Sam asks “why people who produce content where they have the script, they have the content, they have the time, they have the resources, don’t provide captions that are accurate?”
Thanks to Fable for sponsoring the transcript for this episode.
Transcript
Nic
Hi, I’m Nic Steenhout. And you’re listening to the accessibility rules soundbite, a series of short podcasts where disabled people explain their impairments and the barrier they experience on the web. Just a quick reminder, transcripts are available for all episodes at the time of publication from the website at https://a11yrules.com. I would like to thank Fable for sponsoring this episode. Fable is a leading accessibility platform powered by disabled people. Fable moves organization from worrying about compliance to building incredible and accessible user experience through product testing and custom courses. You can learn more about how Fable works with your team at https://makeitfable.com/nic.
Nic
So today I’m talking with Sam Evans. Hey, Sam, how are you?
Sam
Doing very well today. Thank you, Nic.
Nic
We have been talking a lot over the years. I’ve been trying to organize you coming on this show for a little bit. So I’m glad we finally connect. Let me start with the question I asked everybody. The first question is what’s your disability or your impairment?
Sam
The biggest challenge I face is being hard of hearing I have… I use hearing aids. And so I am very much relying on captions. And if I’m in person with someone lip reading, or if their image is large enough on a screen to compensate for being able to hear and understand clearly what the spoken word is.
Nic
How does doing video calls like this on a platform where there’s not necessarily captions? How does that work?
Sam
I’m familiar with your speaking tone and, and how that works for you. And having seen your face in person, and a clearer view of your face where we have video while we’re chatting. But I turned my audio up. Now if you’re if you’re covering your mouth, I wouldn’t be able to but but I turned my audio up. And I also have my hearing aids tuned in for audio input from a computer device. So I rely a lot on trying to understand context, if it’s on a video call. And trying to catch what’s happening, I’ll often use a secondary tool or device if there’s not captions included in the episode or in the event. Most of that is AI. So at best 60%, 70%, maybe 80% accuracy. So it’s a lot of guestimation which is a lot of cognitive load on top of trying to engage.
Nic
That would actually be very tiring. I mean, everybody finds video calls tiring. But if you have to have that added cognitive load on top of it, how… What’s the effect, if you have, you know, three or four or five hours of video call in a day?
Sam
It’s exhausting. And for those of us who’ve come up in trying to multitask and functionally do more than one thing at a time, you cannot do other things other than follow along, listen, try to hear, read and engage. So even if you are dedicated to doing nothing but being on focus, it’s still a lot of load. It’s mentally strenuous, in addition to trying to take in what audio my ears can hear.
Nic
All right, so that seems like a pretty significant thing. But my usual second question is what’s your biggest barrier or your biggest pet peeve on the web related to your disability? Is it different from from this thing that we’ve just been talking about? Or?
Sam
One of the other things that accompanies that, for me is vestibular disability about balance and motion. And so if those two things come together with online video content, it’s it can be just absolutely draining for the day. So my biggest pet peeve is why people who produce content where they have the script, they have the content, they have the time they have the resources, don’t provide captions that are accurate or don’t make the time to invest in accurate and usable captions, perhaps not understanding and I think that’s the biggest challenge. For me, the biggest pet peeve is not understanding what quality accurate usable captions mean to people who need them. And this concept of just turn the captions on and you’re done. And that seems to skip over the entire part of understanding the people who have a need. And I don’t think it’s malicious and intent, but the outcome is the same for people who are prevented and from engaging and face that barrier.
Nic
You talk about accurate captions, and you throw out some numbers before. We said 60% or 70%, maybe 80%. Isn’t 80% success rate good enough? I mean that, you know, if you use sit to test, typically 80%, you’ve passed the test 80% When I was at university is an A.
Sam
It is for evaluations for maybe knowledge assessments. But when we talk about the accuracy of captions, every 1% loss and accuracy in captions in the research I’ve read most recently is about a 10% loss in comprehension. So if we’re talking 80% As a best for AI, that’s a 20% loss in accuracy. And if you multiply that by 10%, for comprehension, we’ve reduced the comprehension by 200%.
Nic
Nice. That’s very nice. I mean, it’s not but it’s, it’s, it’s an interesting set of numbers. Thank you.
Sam
So 1% accuracy if we consider just a simple word, and it depends on someone’s pronunciation, or accent or speaking patterns. If AI, artificial intelligence gets the word can’t C A N, apostrophe T wrong, then somebody is going to say, oh, I can do this. One word.
Nic
Yeah.
Sam
And make a massive difference in the guidance, instructions, or information someone comes away with. So that’s one to 20%. That’s massive, and change.
Nic
Yeah, I come across that all the time. I use voice to text on my phone very often. And I cannot use voice to text without editing what I’m sending. And a couple of days ago, I had a good laugh. I said argument, and Siri wrote sex garment. And it was in the context of a business communication. So that would not have gone very well.
Sam
I also cannot trust Siri to hear and translate what I speak all the time. I tried to double check, but we’re not there yet. And 20?
Nic
Yeah, we are not there yet. So if you had one message for designers or developers around accessibility, what, what would that be?
Sam
I want to encourage designers and developers to first think about the people. So first, start by understanding disability. Pick one, two or three types of disability and consider the barriers that disabled people face with digital engagement and learn just some of those personas, and how disabled people engage, and how inaccessible content prevents them from having an equitable experience. If we can start with the who, then we can think about why there’s a challenge a barrier or how we, as developers, designers, can change our methods to remove a barrier instead of creating or sustaining existing barriers. And I think if developers can take one moment to think I want to make the world less full of barriers, they don’t have to remove them all. But what can I do to remove one barrier? I think that’s a really empowering opportunity for developers, when they can make it a personal effort, as opposed to a task list or challenge or an add on to what they’re already doing in their busy days. If they can find a personal commitment to why it affects humans, to make the world a better place, I think that usually is the way that I find developers most likely to voluntarily affect change in their process.
Nic
I love that. Sam Evans, thank you for being such a good guest. And I’m sure we’ll see you around on the web.
Sam
We will. Thanks so much for having me join today, Nic, I appreciate it.