Not even a drop in a bucket. In order to translate the film into other languages they need to CC it first. Those translations result in billions of dollars in sales.
Why should Amazon, Hulu and Netflix, etc, pay the same costs over and over to do this? Likely all those companies will team up to get it done one way or another and ultimately the cost will go to the consumers. It's likely the more niche movies and shows that will suffer from this since they have a smaller audience and may not have the budget to justify CC. The studios don't care because they're already CCing the blockbusters and if that's all Netflix can provide then that works out better for them.
However, this sort of thing really does benefit everyone. There are a lot of reasons that even people with good hearing benefit from closed captions. TV speakers might suck, actors might have thick accents or mumble, maybe you need to keep the volume down so other people can sleep.
It's also not terribly expensive. A quick search on Google shows it's around $35 a minute which works out to about $3000 for a 90 minute film. And there are plenty of companies that do it for varying costs to well under $10 a minute. So really, this is a non-issue. If your movie didn't make enough to be able to afford even basic closed captioning it probably isn't streaming anywhere.
Work Safe Porn
GET SOME DAMN EARS. We have the technology. You know why I'm not providing a spoken audio recording with this message for the blind? Because we have the technology to turn text into speech. It's really unfortunate when disabled people have problems due to their disability, but hindering the herd needlessly is just retarding.
Let's be grown ups about this. Shite doth occur. Not everyone can live the same lives. Life isn't always fair, nor can anyone force it to be at all times. Compromise is key. Rationality is an important thing.
Now, I can see where local TV could have an impact on disabled people's lives because they provide local news and weather and if none provided CC, then who else would provide that content... but Netflix? Seriously? That's a luxury item. Many folks are disabled with poverty, and can't even afford Netflix. Hey, ADA, Why don't you force them to give them Netflix for free? Hey, my MS Windows is disabled! It kept getting viruses until it died, the install CD was scratched, so now I have to use Linux... Waaaaah! I can't use Netflix on Linux! I'm being discriminated against because of my proprietary software disability! ADA, make them give me a Netflix that runs on Linux! (No, instead I write them emails and sign petitions, letting them know there is a problem.)
I can see wheelchair ramps at grocery stores and side walks, but what about jungle gyms? Should there be a wheelchair ramp or elevator for disabled kids who can't walk so they can get to the top? What about folks with seizures? Oh, screw them, eh? My local nightly news is constantly showing scenes with police and ambulance lights flashing. Shouldn't they be forced not to show that? Wait, let's go to the source, shouldn't we just get rid of all flashing lights on police and emergency vehicles to make it easier for disabled folks with photosensitive seizures to live normal lives? What about kick-ball or badminton? Shouldn't we outlaw sports in schools that aren't accessible to quadriplegics?
I make videogames. Should I have to limit my game designs to ensure mentally retarded people can still win, and make the controls simple enough that it can be played by blowing through a straw? Shouldn't my games have to come with a sentient robot that can speak out loud what's going on in the game, for the blind? That, or should all videogames be text only?
We have to ask ourselves: What's Reasonable To Do? What's an acceptable effort level to assist the disabled? Not even trying to provide for the disabled is one thing. Sometimes people are just ignorant that a small change or addition could help out the disabled. We don't all think about every disability in everything we do, certainly not in indie games. Human society is a collective hive of minds, so fire off some signals if attention is needed! Open up discourse before getting lawyers involved -- Seriously, lawyers screw everything up forever and always. The money I'd spend on getting the accessibility features installed in my products would be wasted as legal fees. So, the end result when legal action is involved would be: No product for anyone. That's harmful to society. People who harm society deserve to be excluded from it (See also: jails). Yes, unreasonable and absurd actions beget unreasonable and absurd reactions.
Being unreasonable and removing content or a service that isn't as accessible as desired makes folks without disabilities have crappier lives for what purpose? To make it harder for the rest of society to be sympathetic to the cause? I'm really seeing zero benefit for anyone here.
Sure Netflix should get the ball rolling and get CC in their works. Some works have CC already, so they have the technology to improve the accessibility. Suing them over the lack of the feature? That's just fucking asinine: it makes everything worse for everyone; The lawyers get paid from the pool that gets you better services faster.
The description of a surgical operation with terms like "drilling into the skull to place a piece of hardware in the head" certainly places you in a certain category of people that are not worth listening to. I wouldn't want to hear you describe heart surgery next.
