2923 ABC Gruen Planet/media/Broadcasting... · Web viewis a fast-paced, humorous and information...

Investigation Report No. 2923File No. ACMA2012/1436

Licensee Australian Broadcasting Corporation

Station ABC1 (ABN New South Wales)

Type of Service National broadcasting service

Name of Program Gruen Planet

Date/s of Broadcast 17 October 2012

Relevant Legislation/Code

Section 130ZR(1) of Part 9D of the Broadcasting Services Act 1992 [Captioning]

Date finalised 17 May 2013

Decision Breach section 130ZR(1) of Part 9 D of the Broadcasting Services Act 1992 [Captioning]

ACMA Investigation Report – Gruen Planet broadcast by ABC on 17 October 2012

The complaintOn 19 November 2012, the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) received a complaint asserting that the national broadcaster, the ABC, failed to provide adequate captioning for the program Gruen Planet broadcast on ABC1 on 17 October 2012, in accordance with the requirements in subsection 130ZR(1) of the BSA.

The ABC is a national broadcaster under the BSA as it provides national broadcasting services under section 13 of the BSA.

This complaint relates to a provision of the BSA that is applicable to a national broadcaster. As such, the complainant complained first to the national broadcaster, and finding the national broadcaster’s response inadequate, subsequently referred the complaint to the ACMA for consideration.

The ACMA has investigated the national broadcaster’s compliance with subsection 130ZR(1) of the BSA in accordance with sections 150 and 151 of the BSA.1

The programGruen Planet is a fast-paced, humorous and information based program providing analysis on advertising. Hosted by comedian Wil Anderson, the expert panellists discuss and debate various aspects of advertising (including methods used, finances incurred, profits made, viewer numbers, consequences of). The advertisements and video clips that are shown and discussed on Gruen Planet contain visual images, dialogue, sounds, songs or melodies and are generally brief, ranging in length from a few seconds to several minutes. The topics discussed by the panellists can change rapidly at different stages of the program.

AssessmentThe assessment is based on written submissions from the complainant and the ABC and a copy of the broadcast provided by the ABC to the ACMA which was reviewed by the ACMA.

Issue: Did the national broadcaster provide a captioning service for the broadcast of Gruen Planet on 17 October 2012?

Relevant provisionsSubsection 130ZR (1) of Part 9D of the BSA provides, inter alia:

(1) Each national broadcaster must provide a captioning service for:(a) television programs transmitted during designated viewing hours; and

(b) television news or current affairs programs transmitted outside designated viewing hours.

Section 130ZL defines designated viewing hours as:

Programs transmitted before 1 July 2014

(1) For the purposes of the application of this Part to programs transmitted before 1 July 2014, designated viewing hours are the hours:

1 Sections 150 and 151 of the Broadcasting Services Act 1992 set out the ACMA’s jurisdiction to investigate complaints relating to the ABC or SBS.


(a) beginning at 6 pm each day or, if another time is prescribed, beginning at that prescribed time each day; and

(b) ending at 10.30 pm on the same day or, if another time is prescribed, ending at that prescribed time on the same day.

Complainant’s submissions The complainant submitted to the ACMA on 19 November 2012:

[...]

I’d like to make a complaint against the ABC as I’m unsatisfied with the ABC’s response to me.

It seems to me that the ABC believe that they will simply be able to say content is finalised too close to the original broadcast time and will be able to get away with using ‘live’ captioning methods for a program such as The Gruen Transfer [sic], even though this is detrimental outcome for viewers...

The complainant submitted the following in the initial complaint to the ABC on 25 October 2012:

[...]

I am disappointed that the ABC is continuing to use ‘live’ captioning methods (which are of much lower quality (lag time) and much more stressful for viewers who rely on captioning, as it’s harder to read one word at a time that moves around on the screen) than pre-prepared ‘block’ captions.

The recent Captioning Quality [Standard development] process reached a consensus view that pre-prepared ‘block’ captioning methods should always be used, so why is the ABC continuing to persist with ‘live’ captioning methods for ‘non-live’ content?

National broadcaster’s submissions ABC’s email to the Complainant, dated 19 November 2012, included the following:

[...]

As we have previously advised you, the ABC utilises live captioning as required when it is not feasible to provide pre-recorded captions. This may included live broadcasts or programs completed close to broadcast time. The production cycle for Gruen Transfer [sic], which means that the program was completed just prior to broadcast, precluded the use of offline or pre-prepared captions.

The ABC understands that the process for developing an Industry Captioning Quality Standard has not concluded and is ongoing with ACMA and other stakeholders.

