The next president is likely to be (Open Captioned)

An open-captioned video by an average-looking hearing person. He talks about his prediction on who will win the Presidential Election 2008. This video was taken in March 20, 2008.

I decided to add this to my blog because it was interesting, open-captioned, and showed the relevant political opinions of the public. If more hearing people would caption their videos, more deaf people could benefit from it and join in the discussion. As opposed to "being left out of the conversation" as we often are with non-captioned, non-transcribed videos.

It is my hope that the internet will become more accessible with time and that the hearing people will be more open to personally captioning their videos.

However, we the deaf should be the ones who are setting the example. We can make the first step in captioning/transcribing our videos in ASL. The reason why I'm supportive of this is because hearing people out there ARE interested in hearing what you have to say. This applies in political interest and all other spectrum, such as entertainment or chatter, too. When you make yourself accessible, you are opening your world up to the world and enabling them to better understand you, your interests, and your stance on issues.

I'm compelled to talk about a Washington Post article that I was featured in few months ago about the internet and technology:

But as entertainment and communications tools increasingly take digital form, some people with disabilities feel left behind. Online videos are not required to have captions for those who can’t hear, for example, and ticker-style emergency messages are not narrated for those who can’t see.

The article talked about a bill, which at the time, was being introduced. The bill would have called for the internet and newer technology to be more accessible:

The bill, also sponsored by Rep. Heather Wilson, R-N.M., calls for new rules for devices that display video programming. Federal law requires all TV sets with screens larger than 13 inches to display closed captions. Under the new legislation, all gadgets from MP3 music players to cell phones would be required to show captions.

Devices also would be obligated to provide video description services and read aloud emergency messages that scroll across the bottom of the screen. And they would have to be designed so that on-screen menus are usable by people with disabilities.

When you vote, you are making your voice heard and voting people into office who you believe will support your agenda. Nobody is overlooked when you cast your vote. When you vote into the office a Senator, make sure he or she will support bills that will improve your life. And bills such as this one may help remove the barriers to online captioning so that we may have more interesting videos to enjoy such as the guy above. Voting is one of the many ways you can help push the deaf/hard of hearing agenda.