Secondly, I call bullshit on your damage claims. Infants have an amazing ability to recover and regrow stuff that adults lack.
Finally, I've never heard anyone suggest that learning sign language interferes with learning speech. In fact, some parents actually teach their children sign language very early so they can communicate before the children are able to speak.
Fine from an "I'm not likely to be targeted" standpoint. Legally, at least according to TFA, anything produced in the USA post-1996 and later sold in commerce must have CC content or is subject to FCC fines after the 2014 deadline.
So, realistically you're fine if nobody cares about your production. Get noticed by the wrong person, however, and you'll be pulling your production or paying to have it captioned.
I've never seen anyone substantiate this claim except in the case of a multi-story building designed without elevators where a remodel requires one to be installed. Those are a vanishingly small number of cases these days since all multi-story facilities come with elevators now (and the price of simple hydraulic elevators has dropped).
No one is making you retrofit anything if you are just using an existing building as-is. You only have to comply with the ADA if you are remodeling and then you can bypass restrictions if the facility is physically unable to accommodate or if it would be a financial hardship. How much does it really cost to combine two toilet stalls into one wheelchair accessible stall? A bag of quick-crete, a compass & string, and a couple hours of your time and you can pour your own wheelchair ramp for less than a hundred bucks and be 100% compliant with the latest code.
The vast majority of complaining about ADA compliance is just penny-pinchers or people who don't like doing extra design work, even if it doesn't add much to the cost or timeline... Same reason railroads didn't adopt the safer air brakes or coupling knuckles even though both saved them money (and many brake and car men their fingers/lives!) in the long run and resulted in far fewer derailments. Congress literally had to force them to adopt technologies that saved lives, paid for themselves, and ultimately saved a lot of money.
ADA won't save money so please, do tell, how exactly a combat vet with his legs blown off has any chance of enjoying a semi-normal life without things like the ADA? Don't those businesses owe him something, for protecting the society that allows them to even have a business in the first place? Or did the safety and security of the United States spring wholly from their own bootstraps in some sort of Randian fantasy land?
Natural != (nontoxic || beneficial)
For the same reason the IRS doesn't just say send in whatever you can and call it good.
The reasonable requirement woudl be to have to have every movie in the streaming cache twice, once with the regular movie, and once wiht the movie closed closed captions on if and only if the movie was released with that option. But requiring the service to cache every movie twice is kinda not reasonable from an expense point since that, by definition, doubles the required resources.
The problem is that putting in a ramp isn't tantamont to building an entire second store.
I find closed captions distracting, but I have no problem using inclined floors and ramps.
When the accomidations are mutually exclusive why should there be a requirement to do both?
Its a mess.
Plus lots of the software would have to be re-written to make the two pools selectible instead of having a ghetto for the captioned movies etc.
The whole thing is dumb once you get far enough afield.
A local park was forced to shut down some "extra bathrooms" that they crammed into a disused corner because the tiny restrooms were in a tiny corner too small to be handicapt excessible. So while it freed up the main bathroom, since it was too tiny it had to be closed. That's just dumb. Sometimes taking a good thing to a stupid extreme should not be done. That's why the word "reasonable" was put before the word "accomodation". The courts keep forgetting the "reasonable" part because the complainers are not clued in to what things really take. They just want the be in on the game.
When we are not allowed to play rugby because the legless cannot compete, our end will be final.
Innocent people shouldn't be forced to pay for inferior software development.
--"Code Complete" Microsoft Press
While I don't have a hearing problem (that I'm aware of) I have closed captioned turned on.
There is a local station I can pick up called "ThisTv" out of Seattle. Recently
they have supplied closed caption for all shows; it has to be using Speech recognition software to do this.
At first it was funny. Horror show and a woman screaming "Stay away, Stay away"
closed captioned would show "Stairway, Stairway".
This has been going on for a few months now, It's so bad as to make it useless.
The fact nothing has changed since it started. I figure I might be the only one with closed captioned turned on.
And let the consumers vote on who does good subtitles and offer corrections - all for free. and give acheivements to those who write good subtitles and get good scores - they can watch ad-free
Hard subs are broken, CC does not require the alteration of the source video just the inclusion of the CC data that can can over layered, displayed on a separate screen written out as braille etc. The issue is two fold they did not bother to trans-code the CC data from the original source and they refuse to inter-operate with external sources.
No sir I dont like it.
