[community] Zoom vs Google Meet for captions?

Wed Nov 11 14:00:23 UTC 2020

Hi Ann,

Thanks so much for sharing Meryl Evan’s link. It’s a wonderfully prolific and detailed resource for listing and evaluating many different considerations when it comes to woking with automated captions in online meetings.

-Charles

> On Nov 6, 2020, at 9:11 AM, Ann Gagne <ann.gagne at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> Hello,
>  I have been part of this listserv for a few years and always read the messages with interest but have never posted. This particular thread is of specific interest to me in the work that I do as an educational developer at UTM. I wanted to share a possible resource to inform the conversation further around the need to have a system to evaluate automatic caption options.
>   Meryl Evans is a deaf digital marketer, and she has created this web page that she updates when new versions or add-ons appear.
> 
> https://meryl.net/best-automatic-captioning-tool-for-video-calls/ <https://meryl.net/best-automatic-captioning-tool-for-video-calls/>
> 
> I hope this is helpful in some way and thank you for the great conversations.
> Best,
> Ann
> 
> On Fri, Nov 6, 2020 at 9:02 AM Cybele S <cybele.sack at gmail.com <mailto:cybele.sack at gmail.com>> wrote:
> “Sounds like a grant with a lot of co-design/co-lead involvement.”
> 
> Great idea.
> 
> I think “good enough” is problematic, because people can have multiple
> disabilities and situations where cognitive load tips from manageable to
> not quite quickly.
> 
> I turn on captions when they are available on zoom calls, in order to watch
> to see if they match what’s said.  They are often off, and sometimes way
> way off.
> 
> I’ve tried various voice to text apps and found them to be “not good
> enough”.
> 
> As you referenced standards for broadcasting, one question may be, “how
> might we get Zoom and other remote meeting apps to provide cc at the level
> of broadcasters?”  There are many other questions to ask, that’s just one.
> 
> The influence of mic quality is interesting. And the same mic can perform
> differently with different apps depending on the computer it is plugged
> into, I’ve noticed myself.  So one part might be certifying hardware for
> audio quality, and wouldn’t that be a great thing.  And that would need to
> be done for everyone’s hardware not only the hardware destined for those
> who face specific auditory barriers.
> 
> It’s a big project and a super important one.  COVID made it much more
> pressing.
> 
> C
> 
> On Fri, Nov 6, 2020 at 7:11 AM Charles Silverman <charlessilverman at me.com <mailto:charlessilverman at me.com>>
> wrote:
> 
> > Cybele,
> >
> > I wouldn’t want to regulate a field like live captioning (CART), as
> > there’s already fairly intensive training, standards, guidelines, rating
> > systems (but how well do they work?), certifications, best practices, and
> > even regulations involved (in the case of broadcasting).
> >
> > Automated captioning is a different story. It's still evolving, still very
> > much beta, much better than a few years back, and in different situations,
> > it’s not perfect, not close to human captioning, but quite useful. But is
> > it “good enough”, and "good enough" for whom?
> >
> > Is Otter better than Skype or Google Groups? Can remote meeting
> > participants do things to help deliver better quality captioning? For
> > example, does the mic’ing quality matter? should participants be more
> > mindful of their enunciation and speed? Do we need to be in a room without
> > a ceiling fan?
> >
> > As you point out, automated captioning is attractive to many
> > organizations, especially in these pandemic times where many of us are
> > connecting remotely, as it comes cheap or free. It’s one thing to have
> > human captioning at the occasional event but another entirely to provide
> > captioning for multiple zoom meetings each week.
> >
> > It’s would be a step forward to undertake a robust evaluation of the
> > effectiveness of automated caption services being currently deployed for
> > online meetings, as well as gain knowledge of various and diverse end-user
> > experiences.
> >
> > It would be helpful to come to an understanding of what “good enough”
> > automated live captioning should look like for different types of meetings
> > and different users.
> >
> > Sounds like a grant with a lot of co-design/co-lead involvement.
> >
> > -c
> >
> >
> >
> > On Nov 5, 2020, at 11:34 PM, Cybele S <cybele.sack at gmail.com <mailto:cybele.sack at gmail.com>> wrote:
> >
> > Charles,
> >
> > It would be helpful to have a ranking system for these software captions
> > with something akin to a grading scheme.  It would also be helpful to
> > include add-on auto captions and live editable auto-captions in this.
