HELP WANTED: Deaf/Hearing ASL caption contributors. Share about this with friends, family, coworkers, etc..

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Booger Bender

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Feb 6, 2013, 12:13:57 AM2/6/13
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Hello Everyone,

I'd like to proudly state that Amara's Caption Requested team has started adding ASL videos to be captioned so that our Hearing/Deaf (those who do not sign) can understand and learn from these videos about Deaf culture and the many topics they have. I encourage anyone in any language to join us and help spread out the news about captioning ASL and other sign language videos. This is good to educate about various Deaf cultures. We welcome submissions of HOH videos as well. Help us make ASL videos more accessible for all. Share on twitter, google+, Facebook, and around the Internet. The more exposure we have the better chance we'll have a lift off with great success. Who knows perhaps we'll have an Enterprise option with a University or Business.
Sharing is Caring. 
Best,
Dylan ( Booger Bender )

Claude Almansi

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Feb 6, 2013, 4:22:21 AM2/6/13
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Hi Dylan and All

From the viewpoint of a non-signer who'd like to understand Deaf
Culture better, I wholeheartedly second Dylan's message and I warmly
thank the signers who have already subtitled in spoken languages some
of the signed videos of the Captions Requested team (
http://www.amara.org/en/teams/captions-requested/videos/ ).
Most of these videos are in American Sign Language (ASL), but there
are also other ones in other signed languages, like Italian Sign
Language (LIS). And then, outside the team, but in part already with
Amara pages, there are the videos of the Irish Deaf Archive YouTube
Channel ( http://www.youtube.com/user/IrishDeafArchives/videos ),
which give a fascinating insight in Irish Deaf culture, but also in
Irish social history in general. These are mostly in Irish Sign
Language with a few in ASL. And some Israeli Sign Language videos
have been added to the Music Captioning team (
http://www.amara.org/en/teams/musiccaptioning/videos/ ).

If you want to subtitle any of these signed videos in a spoken
language, you only need an Amara account, but in case they have been
added to the Captions Requested or Music Captioning teams, you don't
need to join the relevant team (though it'd be lovely if you would).
In fact these videos are just "added" to the teams, but they don't
belong to them. So anyone with an Amara account can subtitle them.

Dylan, your "Who knows perhaps we'll have an Enterprise option with a
University or Business." looks very promising, but could you expand a
bit more on this concept? A specific team for subtitling signed
videos? ASL only or international? Or inciting existing enterprise /
education teams to provide signed videos too? I seem to remember that
there was a project to re-do the Amara presentation video presently
shown on the Amara.org home page including signed version. That would
be a great incentive for enterprise / education teams to do the same.

Best

Claude (Almansi)

Dylan Mahoney

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Feb 6, 2013, 6:49:10 AM2/6/13
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Claude,

Re: Enterprise, I was thinking say if there was an education system or Deaf University like Gallaudet to caption all of their videos using Amara much like the fashion that Netflix does. The same could be said about Businesses. I'm no specialist in that area but, I do understand that there are huge benefits with Enterprising with Amara. There are also benefits from individual people creating teams or simply supporting existing teams by contributing their videos towards any team. The true goal of mine was to make all videos accessible even the ASL, BSL, CSL, etc.. I thought even for the blind using digital braille tracks embedded into video (I don't know if there's such technology yet but could be very possible). I would like to explore every opportunity of technology within Amara and work with Universities, Businesses alike. Of course with the support from Amara directly.
Stop me if this seems unlikely. :)
Best,
Dylan



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Claude Almansi

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Feb 6, 2013, 1:16:08 PM2/6/13
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Hi Dylan,

Thanks for your explanation. Between your lines:

On Wed, Feb 6, 2013 at 12:49 PM, Dylan Mahoney <dmaho...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Claude,
>
> Re: Enterprise, I was thinking say if there was an education system or Deaf
> University like Gallaudet to caption all of their videos using Amara much
> like the fashion that Netflix does. The same could be said about Businesses.

Mm actually Netflix is PURE business - and Gallaudet is education,
like Coursera, Udacity (well, these are also business, but possibly
mainly education), Khan Academy. Yes, it would be great if Gallaudet
and/or similar educational institution would subtitle their signed
videos on Amara.

(LOL I see you keep saying "caption" and I keep saying "subtitle": but
as Signed languages are different from spoken languages, providing
subtitles in the written form of a spoken language for signed videos
is making translated subs, no?)


> I'm no specialist in that area but, I do understand that there are huge
> benefits with Enterprising with Amara. There are also benefits from
> individual people creating teams or simply supporting existing teams by
> contributing their videos towards any team. The true goal of mine was to
> make all videos accessible even the ASL, BSL, CSL, etc..

Agreed: also because you can't exclude "post oral" deaf people who
remain within the speach/writing culture. I just got a notice about a
new video communique from the Italian Ente Nazionale Sordi (a bit like
NDA in US): sign-only, though it's about issues concerning all Italian
Deafs. I suppose the reason might be that the Italian Sign Language is
under legislative attack: there's a drive in Parliament to call it
"Linguaggio di mimica e gesti", which is disparaging - kind of
"mimicry and gesture linguo". So the Italian born deaf are all the
more intent on defending it. But I'm not sure that pissing off
non-signing deaf people by not captioning these videos is the best way
to involve them in the fight for Italian Sign Language.

> I thought even for
> the blind using digital braille tracks embedded into video (I don't know if
> there's such technology yet but could be very possible).

Wow, that's an interesting idea: you mean e.g. listening to the
original audio and reading the subs in another language with the
Braille bar? Well, if YOU can talk and sign at the same time, then
maybe some blind people could do that listening+braille reading too.
But in the case of a signed video without audio, perhaps they'd just
prefer to read the transcript.

> I would like to
> explore every opportunity of technology within Amara and work with
> Universities, Businesses alike. Of course with the support from Amara
> directly.
> Stop me if this seems unlikely. :)

No, not unlikely at all. However Amara should clarify a few things in
the the crowdsourcing business concept, particularly concerning - and
to - the "crowd" of volunteers they aim to involve as unpaid human
resources.

Best,

Claude
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