I get Netflix via AppleTV, TiVo, and a sony BD player on one TV in the house (I'm not counting my other viewing options or mobile.) I love captions, they make it much easier for me to understand and follow. When I watch Netflix via AppleTV, I get beautiful captions. Same content via TiVo, nada. First step, they should make sure if the CC is already there, that everybody passes it through without trouble. There must be so many people who don't know the captions are really available on the content I'm enjoying now... before I started using the AppleTV path, I had no idea the captions were there
Most of the content on Netflix was already captioned at some point in the past.
The problem is really that the captions are either not provided in a form that Netflix can accept them or they get lost when the material is transcoded. There already exists a patch for ffmpeg to maintain MPEG2 user_data and hence captions during transcode and SMPTE has released a standard for translating those captions into timed text for use with codecs that can't carry the captions natively. The cost to maintain the captions in already captioned content is near zero.
The remaining content, such as independent documentaries, would impose some additional cost but this can be pushed onto the content provider. The providers of that content are ecstatic to have an outlet like Netflix available to them and can spend a few days creating the captions themselves for the opportunity to monetize content that before could only play in a few art houses and could rarely break even before Netflix existed.
The CC rules would be very difficult on services that accept gobs of user generated content, but I would be surprised if larger players like YouTube aren't already working on a speach-to-text algorithm for that content.
"World of Warcraft" for the blind .. I can see it now. No, wait, I can't! I'M BLIND! Where's my lawyer?
Toad
Supermarkets are also a necessity.
Some people (not me, I'm not the argumentative type) would argue that 'art' forms are also a necessity for an intellectual and social animal
I work with a blind guy in my office. He tests my web sites, handles support requests, we exchange emails, etc. It is almost like he isn't even blind. He is able to have that life because of laws like these. Instead of being a burden on society he is paying taxes and making other contributions.
From what he has told me if it wasn't for organizations like the ADA suing orgs he and others would not have the things they do.
i think that the ADA should be used to start requiring sites to take a few measures to make things a bit more accessable.
1 ALL sites should be required to have a Non flash version
2 this whole thing of scrolling frames inside scrolling frames MUST DIE
3 not everybody has a huge screen (netbooks are 1024 wide but not 768 high)
4 requiring you to watch a Video to apply for a job SHOULD BE BANNED
Any person using FTFY or editing my postings agrees to a US$50.00 charge
What you suggest (a text or image overlay) may work for Silverlight streaming. But I imagine that the streaming software built into limited-purpose set-top devices is not in fact "remotely sane". Does Netflix have the ability to push a software update to all devices?
Netflix isn't discriminating. They're selling a product. Whether that product is of use to someone with a particular disability is going to decide whether or not they purchase that product.
If you're deaf, and if you know that you're not going to get captions out of something you purchase, are you going to buy it? Are they going to require that every single thing that is bought or sold in our country specifically accommodates deaf people?
By that nature, are auto manufacturers going to be required to provide cars that can be driven by the blind? Is Nike going to have to make shoes that can be worn by quadruple amputees? It's a slippery slope when you dictate what a company is or is not allowed to sell.
Without closed captions, a video is not as valuable to someone who can't hear the attached audio. At that point, a decision can be made to purchase or not purchase the product. Netflix isn't fraudulently claiming that their videos contain captions when they don't. There is no barrier that stops people with disabilities from purchasing their product. There is nothing that stops people from using their own third party software to convert speech to captions.
With that in mind, people who are hard of hearing or deaf have a choice. They can purchase the product, which is advertised as is, or they can choose not to. The ADA requires that accommodations are available for accessibility of stores - it makes no claims over whether the products said stores are selling needs to be what people with disabilities would want. Otherwise, Wal-Mart would be in violation for selling pogo sticks, because clearly, a quadraplegic would not be able to use one. Barnes and Noble would be in violation for selling books, because illiterate people who are such because of a learning disability would not be able to read them. Certainly Best Buy can't sell car stereos without requiring that they have a display that shows all of the lyrics of every song they play.
ATMs used to be mostly OS2 under the hood. It's this ADA update that is putting the final nail into OS2's coffin.
Hoist Number One and Number Six.
"all men are created equal and therefore should all have the same rights"
As usual, this quote is being completely abused; it refers to natural rights. Having closed-caption movies is not a natural right. The rights referred to are rather more fundamental than that: life and liberty being the primary two. A disabled person has a natural right to be secure in their life; they do not have a natural right to have a wheelchair ramp leading into every business in town.
