Live Captioning Resource List
The gold standard of captioning is Communication Access Realtime Translation or CART, where a live transcriber types what is spoken in real time. This can be helpful for people with a wide variety of disabilities, including those who are Deaf/Hard of Hearing (who do not know ASL), people who have learning disabilities who have an easier time comprehending the written word, and people whose first language is not English. CART greatly eases the cognitive load of a video meeting or event.
- 1CapApp: www.1capapp.com, (866) 945-0250
- Carolinas Captioning Services: www.abccaption.com, (704) 552-6753
- On Point Captions: onpointcaptions.com, (818) 279-8136
- StreamText: StreamText.net, (608) 234-4759
- Transcription Star: www.transcriptionstar.com, (877) 323-4707
- 20/20: www.2020captioning.com, (800) 870-1795 ext. 1
- Alternative Communication Services: www.acscaptions.com, (800) 335-0911 ext. 705
- A La CARTe Connection: alacarteconnection.com, (888) 900-3239
- CART Agency: cartagency.com, (877) 871-2654
- Captions Unlimited: captionsunlimited.com, (775) 746-3534
ASL Interpreters
Live captioning may work well for forward-facing events, where participants are mainly watching, but it must be noted that if the Deaf/Hard of Hearing individual does not use voice chat, they will be limited to using the platform’s text chat function which, depending on the organization’s customary videoconferencing practices, may not be tracked as closely as voice chat. For meetings and events where participants are actively engaged in interactive discussions, some Deaf/Hard of Hearing individuals would prefer having an ASL interpreter over live captioning to ensure their active participation. In addition, for events that involve complex subject matter, technical terms, or industry-specific terminology, viewers will find that automatic captioning, and in some cases, even live-captioning solutions, struggle to maintain a reasonable minimum level of quality and legibility for the user.
- InterpretThat: interpretthatinc.com, (562) 400-5452
- LifeSigns: lifesignsinc.org, (888) 930-7776
- The Sign Language Company: signlanguageco.com, (818) 728-4241
