Miro Subs Alpha a project of the participatory culture foundation

We’ve looked to the BBC and WGBH to find some of the best practices for creating captions and subtitles. These should help you as you start captioning and translating.

7 Top Tips for Subtitling

Hope these tips help as you’re creating captions and subtitles. If you have additional ideas, thoughts, or tips, we’d love to hear them in the comments.

Sources – WGBH – Media Access Group – Captioning FAQ, BBC Subtitling Editorial Guidelines, and a fansubbing guide.

Last week’s outrage over Netflix price hikes had an interesting side effect: a chorus of users discussing how the lack of captions and subtitles is more shocking than the increase in price. For years, Netflix claimed they would subtitle the videos in their library so that deaf and hard of hearing individuals could enjoy their media as well. However, after two year unfulfilled promises of subtitling, they’ll need to make their case in court. In June, the National Association of the Deaf filed suit against the provider of streaming videos for failing to offer closed-captioning on its content.

Oscar-winning actress and member of the deaf community Marlee Matlin reiterated the importance of making entertainment accessible last week, tweeting:

Others make the case that it’s a question of captions or their subscription, claiming:

Netflix should take a cue from other popular media outlets like Al Jazeera and wise up to the fact that captions and subtitles make media better for everyone. By adding subtitles to their very popular video franchise, they would be simultaneously increasing their audience and creating a more accessible, user-friendly environment. And if they need a platform to use, we’d be happy to take their call!

When the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear catastrophe occurred in March 2011, many people looked for a precedent that could give them an understanding of what this tragedy might mean in the long run. They soon found one – this year marks the 25th Anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster.

Since March, the Universal Subtitles community has been sharing information about Chernobyl as the eyes of the world once again turn to the question of nuclear power. Thanks to the hard working people who translated these videos, this info is now available in many languages and can be viewed and understood by an international audience.

A lot of people continue to share this interview, subtitled into Japanese, on Twitter. It is an examination of the nuclear disaster and its environmental consequences.

Information is also flowing the other direction. “Message from Fukishima,” is a plea for help from the people living with the consequences of the recent disaster in Japan.

The dedicated people translating this particular video are working together to reconstruct accurate subtitles. You can witness their teamwork by scrolling to the bottom of the Message From Fukushima page.

If you are inspired to help the people of Fukushima through Universal Subtitles, help us translate videos from Japan’s recovery so their message can be heard around the world.

The Libyan conflict has made international headlines this year and the Universal Subtitles community has absolutely taken notice. Our great volunteers have been translating videos into multiple languages, and Universal Subtitles is now being used as a medium through which world news can be shared with everyone.

This particular video is extremely popular among people following the conflict on Twitter. It presents a speech given by Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, the Libyan ruler’s son and colleague.

Saif al-Islam Gaddafi's Speech

In this next video from the Universal Subtitles site, watch President Barack Obama’s speech as he examines the corrupt ways of Libya’s ruler and the United States actions against him.

President Obama's Speech

If you are interested in following the Libyan conflict through Universal Subtitles, check out Alive in Libya, a free news source created by Libyan journalists.

We’re looking for volunteers to caption and translate videos on our volunteer team page. We’ve curated some fascinating videos from non-profit and educational partners that deserve a global audience.

Even if you don’t speak multiple languages you can still help make the video more accessible by creating captions. Anyone can join!

Why Volunteer?

Any video that you caption or translate has the potential to reach a global audience, and will also be available for anyone who is deaf or hard of hearing. If you want to see how this will look in practice, take a look at some examples of Universal Subtitles in action.

In addition to the volunteer page, we also have partners running volunteer teams, including Al Jazeera, MIT Open Courseware, Feminist Frequency, Khan Acadmey, and Streetfilms.

Any translations or captioning you do helps open up content to more people – spreading knowledge, cultural understanding, and fun. Please help us spread the word about Universal Subtitles, and join the volunteer team today!

Universal Subtitles has just been updated! Now with the new navigation bar and search box on every page, along with our new “Watch” page, it is a lot easier to search, explore, and navigate the site.

If you visit our homepage, the new navigation bar can be found in the upper right-hand corner of the site.

The new Navigation Bar

With this new addition, you can readily watch more videos, translate directly, and learn more about Universal Subtitles at an accelerated rate.

The search box at the top of the page is another great addition; now, you can search directly for a specific video.

Finally, the new watch page is a great new resource for Universal Subtitles users. By clicking on the “Watch” button in the navigation bar, you will arrive at a page full of interesting videos already translated into several languages.

The new Universal Subtitles is a great improvement, so check it out and support us by continuing to translate!

All creativity builds on what came before. This is the disarmingly simple and poignant message of Everything is a Remix, a four part video series and accompanying blog from New York filmmaker Kirby Ferguson. Part 3 of the series has exploded, getting more than 150,000 views in 4 days. Already, fans have completely translated the video into 8 languages.

Join the translation effort now:

“The Elements of Creativity” focuses on how copying and remix were essential elements in the development of the personal computer and the world wide web. Ferguson posted the video on Universal Subtitles so that his fans could help his message go global. By creating subtitles for the video, these fans become co-collaborators, spreading the word and making it ripe for the next wave of creativity to build upon. The ten minute video is now available in Spanish, French, Portuguese, Turkish, Dutch, German, Italian and Danish, with more on the way. You can help translate too!