Note that there may be a legal right to such a thing; this is what the ADA says. However, it is totally corked. Such laws ought to be tempered with common sense. How much relief does the law provide, as compared to the burden it creates? The ADA is not, at least not the way it is usually interpreted by the courts
Real example: A third-floor restaurant in a historic old building that only has stairs, and has no place for an elevator. The ADA forced it to close. Just who is served by that? How did disabled folks benefit?
In this case, Netflix may be required to stop distributing video content that does not have closed captions. The people who need closed captions will gain absolutely nothing. Meanwhile, the vast majority of people who do not need close captions will have lost something.
If someone is disabled, life is not the same for them as for non-disabled people. That is cold, hard reality. Reasonable accomodations can and should be made, but their disability will not be eliminated by taking things away from the non-disabled. The ADA is an albatross.
Enjoy life! This is not a dress rehearsal.
If Netflix loses this case, I'd imagine that Netflix can use the loss to put more pressure on the individual distributors to provide the HOH subtitle track that is required by law. Does anybody reading this know what kind of indemnity clause is in Netflix's contracts with the individual distributors?
So many of the political videos would be better suited as static text pages of the transcript
But I haven't found a place to post static pages on random subjects that shows a selection of newly posted pages to readers and has links to related pages. Wikipedia doesn't work because it's banned as "original research". Everything2 used to work until Wikipedia took most of its readership away, and it still doesn't support the use of graphs and the like. So instead, people make a video of it and post it to YouTube.
so you do think the Louvre should be forced to provide a Mona Lisa in braille, then? As was said, a ramp is a minimal expense - very minimal expense, actually. It's a reasonable thing to expect. It's not reasonable to expect a record store to make captioned versions of every LP they sell, however. Eating is necessary. Watching a movie is not. And as said - the audio is part of the experience. Not all art can be enjoyed by everyone, that's just how it is.
*hands over ears* LALALALALALALA
This is me not getting into an argument.
My freaking running track has handicapped spots. That is retarded
Not all disabilities make one unable to use fitness facilities. The gym I used to go to had a member who used a wheelchair to get from one upper body strength training machine to the next.
excuse me...do they think there should be a braille Mona Lisa....
you're more mature about it than I, then ;)
Netflix already supports subtitles. It's not on a lot of shows, but some do have them.
If a given device doesn't support subtitles when the Netflix stream does, then it's the device maker that should be in the hot-seat for that case.
a locally owned pet store in Los Angeles who uses UPS to send something to Vermont is NOT interstate commerce.
Even if mail order is not "commerce [...] among the several states", I imagine the constitutional right to regulate post offices and post roads would extend to other means of communication thereinafter invented, just as the army and navy powers extend to the Air Force, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard.
If a corporation can't be serious enough to accept a minor cost, its not a serious corporation, and will die and wither, even in the free marked.
But rather than the tiny subtitle text at the bottom, I want to see it in 1960-style batman captions...
By contrast sign language has shown to allow communication and build cognitive function at preverbal ages!
Good point. I wonder why elementary schools don't try to provide some exposure to ASL even to hearing kids the way they provide some exposure to Spanish.
That's peanuts compared to the cost of filming the movie, though.
It's easy to say these things are "minor" costs when you're not the one paying for them, even if you are indirectly. Many businesses eek out a living on shoestring budgets.
Of course many will fail, but many go on to succeed, and some just hum along making enough profit to stay in business. Every barrier you put in the way makes it that much harder for a business to succeed.
I don't remember seeing you complaining for years here about how each and every book ever published didn't have a Braille edition, or audiobook edition.
That's because U.S. copyright law has an explicit exception for books produced in formats for the exclusive use of blind people.
By this same token, a duochrome-colorblind person can petition for color-adjusted films.
Have you ever wondered why movies are trending toward an orange and teal color scheme? That's the scheme that happens to work best with common forms of color blindness.
Look at Dick Cheney who mistook his friend for a moose!
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
Try 55,000 instead of 100,000.
Try the fact that most movies already have been captioned by the content owners and that Netflix is not displaying those captions, rather than having to caption from scratch.
Try 1.5 billion in revenues in 2011 versus substantially less than the $40M figure.
for instance: when we have to spend 80% more on public busses so 5% people can get on them more easily... i see it as defunding the majority of citizens. of course there is value in that a lot of the time -- within reason.
but when bus lines can't be provided because they can't afford the bus for the 5% of *potential* users... who is getting served?
and when nobody can see a movie because 1% of the people can't fully enjoy it... seems wrong-headed.
