The UK’s Teletext analog TV text service is to close next year – two years ahead of schedule, leaving large parts of the UK population without subtitling for the hard of hearing.
Associated Newspapers, which runs the service for the ITV, C4 and Five channels, had originally planned to shut the service down in 2012, when the BBC’s equivalent, Ceefax – which has been running since 1974 – will also be switched off. The company blames ‘economic conditions’ for the early shutdown.
While the UK is moving to digital terrestrial broadcasting – with viewers in some areas being able to receive digital transmissions for more than ten years – many areas of the UK still rely on analog broadcasts and are not due to receive digital broadcasts for up to three years.
This will hit deaf viewers in these areas hard as they will no longer be able to receive subtitled broadcasts. Teletext has been making a loss for three years, with revenues down 50 percent since 2003. Some 70 jobs will be lost as a result of the closure.
Source: TG Daily
So what is a deaf person meant to do, if they can’t currently receive digital broadcasts? Just read a book? I think if hearing people had to make do with TV broadcasts for 3 years with no sound, there would be a huge outcry and refusal to pay the TV licence. I think this totally sucks.
Write and complain to your local MP.
This brings me to the question …… why are deaf people still having to put up with an ineffective analogue phone system? That’s the subject of another post!
The UK’s Teletext analog TV text service is to close next year – two years ahead of schedule, leaving large parts of the UK population without subtitling for the hard of hearing.
Associated Newspapers, which runs the service for the ITV, C4 and Five channels, had originally planned to shut the service down in 2012, when the BBC’s equivalent, Ceefax – which has been running since 1974 – will also be switched off. The company blames ‘economic conditions’ for the early shutdown.
While the UK is moving to digital terrestrial broadcasting – with viewers in some areas being able to receive digital transmissions for more than ten years – many areas of the UK still rely on analog broadcasts and are not due to receive digital broadcasts for up to three years.
This will hit deaf viewers in these areas hard as they will no longer be able to receive subtitled broadcasts. Teletext has been making a loss for three years, with revenues down 50 percent since 2003. Some 70 jobs will be lost as a result of the closure.
Source: TG Daily
So what is a deaf person meant to do, if they can’t currently receive digital broadcasts? Just read a book? I think if hearing people had to make do with TV broadcasts for 3 years with no sound, there would be a huge outcry and refusal to pay the TV licence. I think this totally sucks.
Write and complain to your local MP.
This brings me to the question …… why are deaf people still having to put up with an ineffective analogue phone system? That’s the subject of another post!