> > Manual captions are obviously harder to rate as it depends on the
> > individual involved, but some kind of separate professional standard would
> > be good too, if we want to get into licensing people.
> >
> > Putting it on the individual organization or host of a zoom talk is fair
> > enough, but leads to challenges as Ushnish has raised, where some of these
> > hosts are highly under-resourced and well-meaning.
> >
> > The cognitive load you describe should be unacceptable and we need to get
> > services up to a higher standard ASAP.
> >
> > Captions have been an ongoing concern pre-covid and can in certain
> > circumstances fall into undue hardship if the expectation is for a small
> > host of very limited means being required to pay for a highly professional
> > captioner for every meeting.
> >
> > There needs to be a solution to this problem, especially now that do much
> > work is being done remotely, where digital tools ought to be widely
> > available and of a quality that doesn’t create cognitive load barriers.
> >
> > I wonder if a ranking chart with links to choose the higher ranking
> > options might be a good start.
> >
> > What are your thoughts?
> >
> > C
> >
> > On Thu, Nov 5, 2020 at 10:43 PM Charles Silverman <charlessilverman at me.com <mailto:charlessilverman at me.com>>
> > wrote:
> >
> >> My experience, as someone with hearing loss, is that quite often with
> >> automatic captioning, too much goes missing, too much is left to guesswork.
> >>
> >> If the goal is to provide meaningful access, that is, engagement and
> >> participation for people needing captions, please use trained human caption
> >> writers (stenographically trained captioning is best, and voice writing,
> >> where the caption writer uses Dragon Dictate, isn’t bad).
> >>
> >> I’ve spent a lot of time during the pandemic using depending on some of
> >> the available automated caption services such as Skype, Google Meet, Zoom
> >> (if you subscribe to one of Zoom’s professional packages), or available to
> >> you as a user in the form of an App for your iPhone or Android phone.
> >>
> >> Most of my energy when using these services goes into attempts at
> >> re-constructing what I think I’ve heard, applying whatever context I have
> >> to work with. There’s a lot of cognitive overload in a process that often
> >> results in less than useful comprehension. It doesn’t help that with
> >> automatic captioning speakers are not identified, and basic grammatical
> >> conventions e.g., commas, question marks, periods, etc., go missing.
> >>
> >> There’s a lot more that could be said, but the skinny is, if you are the
> >> person organizing these events, have some mechanism for evaluating the
> >> quality and usefulness of the caption service that you’ve selected.
> >>
> >>
> >> -Charles
> >>
> >> ______________
> >> Charles Silverman, M.Ed.
> >> Sessional Instructor, Accessibility & Inclusive Design
> >> Disability Studies, Ryerson University
> >> Email: csilverman at ryerson.ca <mailto:csilverman at ryerson.ca> <csilverman at ryerson.ca <mailto:csilverman at ryerson.ca>>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> On Nov 5, 2020, at 9:35 PM, Brian Moore <bmoore at screenreview.org <mailto:bmoore at screenreview.org>> wrote:
> >>
> >> I can't really comment on captions since I don't use them much. I have
> >> played with the auto captioning in teams just for fun while I was in a
> >> meeting I could actually hear and my screen reader actually did read me
> >> pretty good captions.  All of them are fairly good for screen readers
> >> although zoom has done some extra things.  Personally, I am happy with
> >> whatever we pick that can include everyone.
> >>
> >>
> >> Contact me on skype: brian.moore
> >> follow me on twitter:
> >> http://www.twitter.com/bmoore123 <http://www.twitter.com/bmoore123>
> >>
> >> On 11/5/2020 8:43 PM, Cybele S wrote:
> >>
> >> I've heard some people say Zoom is more accessible for screen reader users
> >> and other people prefer Microsoft Teams.
> >>
> >> This article says Google Meet is better for captions and someone else
> >> recently told me that as well.
> >>
> >> What solution do you all use for synchronous meetings?
> >>
> >>
> >> https://www.fastcompany.com/90565930/im-deaf-and-this-is-what-happens-when-i-get-on-a-zoom-call?fbclid=IwAR2gI_zmOBpRGDcOZ0_dMK6PdOYp-KyrgVybTXF_7kQyO2cyEtv207_lcNw <https://www.fastcompany.com/90565930/im-deaf-and-this-is-what-happens-when-i-get-on-a-zoom-call?fbclid=IwAR2gI_zmOBpRGDcOZ0_dMK6PdOYp-KyrgVybTXF_7kQyO2cyEtv207_lcNw>
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> 
> -- 
> Dr. Ann Gagné
> 
> Educational Developer
> Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre
> University of Toronto-Mississauga
> 
> Instructor
> George Brown College