ABC’s submission to the ACMA, dated 19 December 2012 included the following:

[...]

The production cycle for Gruen Planet precluded the program from providing pre-recorded block captions on 17 October. The captions were reviewed by the ABC and were found to be consistent with captions delivered in the live environment.


Section 1 of Part 9D of the BSA required each commercial television broadcasting national broadcaster and each national broadcaster to provide a captioning service for

(a) television programs transmitted during designated viewing hours;

The ABC complied with this legislation in this case.

ABC’s submission to the ACMA, dated 4 March 2013, in response to the ACMA’s Preliminary Investigation Report included the following:

[...]

The ABC does not dispute that the captions and the soundtrack differed. As we have previously explained, the ABC uses ‘steno-captioning for live and late delivered programs. This ensures that the ABC can deliver captioned programs to viewers, while managing the kind of complex and finely balanced production schedules that is typical of television broadcasting.

Live ‘steno-captioning’ will never achieve the same quality as pre-prepared captions: the method is imperfect....while the ABC’s captioning provider seeks to minimise these problems, it is not only unrealistic to expect a precise and immediate presentation of each spoken word in captioned form, but the Quality Captioning Considerations impose no such requirement.

The broadcast appears to have been assessed primarily against Quality Indicator 2(i) and not 2(viii) which expressly applies to live captioned programming.

Furthermore, the Quality Indicators explicitly state that for live closed captioning, ‘the priority is always to transcribe as much of the spoken content of the program as possible’ ....the ACMA’s preliminary investigation reports have not addressed the impact of effect of this qualification...similar qualifications have previously been interpreted by the ACMA in respect of superseded paragraphs 38(4)(a) and (b) of the BSA as taking precedence over any mandatory obligation to fully comply with applicable captioning quality standards in the context of live news broadcasts (ACMA Investigation Report No. 1507 and 1520).

The ABC notes that the ACMA has previously accepted intermittent delays of up to 4 seconds between visuals and sound in passages of fast paces dialogue contained in programs using pre-prepared captions.

On 28 March 2013, the ACMA sent its revised Preliminary report to the ABC. In its 30 April 2013 response to the revised preliminary finding, the ABC noted the following:

[...]

It is not reasonable to expect that live captions will provide a flawless transcript of the soundtrack. The captions will appear after the words have been spoken. They will not always include all of the spoken words, particularly if the stenographer is working to minimise delay. Viewers allow for this and adjust their expectations, knowing that they might have to bring more of their own common sense and general knowledge to bear to maximise comprehensibility. Importantly, viewers using captions will try to understand what is being communicated.


In this sense, comprehensibility of captions is not concerned only with accuracy. It relates to how readily the reader can understand the message being conveyed.

[...]

The ABC agrees that the captions were generally provided several seconds after the soundtrack... We do not agree that the delay in itself rendered the program incomprehensible to viewers relying on captions.

It is wrong to conclude that the fact that some segments were less delayed than others ‘[evidences] that captions could be provided more closely to the soundtrack’... The more the captioner sought to prioritise the transcription of all spoken words, the more delayed the captions became.

Furthermore, we do not agree that the identification of different speakers was problematic. The approach taken in this program mirrors the usual approach taken in live captioned content. The ABC’s captioning provider has advised that where possible, in live captions, the steno-captioner assigns a colour to a particular speaker and aims to maintain that colour for the duration of the program. However, only three colours are available – white, yellow and cyan – meaning that where programs include more than three speakers, colours will be re-used. Furthermore, when speakers speak over the top of one another, or speak when they are not actually in vision, it is difficult for the steno-captioner to identify who is speaking and quickly select the correct colour. These factors are particularly problematic in a program of the complexity of Gruen Planet. However, along with the visual cues presented by the images broadcast, we consider that audiences would not have been seriously impeded in understanding which speaker the captions were transcribing.

[...]

We do agree, however, that the frequent errors in captioning (of which the example cited in the report is one) and the failure to caption some dialogue had a cumulative effect throughout the program that justifies a breach finding in this instance...

However, we do wish to emphasise that an assessment of what is practicable in particular situations must take into account the complexity of the captioning task. For example, the ACMA has cited the error which occurred at 20:42:03. The speaker has just used a complex and unusual combination of words to make their point: ‘it’s like the dinosaurs, the digital meteorite has already hit’. The steno- captioner is seeing the program and hearing the soundtrack at the same time as the viewer. She has less than a second to try to decipher what is being said and get the text out in order to maintain synchronicity. For every second that the steno-captioner lets pass by while making a decision on how to caption this phrase, another 4-9 words are being spoken. At this stage in the program, the steno-captioner is flagging with the speed and syllabic density of the dialogue and she has made fingering errors. The steno-captioner is at risk of completely losing the thread of the sentence and must press ahead without correction to avoid loss of further dialogue. It is a very difficult situation and what is practicable in such circumstances will not always be a faithful rendering of the spoken word in captioned form.


