Is Closed Captioning done by people or by sound-recognition machines? *Fails*

[UTUSN]

Watching a video about ancient history (not watching, having it in the background), and Closed Captioning is on.

So the narrator said, "The Greeks developed the phalanx... round shields, spears..."

Captioning says, "called hop-alongs".

Uh, HOPLITES. The foot soldiers were hoplites. Not "hop-alongs."

There was another, even funnier thing but I can't remember it.

[louis-t]

1. Some of them are really bad.

But some are right on the money. I wonder why.

[UTUSN]

2. Yip, & the volume levels of speech are so variable

When the actors are whispering or I need a, whadayacallit, sound enhancer/amplifier. Yet commercials *blast*. And don't get me started on the Brits and their cultivated dialect!1

So the captioning is ever more needed for me.

[zanana1]

15. The different volume levels had me thinking I was hard of hearing.

[targetpractice]

16. The AppleTV has a feature...

... Just ask "What did they just say?" And it will rewind 10 seconds and turn on subtitles.

I use subtitles a lot.

[AllaN01Bear]

3. youtube with their auto captions can be rediculus at times . ugh.

if the vidiographer is good at putting the closed captions in them selves , then it is ok..

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

4. Bad captioning or subtitling might was around in the late '60s.

[Laffy Kat]

9. I had replied that that was totally bizarre.

Before I noticed it was a parody.

[blaze]

5. I knew a gal who used a stenotype for captioning the news

She was a court reporter by day and did the news at night for extra cash.

We were at her house one night during a broadcast she was covering and we were merciless with the (very occasional) typos.

[UTUSN]

6. So actual humans do it? Plus, hilarious are the Google translations!

[blaze]

7. Well, my experience was... decades ago but

I'm pretty sure court rooms still use court reporters and I think they are still using stenotypes... So I'm guessing they're still using actual humans for live broadcasts.

[Laffy Kat]

10. Yes, think they always will.

Even though there are better ways to record the proceedings now. It's sort of a tradition, like the British wearing wigs in court.

[Beartracks]

11. It's got to be both: sometimes humans, sometimes auto-recognize.

Sometimes it is just too spot on to be automatic.

What cracks me up are when there's closed captioning on an ambient sleep/relaxation video. Every few minutes it pops up..... " (heavy rain)."



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[Ron Obvious]

12. It's been slipshod for years.

Whether it's voice-recognition or interns who haven't watched the show and have a bad ear for accents, I don't know.

One I particularly remember: " 'anging is too good for 'im " transcribed as "Annie is too good for him" (There was no Annie in the show at all, but the transcriber apparently couldn't understand a Northern accent.)

Every time I watch with subtitles on it irritates me. Of course, I irritate easily as the best of times.

[UTUSN]

13. "irritate easily" - hah! Refreshing on you, just ornery age on me!

[Buckeye_Democrat]

14. Perhaps both, but obviously the tech is here to do it by machine.

The app on my iPhone called "Translate" does it in various languages. I held it up to the speaker on my TV while watching "HBO Latino" a few days ago, and even that app translated the Spanish to English pretty well.

I should try other languages found in YouTube videos or wherever.