False equivalence. All the ADA requires is equal access.
It demands that businesses take extra expenses and create special accommodations for a minority. There's nothing "equal" about that. In a free society, I don't need to have my spine severed to decide against that.
As it happens, providing Mona Lisa in the form of, say, an etched surface - it can't be provided in braille, since it's a painting and braille is an alphabet, assuming we don't repurpose AAlib or something - would likely be far cheaper than building a ramp.
Don't most records come with printed lyrics? So record stores seem to consider it reasonable.
Partaking in culture is necessary. It doesn't necessarily need to come in the form of movies, but it does need to come in some form.
But audio is not all of the experience, so this is irrelevant. And besides, since DVDs and Blurays already include captioning, Netflix not doing so would require them to deliberately remove it, which crosses the boundary from lazy apathy into active malice.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
Movies without caption are useless for foreign language speakers, parents, parties, people who talk on the phone while watching TV. They most probably were already close captioned on DVD, so no need to pay for new original work.
What really pisses me off is that Netflix doesn't provide close captioning on any integrated apps on TVs and Blu Ray players. So I have to drag Apple TV - the one device where they decided to get it right - from room to room any time I want to watch a movie other than in complete silence and isolation.
Same with Netflix. I have sympathy for the deaf, but private business does not have to change to accommodate their disadvantage.
Netflix is not a private business - it is a publicly traded corporation. Also, they offer their services to the public. Netflix (as well as any business and individual) benefits from the infrastructure within our country, especially the Post Office and the internet, funded by tax payers. All businesses that are owned by a corporation here in the US are only real entities thanks to government fiat, ergo all corporations are beholden to our government, and all businesses succeed thanks in part to our infrastructure. One of the agreements placed on businesses to continue to exist in our country is that they follow our laws, and sometimes we ask them to do things that might not be profitable in order to help with the common good - like the Disabilities act, or child labor laws, or environmental protection laws that keep everybody from shitting up the rivers.
This is an end run to keep future "broadcast television" from ignoring the needs of the deaf. If this is not settled now, it becomes more difficult to settle this in the future, and IMO it would be horrible if all future streaming services failed to deliver content with CC. If you feel that an allergy to certain foods is the same as being deprived of one of your senses (and such should be equally "protected" under the law), then you can never be reasoned with.
The ADA, specifically, is not the point you made. The point you made is that only people who are handicapped can decide whatever is fair to provide for the handicapped, no matter how ridiculous. By extension, only people of color can decide what is fair compensation for institutional racism. Only those who lose their job should get a say in what resources should be provided for them....
That's absurd and impractical.
Comments are definitely limited to 500 characters. I thought the description was limited to some (larger) number of characters.
The problem isn't the ability to sanely write software with a side stream etc. The problem is that the source materials DVD's and BLURAY disks not digital dumps, so what netflix -can- do is limited by the prior restraint placed inside the DVD and BLURAY players that the cache images are built out of.
There are also legal restrictions on -modifying- said playback, so even though they are allowed to stream it, there is no sense that they are allowed to edit that stream that I can find.
I mean I am just guessing at the technical details, but have you even looked at a "Rental DVD" lately? Spend a buck at a RedBox, bring a disk home, and try to access the "extras". The menu is there but all that's behind its a placquard that says "extras are not available on rental media, go out and buy a copy if you want to see this eight-second out-take".
Netflix source material may not even -have- the caption data stream to start with.
Innocent people shouldn't be forced to pay for inferior software development.
--"Code Complete" Microsoft Press
The OP argued that businesses should be allowed to exclude people with disabilities. He was arguing for taking away, not against giving something extra.
We both know that there's no way you'd be making this argument if it applied to you.
No, you don't, and it is besides the point. That somebody in a wheelchair thinks society should be forced to engineer themselves to accommodate them doesn't mean that the rest of society has to agree or have their spine severed to disagree.
Christ, you're full of shit. I've made it clear over and over again that a business should not have to go through extra expense to accommodate somebody with special needs.
Perhaps if he were arguing for euthanasia or erecting new barricades to intentionally prevent the handicapped from getting around you might have a point. But that is very far from what we're talking about here.
As a society, we ALL have to work out how we distribute our limited resources in a fair, but practical way. Should we spend $100M to cure your child of a rare cancer? Of course not, and suggesting that you (the father of the child) are the only one who gets to make that decision is crazy.
