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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.
And, believe or not, there's actually a movement against that. There are deaf people that want deaf children, and want them to remain deaf. I'm a type 1 diabetic, and I can't imagine forcing that on a child. It makes like a pain in the butt.
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.
Or you could simply be a real parent and not tolerate misbehavior. My parents just told me to shut the hell up when it was inappropriate to make noise.
My spoon is too big.
No, what is child abuse is using the misfortune of someone's child being born with a hearing impairment to excuse human experimentation on infants with dubious real world results.
I'm not a Deaf militant, but I am hard of hearing since childhood and have participated in the Deaf community and use sign language, so I know a little bit about this stuff because it involves me and those like me. I find the saddest thing has always been the way the families involved and the children diagnosed with it are treated. The second saddest thing is how many people who spout off about the issue do so from a position of ignorance and emotion, not facts.
The fact is that cochlear implants are a dangerous gamble, one that rarely pays off as much as those who subject others to it expect. It requires drilling into the skull to place a piece of hardware in the head, one that still requires the use of an external aid to function. There are heightened risks of meningitis, nerve damage, necrosis of the cochlear implant skin flaps...none of which are really explained to parents before hand. Instead all parents of Deaf children hear is that there is a surgery that can "fix" their children.
Worse, the recommendation is that the surgery be done at an early age because there is a limited window to get some form of language to the brain. The problem is that proponents of the surgery often advise against the children also learning sign language because it would interfere with them learning to process sounds. This is where the biggest gamble of all takes place--if the child doesn't properly learn to process the signals as sounds, they are effectively retarded in their development.
By contrast sign language has shown to allow communication and build cognitive function at preverbal ages!
That is why so many Deaf people get so militant about the issue!
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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?