FindingThe ABC breached subsection 130ZR(1)(a) of Part 9D of the BSA.

ReasonsUnder subsection 130ZR(1), the ABC was required to provide a captioning service for the program, as it was broadcast on the national broadcaster’s primary television service, during the designated viewing hours of from 6pm to 10.30pm. That is, as Gruen Planet was broadcast on ABC1 at 8.30pm, during the designated viewing hours, a captioning service should have been provided for the program.

The term ‘captioning service’ is not defined in the BSA although implicit in the obligation to provide a captioning service is the requirement that the captioning service satisfy certain standards relating to quality. Section 130ZZA of the BSA provides that the ACMA may determine a standard relating to the quality of captions provided for television programs by national broadcasting services, along with other television service providers. Such a standard has not yet been determined. In the interim, the ACMA has developed, in consultation with industry and community groups, a set of ‘Quality Indicators’ (Attachment A), to which it has regard in assessing what is an acceptable quality for a captioning service.

In the present investigation, the ACMA assessed whether the program would be comprehensible to a person relying on the captions. This process was undertaken by the ACMA viewing the program without volume and with captions in place. The ACMA then compared the captions to the sound track.

In the present investigation, the episode was broadcast with ‘live’ captions, as opposed to pre-prepared or ‘block’ captions. Notwithstanding this, the reason that the Captioning Quality Indicators apply to both ‘live’ and pre-prepared captions is that they are the key indicators that the ACMA will have regard to when assessing whether a level of quality has been reached that ensures the captions provided are meaningful to the viewers who rely on them.

The ACMA assessed the captioning in the broadcast against all relevant quality indicators, in a cumulative sense, to assess the overall readability and comprehensibility of the captioning. The ACMA assessed whether the captioning service preserved the relationship between the visuals and the sound, for the viewers, by having the captions coincide as closely as possible with the relevant soundtrack. The ACMA applied the relevant Quality Indicator in the ‘Timing and Editing’ category, which is 2(vii) (a) and (b) as the program was captioned ‘live’, along with the other relevant Quality Indicators, in a cumulative way.

The ACMA considers the nature and characteristics of the program is important in its assessment. The program was comprised of brief monologues, discussion, debate and humour. The host, known for his humour and the panellists known for their industry expertise, have a distinct repartee, informing the audience of their experience and knowledge relating to advertisements shown on the program or advertising generally. Pace of these deliveries can change and escalate at different points of the program. Generally where advertisements are shown, there is no panel discussion overlay. The advertisements are shown exclusively with their own audio.

Taking into account the factors outlined below, the ACMA is of the view that in having regard to the cumulative effect of the quality indicators, the captions provided by the ABC, on balance, were not of an adequate quality to allow viewers reliant on the captions to comprehend the content of the


program. The ABC itself has conceded that the quantity of errors in captions and the failure to caption some dialogue justifies the breach finding.

Timing

The ACMA found that there was a consistent delay in the display of captions, of varying time lengths between 2 and 7 seconds, throughout the 30 minute broadcast. Due to the fast pace of speech during the program and the quick changes of topic in some segments, the delay was so significant that, in a number of parts, a large amount of the captioned dialogue was not contained within the relevant period of discussion of each particular topic or during the broadcast of the particular advertisement that was being discussed.

The ACMA found that due to the delay, the relationship between the visual and audio aspects of the advertisements and video clips being broadcast during the program, in addition to the relationship with the associated comments being made by panellists about the advertisements and video clips was not preserved.

In some instances the time lag between captions and the length of time that some captions were displayed did not allow the viewer enough time to read the captions. For example at 20:42:28, there is a time lag in the dialogue and then the two lines of new dialogue at 20:42:34 changed too quickly to allow the viewer time to read them. This time lag occurred when a key point was being made by one of the panellists. The dialogue is “as they say, you can live the old way or the new way, but it’s the transition that kills you”. The captions read “as they say you can live the old way or the new way” (which stayed on the screen for a number of seconds) then the words “but the transition will kill you” appear and disappear so quickly that the viewer cannot read them. Because of this, the essence of the argument by the panellist is lost to a viewer relying on the captions.