Putting in a $50K ramp MAY also be crazy depending on the circumstances.
Yes we do.
Hypocrites like yourself are why these laws are necessary for a free society.
You'd be in a world of hurt if the rest of us didn't accommodate special needs.
It's exactly what we're talking about here. He wants it to be legal for businesses to intentionally design things to exclude the disabled. If a ramp costs $50,000, it's because they didn't properly plan access ahead of time. The cost isn't in the ramp, but the lack of forethought.
I'd rather spend $100 million to cure a child of cancer than to buy a fighter jet. Don't tell me we allocate resources in fair, practical, or even sensible ways.
Hypocrites like yourself are why these laws are necessary for a free society.
Oh really? Where have I demanded special accommodation? I happen to have long legs, and have had hellish trips on buses and airplanes because of it, but I never demanded that airlines and bus lines be legally required to provide more legroom.
The real hypocrite is you, who talks about a "free society" where you think only people with severed spines are allowed to decide on mandatory, special treatment at extra expense.
How so, exactly?
It's exactly what we're talking about here. He wants it to be legal for businesses to intentionally design things to exclude the disabled.
That is a ridiculous exaggeration. There is a huge difference between intentionally excluding the disabled and not taking their needs into consideration. Further, it's not even that they didn't consider it, it's that they would consider it and find the cost excessive. This kind of hyperbole is why many reasonable people who would otherwise support access for the disabled are turned off by it.
If a ramp costs $50,000, it's because they didn't properly plan access ahead of time. The cost isn't in the ramp, but the lack of forethought.
Yes, they should have planned that ramp 200 years ago when the building was originally built. Hindsight is wonderful.
I'd rather spend $100 million to cure a child of cancer than to buy a fighter jet. Don't tell me we allocate resources in fair, practical, or even sensible ways.
Is that really the only choice? I'd rather use that $100M to save 20 lives by reducing pollution, having higher food or safety standards, et al. But if you want to be selfish and kill those 20 to save your kid, I guess I can understand.
We both know that if that lack of legroom actually prevented you from flying, you'd raise a stink.
No one is asking for special treatment, or extra expense. You know this, but you lack the courage of your convictions to just say that you dislike the disabled.
Nope, it amounts to exactly the same thing.
Those people are by definition unreasonable, and as such have to be smacked into doing the right thing.
No business has to operate out of a 200 year old building. If they choose to, there will be many added costs.
There's plenty of money to cut from the military budget to do all of those things.
Keep thinking, you'll get it eventually.
We both know that if that lack of legroom actually prevented you from flying, you'd raise a stink.
No, I wouldn't, and the fact that I suffered in extreme discomfort on such trips without complaining to my local lawmaker should be a hint to you.
No one is asking for special treatment, or extra expense. You know this, but you lack the courage of your convictions to just say that you dislike the disabled.
Wow, can you seriously be that delusional? Do you think closed captioning doesn't cost extra? It's exactly special treatment for a minority being called into force through legislation.
In other words, you're spewing bullshit as usual and don't have an answer.
Aha but who owners the copyright. The text and story transcribed may be a
Violation of the copyright . The owner of the screen play could and should balk.
Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't. Mark Twain.
Nope, it amounts to exactly the same thing.
So you also believe that murder and manslaughter are equivalent. Your semantic fuzziness weaken whatever moral point you are intending to make here.
Those people are by definition unreasonable, and as such have to be smacked into doing the right thing.
In other words, anyone less righteous than you.
No business has to operate out of a 200 year old building. If they choose to, there will be many added costs.
Why not tear it down and build an entirely new building? Sure, but that would cost more than $50,000, don't you think? Are you really just that incompetent at math and business?
There's plenty of money to cut from the military budget to do all of those things.
Of course, just eliminate the military budget and everything else is suddenly free. I'm looking forward to the the immortality and bountiful lifestyle that you guarantee. Free money from whatever business you think is undercharging, free money from government programs you don't agree with. Your world is refreshingly simple.
No, sunshine, I was implying that you're developmentally delayed. The fact that it went over your head rather proves the point.
It's OK. I understand you're an idiot who will claim black is white whenever you feel sorry for somebody. It's just as well you don't explain yourself, as talking to people like you becomes an exercise in frustration.
Blogger? WordPress?
YouTube automatically promotes new videos on the home page and promotes related videos in a column at the right side of a video description page. How do you recommend that one promote one's blog post in a similar manner?