Revisiting Accessibility in Events Post-COVID

In this "Another Mini-Brandt Rant" episode, Brandt and Will discuss the progress made in event accessibility during the COVID-19 pandemic and how it has feels like it regressed. They highlight the importance of captioning services, which became more accessible and affordable with AI advancements. However, they note that these technologies have fallen out of favor as events returned to in-person formats, leaving behind some of the inclusivity gains made during the pandemic. The conversation emphasizes the broader benefits of accessibility features which can aid not just people with disabilities but frequently improve the event for the majority of attendees as well.

Discussions Include:

• Progress and Regression in Accessibility: The hosts reflect on how COVID accelerated the adoption of accessibility technologies like captioning but lament that these practices have largely been abandoned in the return to in-person events.
• Technological Advancements: They discuss how AI has improved captioning services, making them more affordable and efficient, though still not as reliable as human transcription.
• Broader Benefits of Accessibility: The conversation highlights that features like captioning benefit a wide audience, including those with hearing difficulties, language barriers, or simply preferring visual aids.
• Future-Proofing Events: The hosts suggest investing in technologies that can capture and stream content from events, enhancing accessibility and providing valuable resources for attendees.

Quotable Quotes:

• "I think one of the things that during COVID, we started to see, you know, every platform put in at least some basic level of captioning, whether it was auto-generated or otherwise." - Brandt Krueger
• "People with difficulty hearing would literally call these services 'craptioning' at the time because they were so bad." - Brandt Krueger
• "For the first time, a lot of people with accessibility issues felt like they were on even ground with all other attendees, right? Because we were all attending from our living rooms and our bedrooms." - Brandt Krueger
• "Like a lot of attendees, I might want to turn it on just because of the fact that like, you know, every once in a while there's a word I might miss." - Will Curran