As the internet's reach get wider and connection gets faster, social media networks thrive.
Among the ways users are benefiting from a faster and more reliable connection, is the ability to upload videos for their social media posts. Videos can be so engaging and interesting. The thing is, not everyone can enjoy video content due to accessibility. Some people simply could not hear, and Twitter wants to solve that.
And that is by announcing an automatic captioning feature for videos to its Android, iOS and web client.
The feature works in "most languages" that include English, Spanish, Japanese, Arabic, Thai, Chinese, Hindi and many more.
With the feature, Twitter is taking yet another step towards becoming a more accessible platform for its users.
Users on mobile can see captions to appear automatically when they start watching a mute video.
Users can configure the captions to stay on even after they increase the volume on their device through the accessibility settings on their phone.
On the web on the other hand, users will see the 'CC' button in the video player that allows users to quickly turn on/off captions.
However, there’s one significant catch: the automatic captions can only appear on new videos uploaded to the platform and not old ones.
Another thing, just like any other automatic captioning systems, Twitter's version is not perfect. What's more, there is no way to report inaccurate or bad captions.
At least, a Twitter spokesperson said that "we’re always looking at ways to improve our accessibility features."
This should be considered an improvement, regardless of the several issues.
Where are video captions when you need them? They’re here now automatically on videos uploaded starting today.
Android & iOS: auto-captions will show on muted Tweet videos; keep them on when unmuted via your device's accessibility settings
Web: use the "CC" button to turn on/off pic.twitter.com/IHJAI31IvX— Twitter Support (@TwitterSupport) December 14, 2021
Twitter has a somewhat rocky history with accessibility features.
For example, it was heavily criticized for launching voice tweets in 2020 without captions. It was later realized that the cause was because Twitter didn’t have a dedicated accessibility team at the time.
Since then, Twitter that created teams to focus on bringing accessibility to the platform, came up with captions to voice tweets, live captions to Spaces, which is Twitter's Clubhouse-like audio feature, and finally, this automatic captioning for videos.
With Twitter' continuous attempts in providing better accessibility, the social media should become increasingly friendlier for the deaf and hard-of-hearing users.