The closed captions did not coincide as closely as possible with the relevant soundtrack, to the extent that the relationship between sound and visuals was, on a number of occasions, incomprehensible for the viewer. The ABC submitted to the ACMA that it “does not dispute that the captions and the soundtrack differed” and in its letter of 30 April 2013 has conceded the breach on the ground that the cumulative effect of the frequency of errors in the captions and the missing captions affected the comprehensibility of the program.

In a letter dated 4 March 2013, the ABC submitted that the ACMA has previously accepted intermittent delays of up to 4 seconds between visuals and sound in passages of fast paced dialogue contained in programs using pre-prepared captions, referring to ACMA investigation 2737. The ACMA considers that any delay in the timing of captioning, and the impact of that delay on the comprehensibility for the viewer, needs to be assessed on a case by case basis.

The ABC further referred to the ACMA’s previous interpretation of qualification terms including ‘as much as possible’ in ACMA investigations No. 1507 and 1520, in relation to superseded legislative provisions of the BSA. The ACMA notes that the approach to interpretation of superseded provisions of the BSA in the investigation reports referred to is irrelevant to the current investigation and to the application of the Quality Indicators by the ACMA.

The ABC submitted that the ACMA did not take into account all relevant considerations, including the qualification term ‘as closely as possible’ in Quality Indicator 2(viii)(a). The ACMA found that, in the particular circumstances the overall relationship between vision and audio was of a quality that did not enable meaningful access of the broadcast to a viewer reliant on the captions in terms of


readability and comprehensibility. The ACMA found that the delay, in the particular circumstances, could not be considered to be ‘as close as possible’ to the soundtrack to preserve any relationship between the visuals and the sound, as outlined above.

In its most recent submission of 30 April 2013, the ABC noted the ACMA’s position on Quality Indicator 2(viii)(a) with regard to the present investigation. It stated that the ACMA had not considered all of the realities involved in live captioning with regard to complexity of language, pace and interaction of speakers. The ACMA’s role in this matter is to assess whether the captioning for the program provides meaningful access to the program, not how the captioning is achieved. Quality Indicator 2(viii)(a) allows for circumstances where captioning is conducted live if the relation between the visuals and the sound is preserved. The ACMA holds the view that overall, the captioning in this broadcast did not coincide as closely as possible with the relevant soundtrack, so that the relationship between the visuals and the sound was preserved for the viewer.

Identification of different speakers

The ACMA found that limited clarity was provided to indicate the different speakers, and to indicate the relationship between the speaker and their dialogue. Dialogue was attributed to incorrect speakers a number of times. For example at 20:42:43, the dialogue incorrectly changes colour to indicate a new speaker (the speaker on camera changes) however the dialogue was spoken by the original speaker, not the new speaker. This is both incorrect and confusing for the viewer.

Another example is at 20:39:49, when the speakers changed on camera and the captions on screen were still showing dialogue from the previous speaker – due to the delay, the text did not line up with the new speaker on camera until 6 seconds later at 20:39:55. Further, although the text changed colour to indicate a new speaker, the text did not start on a new line, and the first few words of the new speaker’s dialogue were typed in the previous speaker’s colour, making it difficult to follow which dialogue belonged to the new speaker.

The ACMA found that where there were different speakers in several parts of the program, the captions did not clearly identify and distinguish each speaker relative to their dialogue. Although different colours were used, they were used incorrectly at times, so that it was confusing to the viewer as to which dialogue belonged to which speaker. The ABC’s letter of 30 April indicated that only three colours are available, so where programs include more than three speakers, colours would be re-used. Gruen Planet captioning generally deals with the audio of at least five speakers throughout the broadcast.

Readability and comprehensibility

The ACMA also found that there were some cases where the captioning varied so much from the original wording that it was incomprehensible. For example at 20:42:01, the dialogue is “it’s like the dinosaurs, the digital meteorite has already hit” and the captions at 20:42:03 read “It’s like the dines. The indigenous stall meteor unite has already hit”.

There were also instances where large parts of dialogue were not captioned during the program. For example, no captioning was provided for most of the dialogue during the broadcast of the advertisement for Vytautas mineral water.

Another example of dialogue not being captioned was at 20:43:19, where the dialogue is “Princess Di [Diana] dying was the biggest thing to ever impact newspapers in the history of newspapers. Most newspapers around the world doubled their circulation. If that happened today, that impact


would be marginal”. The captions provided on this topic were ‘biggest thing to ever impact newspapers in the history of’ and ‘that happened today, that impact would marginal’. There was no captioning of the reference to Princess Diana or the doubling of the newspaper’s circulation therefore the key parts of the information in that panellist’s argument were missing from the captions.

