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Re: WCAG 1.2.3 Text Transcripts or Audio Descriptions

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From: Andrew Kirkpatrick
Date: Aug 17, 2012 6:01AM

Randy,
My reading of WCAG is that none of the standards need to modified to support users who are deaf-blind, just that 1.2.8 (requires a text alternative to synchronized media such as a text document which includes the content of the captions and the audio descriptions) is at triple-A and to better encourage the necessary support for these users it would need to be at a higher priority level.

Does that match your interpretation? Are there other success criteria that you're thinking about?

Thanks,
AWK

Andrew Kirkpatrick
Group Product Manager, Accessibility
Adobe Systems

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http://twitter.com/awkawk
http://blogs.adobe.com/accessibility


-----Original Message-----
From: <EMAIL REMOVED> [mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ] On Behalf Of Randy Pope
Sent: Friday, August 17, 2012 4:53 AM
To: 'WebAIM Discussion List'
Subject: Re: [WebAIM] WCAG 1.2.3 Text Transcripts or Audio Descriptions

David,

While your interpretation of this provision may be correct, it still does not address the problem of accessing the information for those who are DeafBlind. They cannot see the video, the caption or hear the audio format.
The only access that most DeafBlind have, is alternative text of the content in video or audio format.

This provision and others need to be revised to address the DeafBlind access to information on the web.

Randy Pope


-----Original Message-----
From: <EMAIL REMOVED>
[mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ] On Behalf Of David Ashleydale
Sent: Thursday, August 16, 2012 3:32 PM
To: WebAIM Discussion List
Subject: [WebAIM] WCAG 1.2.3 Text Transcripts or Audio Descriptions

Hi,

I wish WCAG were written a little more clearly, but I think I've finally discovered a nuance of 1.2.3 that I had missed during my previous 100 readings of it.

I now interpret 1.2.3 as saying that it is considered satisfied without anyone doing anything as long as the video in question has no content that is not also present in the default audio track. For example, if I have a video that consists entirely of a talking head that is explaining a new banking service -- and there are no visual cues that a non-sighted user could miss -- neither a text transcript nor an audio description track are needed to satisfy 1.2.3. A text transcript or an audio description track are needed only if there is some content in the video that is only presented visually. An example of this would be that in the video, one person quietly approaches another and slips a note into their pocket without them noticing, then quietly slips away. A non-sighted user of this video would have no indication this happened unless a text transcript that described this action or a user-selectable audio track with another narrator who explained this action when it occurred a
re provided. In that case, 1.2.3 would require that either a text transcript or an audio description track be provided.

Am I finally interpreting 1.2.3 correctly? I had previously thought that
1.2.3 was telling me that all videos need text transcripts to be available, except in the case where some content is presented visually and not aurally, and an audio description track is provided. In that case 1.2.3 would be satisfied by the audio description. But my interpretation was that if the video did not have content that was presented visually not aurally, it would still need a text transcript.

I find that making text transcripts available for every video is a good customer experience best practice anyway, and I plan on adding it to our company's video publishing requirements. But now when someone asks me if making the transcript available for videos that are fully explained in their default audio tracks is because of trying to conform to WCAG, I will say no.
We just do it because it's good for usability.

Make sense?

David Ashleydale