The ACMA found that the timing of the display of captions, the failure to stay close to original wording, along with dialogue that was not captioned would have impacted significantly on the overall readability and comprehensibility of the program for a person relying on those captions.


ATTACHMENT A

Division 1—General

7 Conditions of commercial television broadcasting licences

1.

[...]

(o) if a provision of Part 9D (which deals with captioning of television programs for the deaf and hearing impaired) applies to the licensee—the licensee will comply with that provision;

[...]

Part 9D—Captioning

Division 1—Introduction

130ZL Designated viewing hours

Programs transmitted before 1 July 2014

(1) For the purposes of the application of this Part to programs transmitted before 1 July 2014, designated viewing hours are the hours:

(a) beginning at 6 pm each day or, if another time is prescribed, beginning at that prescribed time each day; and

(b) ending at 10.30 pm on the same day or, if another time is prescribed, ending at that prescribed time on the same day.

[...]

Division 2—Captioning obligations of commercial television broadcasting licensees and national broadcasters

130ZR Captioning obligations—basic rule

Basic rule

(1) Each commercial television broadcasting licensee, and each national broadcaster, must provide a captioning service for:

(a) television programs transmitted during designated viewing hours; and

(b) television news or current affairs programs transmitted outside designated viewing hours.


Note: For compliance by licensees, see clause 7 of Schedule 2.

ATTACHMENT B

CONSIDERATIONS – THE QUALITY OF CAPTIONING

Introduction

The ACMA is committed to ensuring that the captioning services provided by television broadcasters give the deaf and hearing-impaired community meaningful access to television.

As part of this commitment the ACMA uses the quality indicators set out below to assess the overall readability and comprehensibility of closed captioning.

In considering whether a particular broadcaster has satisfied the captioning obligations, the ACMA has regard to all of the relevant quality indicators and, most importantly, the cumulative effect of their application rather than assessing a broadcast against each individual criteria.

Quality Indicators

Grammar and Presentation

1. In assessing closed captions during programs, the ACMA will have regard to the extent that:

i. punctuation is used to make captions as easy as possible for viewers to read;

ii. punctuation conveys, as much as possible, the way speech is delivered;

iii. sentence case is used where practical;

iv. spelling is, as far as practicable, accurate;

v. repetition of information that is already on the screen (such as the name of a presenter or temperatures in a weather report) is avoided;

vi. as far as practicable, closed captions do not overlap or impede any text based information already on the screen.

Timing and Editing


i. closed captions coincide with the relevant soundtrack, so that the relationship between sound and visuals is preserved for the viewer;

ii. closed captions stay as close as possible to the original wording while allowing the viewer enough time to read the captions and still watch the action of the program;

iii. where time allows, and where practical, closed captions are verbatim (word for word);

iv. having regard to the intended audience, text reduction remains faithful to the script, and vocabulary and sentence structure is preserved as much as possible;


v. line breaks reflect the natural flow of a sentence and its punctuation;

vi. closed captions are not consistently more than three lines in length (the preference is for one-line or two-line captions to be used);

vii. during live closed captioning:

a) captions coincide as closely as possible with the relevant soundtrack, so that the relationship between the visuals and the sound is preserved for the viewer;

b) the priority is always to transcribe as much of the spoken content of the program as possible is transcribed.

Identification of Different Speakers

3. In assessing closed captions during programs, where there are different speakers, the ACMA will have regard to the extent that broadcasters have ensured that, as far as possible, the captions clearly identify and distinguish each speaker. This should be done through varying the colouring of the closed captioning, and as far as possible, varying the positioning of the closed captions (see 4 and 5 below).

Colour and Font

4. In assessing closed captions during programs, the ACMA will have regard to the extent that :

i. white closed captions are used as much as possible as they are the easiest to read;

ii. sound effects are identified using a different colour and the same colour is used for all sound effects throughout the program;

iii. if using colour to denote different speakers, as far as possible, a different colour is used for each speaker.

Positioning


i. as far as possible, positioning of closed captions avoids obscuring important information on the screen, such as action, superimposed text, graphic text descriptors or activities, or the speaker’s lips.

ii. as far as possible, positioning is varied to identify who is speaking.

Sound Effects


i. any noise or music that enhances the visuals, contributes to characterisation or adds atmosphere, is captioned;

ii. a viewer does not receive any more information than a hearing viewer would get.


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